Ideas for Side Projects

[Snario]

Hey, I'm going to CS at Waterloo next fall and I want to make some side projects. I have a few ideas myself but they're all very long-winded. Is there any resource I can use to gather ideas for small projects I can work on? I basically just want some things that will give me experience but that will also end up as useful for Co-op jobs.

[Insectoid]

School will teach you how to program. Learning to use different software environments is something you need to do on your own, and I recommend it. Install Linux on a spare computer/partition/VM and do all your programming in it. Set up a game server for some game, or an IRC server. Build a website. It doesn't need to be that great (you're not a web designer after all), just get the foundation down so you can connect to it and learn how it works. Get a ssh server going. There's plenty of stuff you can do.

[Tony]

Insectoid @ Wed Jul 11, 2012 1:29 pm wrote:

School will teach you how to program.

Unless it's UWaterloo. UW has almost not programming classes (e.g. they'll teach you how a compiler works, not how to write code to write a compiler).

[DemonWasp]

Even when schools DO teach you to program, they generally don't teach you how to program professionally. That is, they'll teach you about language constructs and features, and even software engineering and design principles, but they generally won't teach you to write idiomatic code in any given language.

[Insectoid]

Quote:

Unless it's UWaterloo. UW has almost not programming classes (e.g. they'll teach you how a compiler works, not how to write code to write a compiler)

At Lakehead, they skip explaining how it works and just give you the code. No joke.

[TerranceN]

Tony @ Wed Jul 11, 2012 1:55 pm wrote:

Insectoid @ Wed Jul 11, 2012 1:29 pm wrote:

School will teach you how to program.

Unless it's UWaterloo. UW has almost not programming classes (e.g. they'll teach you how a compiler works, not how to write code to write a compiler).

Really? I'm in 2A right now and every CS assignment I have had has been very cookie-cutter. For example, instead of telling us to implement something in an object oriented way, they give us the header files and tell us to implement them. I know it will change a lot in the last two years, but it's still kind of disappointing.

It's also really disappointing how the only things most people program is their CS assignments, so kudos to you Snario!

As for ideas, I've always tried to make games (lots of ideas here). Also learn either vim or emacs (my preference is vim), they will change how you edit text.