:) nice

first year CS undergrad? 'that's false.' As if saying this makes it so :D In fact, typing should be the least amount of time spent on a projects. If it isn't then, you my friend, are the crappy programmer. --define 'projects' --define 'programmer' depending on the size of the 'project' and the role of the 'programmer', it may be that you had better be clackity-clacking all day long :D

i think the thing here is that knowing 'esotoric editor commands' usually implies programming skill :D it is generally not memorization so much as learned behavior or something.. that is to say, so-called 'script-kiddies' are not very likely to have 'memorized' 'esotoric editor commands' of course, most of the 'esotoric editor commands' that I use, I make myself.. That being said, i think its a bit silly to think that there is some mouse that magically makes you a better programmer, as most of the business is done with the keyboard.. you can use the keyboard to do a whole lot.. e.g. you can configure your computer to magically do things when you press certain combination of keyboard keys *~ While I don't use the macs myself, I like their single-button mouse. I'd recommend a single-button mouse because they are neat.

mouse? i use the keyboard to program... i prefer trackball, everyone says its crazy :D wireless? if you program a lot, you will have to stop and recharge all the time.. me, i program pretty close to my monitors/keyboard so.. i use wired mouse * ~ good luck finding your uber programming mouse!

bah.. don't worry about what language you are learning. learn how the machine itself works (memory, cpu, busses). next, learn how to write a compiler for something like fortran. next, learn how they wrote compilers for things like c, java. Play with javacc, antlr or similar and create your own parser. imho, if you can figure out how a compiler works, you will pick up any programming language you come across with minimal trouble.. learn the basics and the theory behind them and then you can learn the rest as you go. if you are going to college to 'learn how to program in language X', i think that you may be missing the point.. The idea being that you should be able to teach yourself how to express an algorithm in some specific language.. Trying to pick one or two to be really good at sort of pigeonholes you.. I bet that, given the time and motivation, you could figure out how to use to perform , provided you understand the task from an algorithmic pov.. it may sound silly.. but actual engineering courses may help you learn about the software engineering.. Try taking an EE or ME course, just to get an idea of how unlike engineering much of SE is :D SE is all about measurements.. the real question, to me, is this: what are you measuring and what exactly do your measurements mean? in classical engineering, these questions are often 'black and white' - that is to say, there are usually answers.. in SE, these things are much less clear.. You can't learn to be a good SE by taking courses.. THe theory does help but you must, in the end, learn by doing. I recommend joining some open source projects. Get experience. A BSc is nice.. A MSc is nicer (depending on the school, of course...).. Actual experience working on projects will often trump the degrees :D What sort of software do you like working with? I'm pretty sure that you can find some open source project that is looking for someone just like you to help it along. Work with a team, see how it is done.. That being said, you may find that the open source development is not a whole lot like 'industry' development.. But experience is experience.. Go ye forth and get ye some!

Look into GNU projects! http://www.gnu.org/ for example, kde is always looking for developers :) http://www.kde.org/getinvolved/ I think these are good places to look for projects * ~