Week 16 Discussion/Lab Notes

Well, it's that time of year.

I've spent a lot of time going over details to various things. In the long-run, these details aren't very important. (Most of you probably won't use Lisp ever again, except possibly in CS188.) Take a step back and think about the big ideas what we've covered! You'll encounter them again in later CS courses. I remember Professor Hilfinger, during a CS164 lecture, saying "Everything you need to know you already learned in 61A."

One of those unfortunate things about CS61A is that it's an introductory course, but most people probably won't appreciate it fully until they gain more programming experience.

Contrary to what some people may think, CS61A is not about learning Scheme. (If it's not about Scheme, then why do we use it?) Nevertheless, in my opinion, Scheme is a superior language to most of the other ones out there, so it's good that we learned it along the way.

One of the things we try to teach you (indirectly) is how to write good code. What is good code? What is good style?

Here are some links some of you may find useful in your futher misadventures in the world of computer science:

• Java IAQ (Infrequently Asked Questions)
     When you take 61B and get the hang of Java, you may find some of the information here enlightening.
• comp.lang.c FAQ
     An invaluable C reference.
• Review of Existing Languages
     A comparison and critique of many programming languages in existence.
• emacs.org
     If you're going to do serious programming, you'd better get used to Emacs. Read the FAQ and other documentation.
• The Jargon File (aka The New Hacker's Dictionary)
     If you really want to be CS, you need to walk the walk and talk the talk.
• useit.com
     And for heaven's sake, if you're going to write software, make it usable!