necessity of a laptop?

[unoho]

Like the title says, is it really necessary to bring a laptop for waterloo?
i plan to study software engineering this year. i got 2 math classes, 1 physics, 1 linear circuit class, and 1 soft. eng seminar and 1 comp sci class.

like right now, I have a very fast desktop which im completely happy with and im definitely gonna take it to waterloo.
do i really need to buy a laptop? do the students in first year engineering or comp sci classes uses laptop in class?
any advice is much appreciated.

[jcollins1991]

Alot of people take laptops to cs class, but they're not really necessary and you can take notes by hand if you want... None of the other classes you have would need a computer either... If you need to check something on a computer during the day you can use one of the unix or mac labs...

[andrew.]

How much of the workload for engineering relies on using a computer? Are most of the assignments done by hand or passed in through computers?

[Tony]

A more proper question here is "on a computer in a lecture hall"; which I feel is very little.

[unoho]

ahh..i was hoping for tony's idea
also, r the compilers that r used in comp sci (or soft. eng) very heavy to load?
because i remember in grade 12, we were using netBeans 6.8 for java and it would take quite a while to load up on my sister's laptop (core 2 duo, 3gb ram).
if i really have to buy a laptop, would i need any faster thn tht?

[andrew.]

Well Netbeans is the IDE, not the compiler. The compiler for Java is javac and is run from the terminal/command prompt. This has no loading time.

[unoho]

well..ya, was wondering if those IDE that comp sci department uses r too heavy to load

[chrisbrown]

unoho wrote:

well..ya, was wondering if those IDE that comp sci department uses r too heavy to load

In short, no.

Generally, you are not required to use any particular software. Your assignments will describe what you should hand in; you can use any tool you want to produce whatever meets that specification.

Certain classes may require you to use specific programs, but any computer made in the past 3-5 years should be able to keep up.

[DtY]

andrew. @ Sun Aug 29, 2010 10:26 pm wrote:

Well Netbeans is the IDE, not the compiler. The compiler for Java is javac and is run from the terminal/command prompt. This has no loading time.

That's not true, just because it has no gui.

code:

$ time javac --help javac: invalid flag: --help Usage: javac <options> <source files> use -help for a list of possible options real    0m0.313s user    0m0.314s sys     0m0.056s

It's a pretty negligible amount of time, but it still takes time to load the program into memory and launch it.

[andrew.]

Jeez, you know what I meant!

[CEKT]

Having a laptop is in no way neccessary. Other than in tutorials and/or CS lectures, having a laptop on in class will be probably non-beneficial. However, there are many benefits a laptop may have outside of lecture halls. Ie. Study groups, in between classes, etc. The SoftEng department have various rooms in the DC that are for use by SE students, and from personal experience, they are generally filled with students working or hanging out at most times of the day and night. It got to the point, where a group from my class would always take advantage of these facilities and as a group bring laptops there to study and work (either for school or casually). It's a good environment to do so in, as if you stumble into a problem there is a great chance that someone there knows the answer to your problem. Laptops arent necessary to take full advantage of this though either as the facilities have several old but working desktops there. Or you may not like working in such an environment, to each their own. Perhaps, a netbook + desktop combination would be the best for you.

As for the compiler/IDE question; The others that answered mainly covered it, there are no mandatory software to use in first year SE and other than DrScheme for your 1B cs class there is hardly any recommended software. Generally just download the compilers and use what you like in way of text editor or IDE. Note: your choice of text editor may be cause of scorn of other SE students. It is never surprising to see a Vi(m) vs. Emacs debate.

Note my relevant biases/knowledgebase include; Being an SE student, Vi(m) user, laptop owner

[unoho]

@CEKT: thank you so much!! Exactly what i was looking for (perspective of a SE student)

[mcpherrinm]

I didn't get a laptop until partway through 1B, and a few terms later, I'm not sure if I really need it. It was mostly a distraction in class, and labs or the CSC was a better place to get work done. It spends lots of time sitting on the corner of my desk unused.

I have a smartphone that I use for random quick computery-things when I need to, which is handy.

One thing to note: Dragging a desktop around on co-op is a huge pain. If you're insistent on dragging a desktop to school, cool. But it's going to be a pain compared to just having a laptop, even if it's a fat 17"+ beast you never move off your desk.