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Education

Computer Games and Traditional CS Courses 173

drroman22 writes "Schools are working to put real-world relevance into computer science education by integrating video game development into traditional CS courses. Quoting: 'Many CS educators recognized and took advantage of younger generations' familiarity and interests for computer video games and integrate related contents into their introductory programming courses. Because these are the first courses students encounter, they build excitement and enthusiasm for our discipline. ... Much of this work reported resounding successes with drastically increased enrollments and student successes. Based on these results, it is well recognized that integrating computer gaming into CS1 and CS2 (CS1/2) courses, the first programming courses students encounter, is a promising strategy for recruiting and retaining potential students." While a focus on games may help stir interest, it seems as though game development studios are as yet unimpressed by most game-related college courses. To those who have taken such courses or considered hiring those who have: what has your experience been?

Comment Re:Reading glasses are not a universl fix. (Score 1) 549

Separate pair of glasses that are monofocals. When you are sitting at your desk you only need to see the display, and the glasses can be optimally tuned for this. You just put the bifocals on the desk and pick up the reading glasses when you sit down, and switch when you stand up.

If you don't want to buy the $5 pair at Walgreens I'm sure your optician will be happy to sell you a $200 pair that is exactly right for you.

Education

Interesting Computer Science Jobs? 352

mattskent writes "I'm currently a junior in college working towards my Bachelor's degree in Computer Science. As such, I'm starting to look pretty seriously at jobs in the IT/Computer Science field. I've spent plenty of time working entry-level IT jobs doing various kinds of help desk type work, and so most of the exposure I've had to the field is related to support of other people's computers. I enjoy helping other people out, but I'd rather not be plugging things in and restarting computers the rest of my life. Although the possibility is growing on me, I don't think I would particularly love to write code all day for a living either. What are some interesting jobs that you've had or heard of that I could look into fresh out of college with a Computer Science degree?"

Comment Re:Who wants to bet... (Score 1) 237

Wait- are you saying that spammers won't violate the GPL? How will that help?

haxx0r: "Here's software to clean your computer!"
suxx0r: "Cool, thanks! Wait, where can I find the source for this?"
haxx0r: "http://fake.source.example.com/"
suxx0r: "Awesome! I just read every line of source and I can verify it has no security problems!"
suxx0r: [gets 0wned]

Programming

How Should I Teach a Basic Programming Course? 452

riverman writes "I have been 'provisioned' at the school where I work to teach a new Computer Science/Programming course. I'm supposed to be teaching everything from the very-very basics (i.e. where that myspace thing is in your computer monitor, and how it knows who your friends are) to the easy-advanced (i.e. PHP classes and Python/Google App Engine). I'm an experienced programmer, but I'm not sure where to start — I could easily assume that my students know something basic they don't. Are there any resources on the internet that could help me find a solid curriculum? What are your suggestions?" I'm sure many of us have gone through intro-level programming courses of some sort; what are some things your teacher or professor did that worked well, and what didn't work at all?
Math

Submission + - The Equationater (equationater.com)

JohnGrahamCumming writes: "I had an itch that needed scratching... I needed to render equations on the web and I didn't want to rely on something like MathML because of poor browser coverage. So, I created The Equationater. Type in an equation in LaTeX format and it is instantly turned into a PNG file that you can download or link to."

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