UCLA Engineering Q&A

Colleges & Universities University of California - Los Angeles
2981

<p>Hi Flopsy!</p>

<p>Status: Admitted to UCLA as Transfer Students - Fall 2009
Academic Major: EE (Anyone got same major and transfer to UCLA as junior! - Look forward to seeing you guy at UCLA)</p>

<p>As a transfer student with my major, do I need to go to Orientation! Since I’m going out of U.S for my summer vacation, it will be very inconvenient for me to attent in the orientation! Is it possible to make app with department counselor before the beginning of Fall quarter? Can I register for my classes without going to the orientation? Are there any real problems that will impact my academic if I dont go to the orientation?</p>

<p>Any suggestions from Flopsy or anyone else for new transfer student to UCLA (specially EE major) - will appreciate!</p>

<p>Thanks!</p>

2982

<p>Hi Flopsy! </p>

<p>I got into UCLA Comp Sci and Engg this year and have a few questions (like most others around here!):</p>

<p>1) Is UCLA Compsci and Engineering really prestigious among the big-name recruiters such as say- Apple, Microsoft, Yahoo!, Google, Sun, HP, Intel etc.? Could I expect to be interning in these companies and ending up working in one of them??</p>

<p>2) Is it possible to do cross-stream research? I’m pretty interested in Environmental Engineering and Alternative Energy research- but majoring in Comp Sci and Engg.</p>

<p>3) What’s the highest, lowest and median starting salary for UCLA Comp Sci and Engg grads? Are such stats made available? (I got similar stats for CMU- the school I’m turning down for UCLA- <a href=“http://www.studentaffairs.cmu.edu/career/employ/salary/ECE.pdf[/url]”>http://www.studentaffairs.cmu.edu/career/employ/salary/ECE.pdf&lt;/a&gt;)</p>

<p>4) How are grad school admissions to top universities from UCLA like? (places like HYPSM and other Ivies, in general). I’m an international and would I have a better chance of getting into a top US grad-school if I attend UCLA as opposed to me attending a local university in Singapore (NUS or Nanyang Tech).</p>

<p>5) I’m “thinking” of minoring or double-majoring- if I don’t get slaughtered by Comp Sci and Engineering alone i.e. in Economics or Business Economics- is this a possibility- and if yes, do top finance companies recruit at UCLA?</p>

<p>Thanks for all your help! I really think it’s awesome that you’re out here helping us newbies! :D</p>

2983

<p>anyone know when the fall 09 schedule is available?</p>

2984

<p>

Definitely.</p>

<p>

Engineering majors are required to take “tech-breadth courses,” which basically just means three upper-division courses from another engineering (or entrepreneurship or math) major. You can choose to explore classes similar to your outside interests.</p>

<p><a href=“I%20got%20similar%20stats%20for%20CMU-%20the%20school%20I’m%20turning%20down%20for%20UCLA-%20%5Burl%5Dhttp://www.studentaffairs.cmu.edu/ca…salary/ECE.pdf%5B/url%5D”>quote</a>

[/quote]

Random: I turned down CMU for UCLA, too.</p>

<p>

Yes, it is possible. I have a friend with a CS major/cognitive science minor. It’s pretty easy to get a CS major/math minor if you choose the right courses. I also know some students double majoring in CS and another major…but those people are crazy and usually take 5 years to graduate.</p>

<p>

I believe the tentative schedule is up. If you select a major and term “09S”, change “09S” to “09F” in the URL and you’ll get the tentative schedule. However, no professors or time slots yet.</p>

2985

<p>lol how sneaky, madeinchina</p>

2986

<p>100%Tuna - </p>

<p>UCLA CSE is good enough that you should be able to get a job at any of those big companies you’ve named. They show up at career fairs often and conduct mock interviews. </p>

<p>Salaries will vary depending on where you find employment and the associated costs of living there. In California your starting salary may be around 50-70k depending on your negotiation skills.</p>

