Average Achievements

Update: turns out class average for the project was 53%.

At least I won’t have much competition for employment at the end of this…

First-Class Ass

Got the first of the results in today, Objects & Algorithms (C++) coursework: 86%

Quite happy with that, puts me in the “1st Class” bracket, not that it counts this year towards any grade (that starts next year). Pleased not least because C programming (in pure, ++, or # variants) will be the course of most potential employment/earning benefit. Other scores I know who did all parts of the coursework, whose code worked, etc., are 60% and 63%.

That’s just the coursework (which will be 70% of overall mark). I checked my answers for the O&A exam, I utterly knobbed-up one of the four questions. Was a “trace the code” question, I went lunatic in an early step, which fed through much of the rest of the answer. Bah! It’ll cost me a good few percent. Nothing to REALLY worry about (wasn’t a conceptual failure, should still get a good grade), but I’m annoyed because I was debating answering a different question instead of that one & should’ve got near-enough full marks for it. Something to bear in mind.

Am in the process of moving. Packing boxes for storage (handily enough there’s a new facility next-door to the University) and moving to Edinburgh for the summer. Have been (very, very kindly) offered rent-free accommodation. It’ll provide a mechanism to get out of my (modest) overdrafts and hoard-in some cash for next term. That’s if I don’t drink, smoke, pop, snort & blow it first.

How to celebrate, though? Mmm. I know. Let’s have some unrelated Sexy Star Wars!!

One of the ladies. And the Spartans.

Coursework & Exams – Semester 2 Diet 1

The coursework is in. UML diagrams for a supermarket were functional, but nothing really exciting in that. UML itself is interesting, it’s handy to sketch out parts of an OO system, but I don’t really care about it. Enjoyed coding C++ a lot. Wished the coursework was harder, so I did more: put in file handling and made the project work with real-world data and the like (I did check beforehand it was okay to do this). Had a lot of fun making various Linked Lists, Hash Tables and Sorting routines; I’ll be playing with C++ over the summer. The Director coursework was a struggle. The teaching was inexistent and I left it quite late to start the project. I scraped it together quickly (you hurl Darwin’s Eyeball in 3D at various religious symbols) and in the process started to learn & enjoy Director. As a 3D engine it’s surprisingly good, very poor compared to a games engine, or even Dark Basic, but it’s very light and works on all platforms from a browser; and it’s 2D engine is quite exciting. Having decided I disliked Director (a common position amongst the classmates) I’ve changed my mind completely & quite want to do some more (a common position amongst the classmates).

The exams are on. Had the Director-module exams this morning. It’s a weird three-stream module, the soft side of games (impact on society, ratings, etc.), the technical elements of gameplay (lighting, cameras, colour theory, etc.), and some tech (Macrosoft Director). Unlike all past papers there wasn’t a coding question, only soft and technical questions (I suspect retaliation, most of the soft-subject tutorials were poorly attended – I know, I was sometimes there). Two more exams next week…

Semester B

No exam results yet from Semester A, but we are already in Semester B.

Semester A was “soft” stuff: Maths, Games Theory, 3D and Media. Semester B is programming, more programming, and even more programming. I’m very happy about this.

We’ve had two of the three modules so far. Leastly we’re learning Macromedia Director (played via Shockwave). Quite frankly a monkey could use it, though it is powerful and interesting. There is a BASIC-type scripting language underneath, Lingo, which will be fun to investigate. Even so, it’s nice to get some time on a noddy language that can be used to knock up visual, web-friendly games and animations. We’ll be using the latest 3D version, and there are even packs for the Havoc physics engine. Unlike Dark Basic, which I used last year, Director/Lingo is very widely used, and there are many good tutorials for it.

The other two modules are both C++, much more serious, much more interesting. One module is Objects & Algorithms, the other is Object Orientated Structure & Design. I’m not entirely certain of the major differences between the two, but two coordinated modules spent on C++ is entirely welcome.

The change of timetable has brought some disappointment. Semester A I had Friday off, but didn’t need it. Aaaand the moment I get a girlfriend in Edinburgh, Friday is busy till 3pm. I’d have liked the option of spending a long weekend over in Edinburgh, but perhaps it’s for the best. I’ll concentrate on work if I’m here. The up-side is I have more options for the gym each week. Previously I could squeeze in 5 hours of classes, I can now fit in 7 hours per week, and that’s just Monday to Thursday. The killer day is today, Wednesday, with a sports class just after lunch, and a double-bill starting at 4. I just about managed to survive it, though it was a challenge. A good few hours of training per week, coupled with my highly non-student diet of salads and vegetables and fruit and beans (the dried stuff – not cans of baked), is getting me into good shape, both physically and mentally.

Semester A was good. I lost a substantial amount of weight, did my first ever Uni exams, and got a quite amazing girl at an end-of-the-year rave. Semester B looks like it’s going to be even much better.

Dreadlines

Deadlines approach. First is Friday, have a 15 second animation to hand in for ‘Media’. I already have the animation done, and documented, but I want to improve it. That’ll be work for tonight.

Next up is Tuesday next week. Have a (physical) game to hand in for ‘Games’. The game is designed, made, documented. Went for a card game rather than a board game. It requires a lot more documentation, academic justification, citations, and the like.

The third of the modules, ‘Maths’, had the last coursework exam this week. You want my scores? Matrices 53% (class average 73%), Linear Algebra 84% (avg 56%), Partial Differentation 46% (45%). The overall coursework is an average of the top-two scoring exames, giving me a comfortable 69%. You need 45% [to avoid failing the module], but want over 55%, as every percentage over 45% you get is one % mark less needed in the real exam in January.

I am dissapointed with the Matrices results, I could have gotten much higher, but a couple of silly working-out sums mistakes (the tiniest of errors, mostly dropping or miscalculating signs) and the score plummets.

More to say, but food is cooking….

Two Down: Thrice

First Pair Down: Had the second of the pre-exam maths exams; algebra, six multiple-choice questions with no penalty for a wrong answer. There is plenty in algebra I don’t get, but I am starting to get somewhere in it. Nibbling at the edges, as it were. We’ve moved on now to partial differentiation, aka the exploration of multidimensional curves.

Second Pair Down: For the first time I’ve managed back-to-back exercise classes. These are hour-long classes designed to challenge 20-year-old sportsmen (and women). Wednesday and Friday have two classes I like, one starting immediately after the other. I was the only one to do so. Had enough time between them setting the room up to change kit (new, clean, dry stuff helped with a second wind) then headed back in. In Holland I trained in three, two-hour blocks. Here I’m training in five, one-hour blocks. The training itself is brutal; the “sports-inspired” Body Attack©®™ is particularly harsh..

Third Pair Down: Look like we lost two guys from Stow College. Maths fright. It’s a shame, one spent two years getting to this stage. Neither of them put the hours in here. They’d convinced themselves the maths was too difficult (it’s not easy, but it is certainly within their capacity) and had stopped attending lectures and tutorials.