Computer Science Canada

Microsoft loving U Waterloo
Author:  Tony [ Wed Mar 08, 2006 9:17 pm ]
Post subject:  Microsoft loving U Waterloo
Microsoft was giving a presentation today in the University of Waterloo on how to build games with C# and DirectX. Not a Halo 3 (though they were joking about that), though they have covered a lot of fundementals from vertices to polygons to cameras and lights. Sample code for all.

Of course it's not a Microsoft presentation without something crashing. Visual Studio has managed to hang itself at a point early in the presentation Laughing

What's the point of all of this? I got a free copy of
Posted Image, might have been reduced in size. Click Image to view fullscreen.

Programming Windows with C# Core Reference ($CAN 86.99 suggested retail). Couple of t-shirts and a CD for Visual Studio Express (no big deal, Express is distributed for free online).

Also got to talk to some people from the Infusion Development. They'll be hiring in Fall, so who knows.

Now, if only I could find a Windows machine to install this Visual Studio on Laughing

Ninja Edit: Oh, MS was also ruffling out an Xbox 360.. Though they couldn't actually get a hold of one, so they gave away a gift certificate for Futureshop instead. Asking very nicely not to spend it on "something or other-stations" Laughing
Author:  Andy [ Wed Mar 08, 2006 9:20 pm ]
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WOW!, did everyone get that book tony? dang it i want one..
Author:  Tony [ Wed Mar 08, 2006 9:22 pm ]
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yeah, everyone got the book.. the place was pretty busy, they estimated 300~400 people. Most of RCH 101 was filled.
Author:  Andy [ Wed Mar 08, 2006 9:25 pm ]
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err do you have any friends that doesnt want their book?
Author:  Tony [ Wed Mar 08, 2006 9:34 pm ]
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not anyone that I know personally. Though I think that if you ask around, you could find a bunch of people who'll try to sell their copies off.

I think that UW LJ would be a good place to start.
Author:  MysticVegeta [ Wed Mar 08, 2006 11:45 pm ]
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heh now they want to brain drain UW.
Author:  wtd [ Wed Mar 08, 2006 11:57 pm ]
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This would be nothing new. Microsoft has long heavily "invested" in UW.
Author:  Tony [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 12:25 am ]
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they have every interest to invest in us since they hire us. University got a pile of money to teach C#, and now we get free reference books. Score!
Author:  wtd [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 12:54 am ]
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It doesn't strike you as crass?
Author:  codemage [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 9:56 am ]
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It strikes me as good marketing. Crass and effective. That would be a good motto for MS: incultus quod efficax
Author:  Dan [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 12:15 pm ]
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U of W seems like a logical choice to me, it is a school that has a large population of sutdetns sutdying CS and other progames that they need but most importly the magoirty of them also are in it almost soley for money. You whould not whont to go to a uni where the magoirit of the peoleop in the progam are in it are local (from ontraio/canada) and probly are in it for muptial reasons and may have some ideas runing agisted M$ idelgoly.

It also helps that U of W is easy to buy out and i have hured many sotrys of profs get larg sums of money to use X textbook or teach X langue as tony was hiting at.
Author:  bugzpodder [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 12:25 pm ]
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One thing that strikes me is the grades of these "bright" Waterloo CS students. In a class of about 300, merely 11 scored 90% or higher on a recent CS midterm. Now, good grades doesnt necessarily translate into good developers and vice versa, but I find it disturbing at the lack of attitude and hard work that seems all too common with Waterloo CS students. I have being impressed only by a few really good CS students at waterloo, and all of them have exceptional grades of like 98% average.

Just take a recent honour roll, you can count the number of students on there, which isn't much. How hard is it to get 87% average in Waterloo? Not hard at all I'd say. But is everyone doing it? apparently not.

To prove my point, will anyone from Waterloo care to post their grades/averages?

I still fail to see the talent in majority of the CS students here at Waterloo. The only thing I see is vast majority of students struggle to get through the courses (which is mostly theory based... so that might be a reason)
How much is MS, Google, and others getting out of investing in Waterloo?

On other news, Orgami unfolded:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060309/ap_on_hi_te/origami_unfolded
Author:  wtd [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 1:05 pm ]
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Something to consider, for those who are enthusiastic about being the recipient of so muych love from Microsoft, and the fact that Microsoft hires so many UW CS grads.

Microsoft has one of the highest new employee turnover rates in the software business. They spend huge amounts getting schools to train students in how to use today's tools, but four years later, those skills are four years out of date.

Students right now are likely being taught how to write C# 1.1 code. Guess what... Microsoft is already looking forward to C# 3.0, and it's a pretty radical departure from 1.1. Heck, even from 2.0.

By the time anyone here graduates, MS will want people who can write C# 3.0, VB9, and possibly Iron Python code. What do you think the odds are that university classes will even mention this stuff?
Author:  codemage [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 1:47 pm ]
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Grads shouldn't get the idea in their heads that they'll be working at MS for more than 5 years average, 10 years if they constantly upgrade their skillset (on their own time) - unless they crack management.

