I am from: South Korea
Hobbies: Tennis, Basketball
Year: Senior
Other CPS Courses: CPS 102
I first started using a computer around 4th grade in elementary school, mostly to play games like Oregon Trail. While I have used Macs before, I am most comfortable with PCs. I own a laptop and a desktop right now (both PCs) which I use extensively everyday for schoolwork as well as leisure.
The initial reason I took computer science at Duke was because of Sarah Jung and Kenny White (both of whom are in this class). In the fall semester of my sophomore year I was searching for a good elective to take, and they both suggested Compsci 1. It turned out that I really enjoyed the class, so I decided to become a CS major.
In Compsci 1, Professor Forbes taught me that Computer Science is not about computers, just as astronomy is not about telescopes. He helped me understand that computer science is about finding easy/practical solutions to real life problems using this wonderful tool called a computer. Therefore, I think even if someone doesn't work for a company like Microsoft or Google or spends hours in front of a screen coding and programming, they should still be considered computer scientists if they strive to somehow integrate computers into our daily lives and into different fields of study.
My best programming experience was probably writing a MIPS simulator in JAVA as a project for CPS 104 this past semester. It was a semester-long project that I put the most effort into ever in my computer science career, and the rewarding feeling upon completion was amazing. I learned a lot about how computers work behind the scenes as well.
My worst programming project came in Compsci 140, where Professor Rodger made us write an entire robot language parser in Java. Although I did complete it successfully, I ran into so many bugs throughout the course of the project that my memory of the experience remains horrible. I also felt that the project did not help me much in terms of understanding how real computers work.
In the future, I see myself as an intelligent computer user, even though it is most probable that I won't pursue a career in the computer science field. I think it's essential to have a basic understanding of software and technology in a society that increasingly relies on these two things. Whatever I do I will always look for easier solutions to problems using computers.