CS371p Spring 2019: Carla Rivera

Week of February 25 — March 3

1. What did you do this past week? This past week I spent a lot of time just working on my project for OOP and another project that was due on Thursday for Programming for Performance. Since both were group projects, I had to deal with working around my partner’s schedules and around my other commitments this week, such as the HACS basketball party and an HBSA meeting on Thursday. Overall, the scheduling turned out much better than I thought, so that was nice. I also started trying to study for my Algorithms exam the following week, although that was slow-going since I had so much other stuff going on.
2. What’s in your way? Right now I would say one of my biggest obstacles is still time management. I’ve gotten better with keeping track of what things I have due when and starting my assignments at least one day beforehand, but I haven’t quite gotten into the habit of blocking of my time to work on certain things at certain times, which I feel like would help me a lot more. It’s just a matter of finding what works best though, so I’ve been keeping at it and hopefully soon something will stick!
3. What will you do next week? Next week I will be focused on my Algorithms exam until Tuesday, and then I will spend the rest of the week studying for my upcoming exams the week after. I have three in the same week, right before Spring Break, so the sooner I start studying the easier time I’ll have. I’m hoping this week to start with Chemistry and OOP, and then towards the end of the week, I’ll need to start studying for Marketing.
4. What was your experience of learning the subtleties of C++ arguments, friends, and returns? I think the idea of friends is a little weird to me, just because it triggers my *warning danger ahead* instinct of allowing outside access to private members of a class. It does seem like it would be very helpful, especially considering the example we went over in class, but I would still be very cautious about using it and would likely try to find another solution before resorting to declaring friends anywhere.
5. What’s your pick-of-the-week or tip-of-the-week? My pick of the week is this article talking about the success of the new Samsung Galaxy Buds. I am very excited about these, as I’ve loved the freedom that comes with using Bluetooth headphones. The ones I currently use have a wire connecting the left earbud to the right earbud, and although I don’t mind it much and it’s actually convenient to just wear them around my neck when I’m not listening to music. However, I do think it would be nice to just have the single earbuds, and the yellow ones Samsung has released look nice! I’m really hoping to get a pair for myself soon!