powerbook for computer science

[shady28]

IDEs

Well, I think the main thing you can get from all this is that, unless you know what your school is using a Mac is as good as any machine. Better in some ways - if they use linux / gcc, a mac should work fine. If they use VS .NET, you can always get VirtualPC.

That said, when I was in school (~10 years ago) we transitioned from using Modula-2 and Turbo Pascal to C/C++. I had to use VAX, DOS, Solaris, and Unisys compilers. I also used Assembly, FORTRAN, and COBOL.

The focus back then was not *at all* on the IDE, very little on the language itself, but almost entirely on programming and problem solving techniques in general. Many of my classes the professor would tell us we could use any of several platforms as long as we made clear which we used and the program worked. After all, doing a traversal of a B tree is doing a traversal of a B tree whether you're doing it on a Mac, a VAX, or a PC.

I happen to think that's the way a college should be - focus on theory and technique and not the language / IDE of the moment. Things have changed a lot since then but that really is the point - Java and VS .NET may well die off in 10 years just as Pascal did (mostly - Delphi revived it a bit).

Point I'm getting at is I'd be very leery of universities that focus too much on a particular API (like .NET) or particular IDE. That stuff is a lot more transient than most people realize.

 

[superbovine]

Well, I think the main thing you can get from all this is that, unless you know what your school is using a Mac is as good as any machine. Better in some ways - if they use linux / gcc, a mac should work fine. If they use VS .NET, you can always get VirtualPC.

That said, when I was in school (~10 years ago) we transitioned from using Modula-2 and Turbo Pascal to C/C++. I had to use VAX, DOS, Solaris, and Unisys compilers. I also used Assembly, FORTRAN, and COBOL.

The focus back then was not *at all* on the IDE, very little on the language itself, but almost entirely on programming and problem solving techniques in general. Many of my classes the professor would tell us we could use any of several platforms as long as we made clear which we used and the program worked. After all, doing a traversal of a B tree is doing a traversal of a B tree whether you're doing it on a Mac, a VAX, or a PC.

I happen to think that's the way a college should be - focus on theory and technique and not the language / IDE of the moment. Things have changed a lot since then but that really is the point - Java and VS .NET may well die off in 10 years just as Pascal did (mostly - Delphi revived it a bit).

Point I'm getting at is I'd be very leery of universities that focus too much on a particular API (like .NET) or particular IDE. That stuff is a lot more transient than most people realize.

Don't worry, a lot of people still do their homework in Vi,emacs, or pico. I didn't get to use an IDE in university until like 3rd year because there wasn't a need to use it. however you could if you wanted too, but i found not having access to the solaris lab, just using emacs made me quite happy doing my homework. some people did the edit in notepad/IDE then re-upload, but that is a pain the ass.

I've been to two different CS colleges, and their isn't a focus on APIs for the most part. However, they still offer classes that focuses on APIs because the reality is if you don't know an API to stick on your resume by the time you graduate finding a job is hard. it already hard as it is because there is a large community of unemployed IT people that have expierence. i've tried since august to find a job, and basically i keep getting nailed because people with expierence are applying for entry level position. ok, i'll stop ranting.