<p>To double major you will have to file a petition with the school of engineering and the school of letters and science which can be an arduous process, I don’t know if they’ve made it any easier. In any case you will become quite good at navigating ucla’s bureaucracy and hunting down obscure offices in campus buildings. You will need to maintain a good GPA (I’d say 3.5), write a supporting letter describing your intent and how your secondary major will be beneficial to you, and get plenty of signatures. Once both schools approve your petition your max unit cap will increase and you will be on your way to juggling your schedule to fit both your majors. If you take an average of 16-18 units a quarter with no summer school, you can probably finish your double major in an average of 4 1/2 years. </p>

<p>If you’re clever you can try to petition those 3 upper div specialty classes to be ones from your secondary major. I don’t know if the reqs for CS & CSE are still similar to what I had but I petitioned those 3 classes to be from a completely different department. As long as you can soundly justify your choices, you can pretty much petition anything. </p>

<p>You may have to wait until your second year or so to petition for a second major as the schools will want to see your performance in your primary major first. In the meantime you can probably fit in some econ classes for your own interest and see if it is something you would like to explore. Once you are fully in, just know you will be getting plenty of exercise dashing between north and south campus. It does get you out of the smokers’ hangout into the nicer and greener areas of ucla though! Besides everyone knows the girls are much prettier and better dressed in north campus =)</p>

<p>Grad admissions will depend on your CS GRE test scores as well as your GPA. From there on out, it’s not too different from applying to undergrad, except there is always the possibility you could get your employer to pay for your grad education.</p>

2987

<p>Hey,</p>

<p>Does anyone know what are some non-stressful CS upper division electives? I’m looking to take something that is not going to make me suffer. I’m in the process of finishing CS 33 and I’m finding that programming is not very fun :(</p>

2988

<p>

</p>

<p><em>Warning</em> - Lots of parentheses in this post.</p>

<p>Depends on what your interests are. You’ll (most likely) find classes non-stressful if you’re interested in the subject (unless you have a really bad professor).</p>

<p>Personally, I enjoyed CS170A (the only elective I’ve taken so far). I’m CSE so it was really helpful to learn the ins-and-outs of MATLAB prior to taking my upper-division EE courses. </p>

<p>The other electives I plan to take are Databases with John Cho (CS143) and AI (CS161). On a side-note…I heard computational genetics was pretty easy (CS CM124). But I only know one person who’s in the class.</p>

<p>Good luck!</p>

2989

<p>Thanks for the info! I was looking at CS 143 as well or else CS 174A. Do you think that CS 143 is going to be stressful and a ball buster? I’m really considering it as I like to take CS 144.</p>

2990

<p>CS143 isn’t an easy class, but John Cho really does make it enjoyable (from what I’ve heard). You’ll still have projects so it will take time to do the projects…but it won’t be as tedious as CS33.</p>

2991

<p>hey guys, how is the civil program at ucla…is it tough?</p>

<p>also, how are the c classes (Computer programming classes required for engineering- specifically civil)???</p>

2992

<p>So, what would you define as an easy class vs a hard class? CS 31 is a lot of grunt work, but I didn’t think that is was that hard. CS 32 ditto, but CS 33 to me, is a hard class as in terms workload, material, and application. I was think about taking CS 181 this summer? any thoughts?</p>

2993

<p>

The level of difficulty of all classes are subjective to the person taking it. I thought CS180 (Algorithms) was really hard, but I think CS181 is easy (I’m taking it right now). I can tell it’s “easy” because I understand the material that’s taught in discussion, and I don’t have to attend lecture or read the course reader. I went to all the lectures and discussions for CS180 and still performed poorly because I couldn’t grasp the concepts. Neither of those classes involved coding.</p>

<p>Generally, the “hard” CS classes are CS131 and CS111 (and CS152B for CSE). Both of those classes are extremely fast paced and require you to grasp the concepts that are thrown at you.</p>

