Recently in Education Category

This summer has been particularly tough in regards to branching off and adding code to projects that were started in the past. In an effort to publish what I've been working on since the spring semester ended, here's a brief discussion on what's been happening. Care to share what you have been doing?

Just so you know where I'm coming from, I consider myself an upper-level intermediate Java programmer, which means mostly nothing other than the fact I have had my share of books to peruse in my day. Not just Java books either, but a multitude of books in almost a dozen different languages. Out of all of them, Thinking in Java, 4th Edition, has got to be the worst I've ever read - in terms of presentation.  

A topic arose recently in a course I am taking. The IDE Dr. Java, chosen by the instructor of the course, has a serious problem regarding Java SE 6 update 4. Since I have chosen not to curse my system with such a degrading piece of software, most of the problems I hear are just that- hearsay. Apparently Dr. Java cannot compile source code if the JDK is update 4. However, if update 3 is used then source files can be compiled. The question becomes, do you stick with the IDE or do you value the update of the JDK more?

The spring semester began last week at UMass Lowell and so far it's been good to finally be back at the university. Last semester I studied elsewhere and the semester before that I vacationed. Having acquired that all important calculus course from the last semester, plans have changed slightly. When I last wrote about education it was unknown whether the school I was at would offer computing courses this spring or if I had to split my course times between two schools. Now it's not even a question - I'm once again a full time student at UMass.

This review might be a little a one-sided as I have had previous experience working with Java. What this review is not - is a review from a Java beginner. But ultimately, I found Head First Java, 2nd Edition, by Kathy Sierra and Bert Bates, to be an incredible learning tool. Since being hired by Sun in July of 2007, I have slowly but surely been trying to acquire more relevant knowledge as it relates to my position and the overall company, and recently I began to think intensely about sharpening my Java skills. 

Like most students around this time of the year, I'm heading back to school starting tomorrow the 5th, after a semester off. It was a well deserved time off and in that time I found a great job. This semester I'm doing something I haven't done in my entire computer science(CS) education - not taking a computing related course during a semester. I wanted to slow it down a bit until I complete the majority of the math requirements. After the calculus requirement is finished I'll be heading back to UMass Lowell to finish my CS degree.