The brightest & best & safest from burnout are the green recruits right out of undergrad, IMSHO.
Author:  Tony [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 4:29 pm ]
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well that's the bottom line: University is about learning to learn, not actually learning something that will be obsolete shortly after graduation.[/b]
Author:  Dan [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 5:31 pm ]
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Witch is why for CompSci peoleop at least they should not be teaching to a spficet progaming lang but rather to consecpts. I blive that for the most part they are doing this well (from what i can tell from my uni) tho they tend to throw in alot of sutff that find is unrealted to CompSci on the math side just to keep the avgs noramlized. (Yes i know math can help devlop the same logic and ideas that are psotive in CS but there is a limit).

My worry is that comanpys like M$ will start pushing unis to stop teaching the conspects and start teaching just what they need, so the unis will be doing there work for them.

Also i find that one thing poeleop seem to miss about unis is that some of the most importnt lessions you leran will not be the class room and is part of the unvierity excirnce. Sadly i feal the admiseration of many unis dose not see this and is trying to cut back to the basicks.
Author:  wtd [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 5:57 pm ]
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A programming language is necessary. There's just no way around it. You need to be able to demonstrate the concepts in action.

However, this does not mean all is lost. You simply need to find programming languages that express concepts as directly as possible.
Author:  Dan [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 8:46 pm ]
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Obvesly you need to have one to study it. I am just saying that the uni should only be using 1 or teaching just to the lang like they do in high school i find. At LU so far they have used a difrent langue each corse. I like this since it gives expricnes with both conspects and difrent langures and makes one be more able to aptaped to anything that comes up.
Author:  wtd [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 8:59 pm ]
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The other idea is to say: "Here's a problem. Solve it. I don't care what language you use."
Author:  Martin [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 9:01 pm ]
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wtd wrote:
The other idea is to say: "Here's a problem. Solve it. I don't care what language you use."


They tried that in the compilers course. People chose Perl to write their parsers. Needless to say, the profs changed this the next semester.
Author:  wtd [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 9:09 pm ]
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Perfectly good parsers can be written in Perl. Obviously if being able to understand the code is a requirement, then that kind of system can never work, but a decent set of tests should be able to determine the quality of the code.

Reasonable time restrictions will impose good coding practices.
Author:  Martin [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 9:12 pm ]
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bugzpodder wrote:
To prove my point, will anyone from Waterloo care to post their grades/averages?


First semester my average was 87, second semester was 74 but that was because I got a 32 in CS251 for dropping it ONE day after the deadline (and before the midterm too...)

I do agree that I should be working a lot harder though. A lot of my marks could and should be a lot higher. Next year's gonna be a lot better, because I feel a lot more focused. I finally got out of CS into a program that I actually want to be in.
Author:  Martin [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 9:14 pm ]
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wtd wrote:
Perfectly good parsers can be written in Perl. Obviously if being able to understand the code is a requirement, then that kind of system can never work, but a decent set of tests should be able to determine the quality of the code.

Reasonable time restrictions will impose good coding practices.


The problem wasn't that the parser wasn't good, but rather that it was about 30 characters of code.
Author:  wtd [ Thu Mar 09, 2006 9:21 pm ]
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Martin wrote:
wtd wrote:
Perfectly good parsers can be written in Perl. Obviously if being able to understand the code is a requirement, then that kind of system can never work, but a decent set of tests should be able to determine the quality of the code.

Reasonable time restrictions will impose good coding practices.


The problem wasn't that the parser wasn't good, but rather that it was about 30 characters of code.


And if it was genuinely good, then why the problem? Smile

However, I suspect that such a thing would not have held up to extensive testing.
Author:  md [ Fri Mar 10, 2006 12:23 am ]
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I really gotta point out that this isn't in the Math faculty (which CS is part of) but rather the engineering faculty. CS is still safe; it's just the engineers who bent over for MS Wink
Author:  Tony [ Fri Mar 10, 2006 1:03 am ]
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and we get all the benifits of a corporate sponsorship Laughing
Author:  wtd [ Fri Mar 10, 2006 1:20 am ]
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Eeh gads Tony! Do you still have a soul?

Wink
Author:  Tony [ Fri Mar 10, 2006 1:46 am ]
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it's Computer / Software / Electrical that are loosing souls. Being in Mechatronics, I think I'm safe for as long as Microsoft doesn't decide to build giant mechs.
Author:  bugzpodder [ Fri Mar 10, 2006 7:20 am ]
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Quote:


First semester my average was 87, second semester was 74 but that was because I got a 32 in CS251 for dropping it ONE day after the deadline (and before the midterm too...)


thats pretty decent.
omg why would you do that... you should have at least filed a petition saying you did it by mistake. they might have let you off (add it back) for compassionate reasons. Its better than 32... you probably would have passed that course.

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