Paul Eggert is the greatest lecturer I have ever witnessed. He is so passionate about teaching, and it's remarkable how he is so knowledgable while also so good at understanding what it's like to not know things. It is truly an honor to attend CS 35L lectures. Assignments and exams are also very well made. I thought that grading was error-prone, and TAs were not very responsive, but I still enjoyed homework assignments and exams regardless. The LAs, on the other hand, were fantastic. I don't think software construction is a topic I enjoy much, but this class put forth an incredible effort to change that.

AVOID THIS FUCKED UP CLASS AT ALL COST!!! The syllabus and Eggert's teaching is horrible because he's trying to squeeze AT LEAST 2 quarters worth of contents into 10 weeks. The autograder policy he implemented makes this class a fucking nightmare. Yes. one typo will make you get a zero on ALL subsequent keystrokes even if you got them right. I spent like 10 hours for each assignment trying to redo my dribble files again and again just to make the autograder accept my attempt even though I understood how does emacs really work. This class needs a reform ASAP and I don't think Eggert is a great lecturer.

This class is actually so horrible lol. The material covered is so crucial to being a programmer and I think this class has an insane amount of potential, but Eggert's teaching philosophy kills it. On HW, you basically get thrown into the deep end on purpose because programmers are supposed to be able to pick up new technologies on the fly. Well, unless you're one of the smartest people in the class, this approach will really just teach you that cheating is necessary for success. Tests are literal RNG as he picks random moments (often incredibly irrelevant ones) from lecture to turn into terribly phrased, often ambiguous questions. Although I did very well on the final and poor on the midterm, I strongly believe that neither of those tests were even a remotely accurate representation of what I knew or what was covered in class/projects. The one highlight of this class is the group project, I had a good group and found it the most fun and rewarding thing I have done at UCLA. Overall though, get ready for the relentless stress this class brings, and pray that you are smarter than your classmates as this is a pretty competitive class in terms of grading.

I feel like I learned nothing. Class was too hard for no reason. Averages for test were around 45%. No regrades allowed for finals. TAs graded tests completely wrong.

Finally passed this class. I only need a D- to get my degree, so this grade exceeds my expectations.

genuinely one of the best professor's i've ever had, and i'm not even a cs major lol

Oh Eggert. Sweet sweet Eggert. The grade lottery I am playing right now and don't know where I'll come out on the other side. Needless to say, the midterm was horrid. I cannot wait for the final (to be even worse). I like his lecture style, I don't find the information to be presented in a way that's hard to handle, but where I draw the line is the labs being worth abyssmally little percentages and taking hours on end. I know this is for our benefit, but if I'm putting in the effort to get a good grade on the lab, I wish it mattered more. Another thing. The project. THE project. Basically zero guidance on where to start and what you need to know. It follows the Standard Eggert Model: self teach. But I literally pay so much money for these classes that there is zero point to self teach. If I wanted to do that, I wouldn't have gone to college. Simple as that.

I don't know why people keep giving this class a bad review. It's a great class and I learned a ton from Eggert!

I think as it is with all Eggert classes, he bins you on the final based on ur project grades. So make your project grades are very high (other wise you'll suffer more than the bad project grade!)

This class is just something you'll have to suffer through. The course is extremely difficult and you won't have very much guidance for most of it, and from what I can tell, that's mainly the point. You'll learn a lot in this course, and you'll be teaching yourself much of it.

Make sure to pay very close attention to the lectures, since Eggert constructs his exams directly from small tidbits he mentioned during that quarter's lectures. Don't worry about making your notes concise; make them organized instead. The exams are open-book and you will often need the tiny details that Eggert mentioned in passing during a lecture in order to answer a question on the exam.

I got really lazy after the midterm and didn't end up the second half of the class's lectures until the day before the final when I binged them. I definitely do not recommend this strategy, though it ended up working out for me since I remembered almost everything that he had covered in lecture and I ended up doing extremely well (relatively, I got a 69% lol) on the final. So, if you really stressed about the exams, I would genuinely recommend rewatching lectures before exams. Though it'll be a bit painful sitting through it, you can probably multitask browsing Reddit, playing your favorite farming simulator, or building a Lego set while watching the lectures on 2x speed.

You don't really need lectures to do any of the assignments nor for the group project, which is worth a whopping 35% of your total grade. Please make sure to find a good group people you know and trust before it's too late, preferably before you even attend the first lecture. Having a good team of 5 is pivotal to reducing stress in this already very stressful class. You're mostly left on your own by the instructors for the group project, where you'll have to construct some sort of dynamic application with the skills you definitely did not learn from lectures or discussion. The course content is mostly unrelated to the group project.

Eggert has a really lenient late policy for assignments. You should start early but do not worry about having to be multiple days late. If you calculate how much of your total grade you're losing out by taking a few extra days to complete an assignment (also remember that the class is heavily curved), you may realize that you were stressing way too much on turning your assignment in on time.

The TAs are usually pretty late on grading assignments and you do not get much feedback. PLEASE make sure to submit a regrade request on anything you might find reasonable to get points back on. Named your file incorrectly? Regrade request. Assignment guideline was ambiguous? Regrade request. Forgot to comment a piece of code that crashed everything? Regrade request. This philosophy also applies to the midterm, something I regret not taking advantage of. The TAs were very understanding.

Learn as much as you can. Good luck. Unless your laptop is already plastered in arch stickers, you'll probably need it.

No more need to say. He is Eggert. Be prepared to be egged for the exam...

However, Eggert's class really worth it. I end up learning so much useful staff by the end of the quarter.