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Finally made up my mind, just need a little help

Started by September 13, 2012 07:03 AM
2 comments, last by Orymus3 12 years, 2 months ago
I am such a lost soul sometimes! I could never really decide what I wanted to do because I was passionate about soo many things (math, music, and computer science). I changed majors about 3 times when I finally said I would do math. While I do love math, everything I think about 'creating' is a computer science idea. All of my ideas, I believe, are really cool and are a program of sort (some apps, some actual website ideas). So I finally said I wanted to create what was floating around in my head and finally decided on getting my CS degree because it will help me learn everything I need to know to build my ideas, and why cant I build them while doing CS?

One little probelm occurs though. I can finish my CS degree in about 3 years based on the courses I have taken so far, but it will be a tight fit and there are some courses I will not be able to take as a result of my bouncing around and not having the space or time to finish before I need to graduate. I will basically copy and paste what I am talking about, but before I do, I should explain exactly what I plan on doing with my degree.

1. Games. Sorry for the run on sentence there.

2. Apps. I have a lot of cool app ideas. I actually plan to work for myself if possible.They range from games to other various aspects as well.

3. Work for the man and make a decent living in hopefully an interesting field of CS.

The school I am going to will get the standard courses of OS, Algos, data structures, and so on. Where I run into issues is the electives. Since I only have soo much space I need to know which electives are best fit for developing apps/games or being the most well rounded I can be in a CS program. I will link the page and you can scroll down to see the electives and hopefully tell me which ones to prioitize.

http://catalog.csustan.edu/preview_program.php?catoid=9&poid=659

Note, you will want to scroll down to about half of the page to get to the major requirements and electives and theory requirement. While I can only pick 2 theory requirements, they are also relisted in the electives, so keep that in mind.

This is it for me, no turning back!
Your question is "which electives should I take," is that it?
In my opinion: take the ones you want to take or think it would be good to take.

-- Tom Sloper -- sloperama.com

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"why cant I build them while doing CS?"

Because you'll be busy. If you're on a good CS programme they'll say things like "Oh, hey, here's an assignment in language X. Learn X in two weeks and solve this problem in this sort of way. While making classes.."

"I changed majors about 3 times when I finally said I would do math"

Stop pissing about and graduate in something. When you come to be hired as a grad, if you're 25 people will ask why you've been messing about so much. Math or CS won't make much of a difference in the long run; the important part about a degree for employment is that it shows you can knuckle down and study a difficult sciencey subject for at least three years...

"which electives are best fit for developing apps/games"

None of them will be. Because, if it's a good programme, it won't teach you how to write apps. It'll teach you that things like "theorem proving engines can solve this class of problems". Later on in life you suddenly realise you have a problem of that class and are equipped to get a solution.

When you come to be hired as a grad, if you're 25 people will ask why you've been messing about so much


I have to agree here. I've changed my mind once or twice during my full curriculum, and its been part of every single interview I've had ever since. Luckily, I've got a good explanation for it, but its still something some people will be hesitant about. If you're able to change your mind so quickly about fields of study, chances are you can change your mind about whether you like your work or not, and that's never good for business.

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