Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
If you have an email ending in @hotmail.com, @live.com or @outlook.com (or any other Microsoft-related domain), please consider changing it to another email provider; Microsoft decided to instantly block the server's IP, so emails can't be sent to these addresses.
If you use an @yahoo.com email or any related Yahoo services, they have blocked us also due to "user complaints"
-UE
If you use an @yahoo.com email or any related Yahoo services, they have blocked us also due to "user complaints"
-UE
Ampersands
I'm taking a Programming Languages class, and while copying notes I had to write down a pair of ampersands "&&" as part of an example of how the language works. They're really hard to write.
Comments
I've come to use a + written in one stroke so that the bottom is connected to the left as a written ampersand. It works well enough for notes.
I usually end up writing something resembling a sol key symbol.
I also have issues with ζ
I have mastered zeta and xi. Ampersand is sort of like an eight, except I start at the bottom and don't close the loop. On the other hand, I have a bit of a problem distinguishing between hand-written Cyrillic "m" and "i".
I usually just write an ampersand as a curvy E (like a backwards "3") with a line through it.
If it helps, think of it as a monogram of "Et", since that's exactly what it is.
Actually, I meant ξ
Geeze.
Taking programming notes by hand? Without a computer? Writing out code examples with a pen?
God help you.
I'm assuming you either can't afford a laptop or are in high school? But if you're copying notes, aren't you doing it at home?
I have no idea why people think taking notes on a laptop is somehow an improvement over paper. Paper doesn't have Facebook on it.
Also I dunno how common it is but in my first-year programming classes we had to write code on paper for exams, so practising that is a good idea.
Draw the ampersand from the bottom tip, not the top one. It's MUCH easier. After the first upward line, it almost feels like drawing a Z or a backwards S. Like this!
It also makes English teachers yell at you if they catch you doing it, but they're the assholes that make you spend years writing in cursive when nobody cares outside high school.
I had one Java class where the final was to write this big implementation of something longhand. But other than that, I was always fine taking notes in Notepad. Easier to save, too. But for the most part our exams were conceptual and details of implementation, and we'd just have a final project that would be the actual coding.
Actually, once I got to my second major I took notes for most classes in Notepad.
If you spent your class time faffing about on Facebook, well, that was your problem. The college was already getting shitloads of money from you, so they didn't care if you were an idiot as long as you weren't disruptive. Truth be told I spent a lot of my class time surfing too, but my transcript says apparently I paid enough attention.
Why is "Facebook" always the default thing mentioned when people talk about distractions or timesinks? I don't know why, but for some reason that tends to piss me off.![:\](/forums/resources/emoji/confused.png ":\")
@Bee: Some people are more easily distracted than others. I usually have to stuff my phone into the bottomof my backpack to avoid pulling it out whenever the lecture gets boring. Even if you're better at it than that, I still don't see why using a laptop for notes is better. (Also yeah I do ampersands from the bottom up too.)
@ Central Avenue: If it helps, I was 50/50 between mentioning that and LoL. Those are the two most common things I see people doing on their laptops in lectures. (Actually taking notes is something like fifth, maybe.)
I distinctly remember playing Touhou during at least one of my classes.
I didn't say laptop for notes was better in general. I was specifically talking about writing code examples longhand, which seems like a terrible idea to me. I guess if you happen to have a test where you have to write code on paper then that's an exception, but it's beside the point anyway.
You'd have to be extra careful about how I write each symbol ( ) * & { } ' " . and make sure my spaces or non-spaces are totally unambiguous... Agh! Too much room for mistakes and too slow. Copy paste for 100% accuracy and easier read code.
The distractions argument is totally irrelevant to my point, too. I was purely talking about the mechanics of the thing. Besides, you'll be on a computer with those distractions when programming.
Programming is active; listening to a lecture is passive. Not even remotely similar as far as distractions go.
The point of copying down code examples in a lecture is that it's easier to memorize things when you write them yourself. It's not about writing an executable program in your notebook. If you want to see how the examples actually function, you go to the course website and copypaste from the slides.
http://sketchtoy.com/50521752
Here's how I do them, at several speeds
@Nyktos
I would argue that typing out code examples is even better, since you're going to be typing them in actual practice. It's also much faster than writing by hand so you can keep up. What say you to all the stuff I said about making sure all the symbols are written correctly with the correct spacing? One little space in the wrong spot can totally break a line of code. And then when you're practicing, you can either type by hand again or copy paste from your notes.
Like I said, your notebook is not executable. I fail to see the problem with making a tiny syntax mistake there. Also: what programming language are you using where adding a space can break things? I guess in Python you need to make sure you can tell where your indentation levels are, but that isn't especially difficult. Otherwise, you might jam two things together by forgetting a space, but if you've actually learned anything about the language you can probably tell that "publicclass" isn't supposed to be one word.As for the rest, I've never actually felt the need to execute code samples from a lecture verbatim (and even if I did want to, it's all posted online anyway) so I don't see much advantage there. I don't see code notes as being funtamentally different than any other kind of notes, and for any other kind of notes I'm not going to use a laptop for reasons of distraction (plus in certain classes my keyboard can't type half the symbols involved).
Once you get to the higher-end stuff where you have entire classes to teach you just a few libraries/API's, you want to run lecture code verbatim MUCH more often.
Especially when they don't teach you what every single one of the critical intermediate steps does. Like my graphics class did with about half of OpenGL, then tried to cobble skeleton code from the assignments together by cut-and-pasting pieces of the previous class's solutions without regard to those intermediate steps. Good God that class was a disaster.
But how reasonable is it to actually copy down everything at that level? If the code is relatively complex it's pretty easy to make a mistake in copying. That's also assuming the code presented in lecture is even complete: I don't know your prof, obviously, but all the programming classes I've taken have had a good amount of "I'll fill in the rest of this for the version posted online".
What I'm saying is that even if you are running the code (and fair enough, I haven't taken a graphics class or anything of that nature, maybe it is useful) that hardly requires actually copying everything down while you're sitting in the lecture. I usually only bother to copy the parts of the code that are new to me.
This thread is relevant to my interests.
You know, I can write ampersands perfectly well, but actually drawing them (in their most common shape) has always been difficult for me...
Are you good with drawing most other characters?
I have a decent grasp on them...