2994

<p>CS 31, 32 and 33 are considered “weeder” classes (Sort of like the LS 1/2/3 bio classes). They throw a lot of basic concepts at you and you do a bunch of non-related exercises with completely fake languages (fake assembly, fake database, etc), operating systems, and etc. Do you still have to construct a turing machine by hand? I remember I hated that… a lot of it seems like unnecessary busy work as well. </p>

<p>Once you get through that mess and hit the upper divs, it’s much easier and interesting in my opinion. </p>

<p>Hard/Easy really depends on the professor teaching the class, how well you grasp the concepts, how well you keep up with the reading, and how good you are at debugging. </p>

<p>Here’s a quick rundown of most upper div CS classes, it’s been a while though.
The classes pretty much break up into theory heavy vs programming heavy courses. Also how hard/easy you find a class will depend on your interest in the subject, time available and whether you lean a bit more towards theory or programming.</p>

<p>Theory heavy -
CS111 - OS, heavy on concepts, but can also be heavy on programming as well. We had to modify/reprogram a minimal unix kernel. Not too hard of a class if you are decent at programming
CS112 - Math, math and more math! Heavy on the stats. Reading the terms “Bayes theorem, Markov chains” still sends shivers down my spine. Had a really hard time in this class and it didn’t help that it was 4-6pm. There is some hard core math and stats in this class. It’s math, with a twist (the horrible gut wrenching kind).
CS118 - With the advent of the internet, I’m not sure how this has changed. A lot of theory, network layers, packets, memorization of different protocols, etc. Exams were tough only because there was a lot of memorization involved. A lot of theory, and minimal network related programming projects. Theory fairly easy.
CS143 - Primarily theory and more theory. Some database programming.
CS151B - Sit in class, listen to prof drone on and on. All theory about logic design, fairly interesting if you’re interested in that sort of stuff. Otherwise it can be a big snore. Often the best solution to a problem in this class is the simplest solution. Not to difficult once you grasp the basic concepts.
CS180 - Theory, theory and more theory. I don’t recall if there was any programming in this class. I just remember the textbook cost an arm a leg. Quite a bit of math as well. A lot of running through algorithms by hand. Course can be tough, but there are also some students who thrive on this stuff.
CS181 - Oh boy, I nearly fell asleep every day in this class. My prof was a well aged woman who actually had many theories named after her which appeared in the ancient textbook reader itself! All lecture and all theory, but material is not all that hard. Can be very, very boring though. It’s the type of class where you emulate a computer by paper and pencil =)</p>

<p>Programming Heavy -
CS131 - Heavy, heavy programming. Mostly OOP. We used Ada when I took it, don’t ask me why. Also some C++ I believe. Spend a lot of time debugging data structures, classes, etc. I’m guessing Java is the language of choice now?
CS132 - This one is quite heavy on the programming as well, very little theory. It’s pretty interesting if you’re decent at debugging. When I took the course, each week’s assignment depended on the previous one as you slowly built your compiler from the ground up. TA’s finally gave up and started providing “solutions” to the previous week’s so you’d have something to work off of for the next assignment. Can be a tough class if you can’t keep up w/ the workload or have a hard time with implementing the concepts.
CS152B - This isn’t really a programming course, but it involves a lot of lab work and implementing circuit designs. It’s not quite theory, and feels more like programming does to me. We used the crappiest program for circuit design, I hope they have something better now.
CS161 - Depends on prof. My experience was about 50/50 programming/theory. We had to use LISP (Lots of InSignificant Parenthesis). Others have used C. Can be a pain of a class as you spend each week solving “puzzles” programming. Very basic puzzles though, you’re not going to be programming pathfinding AI or any higher level stuff.<br>
CS174A - Depends on prof. Very programming intensive and projects can vary. We did quite a bit of interactive 2D interface programming, then progressed to raytracers, a/z-buffer rendering and texture mapping. Being CG, involves quite a bit of math in the programming as well.</p>

<p>The programming languages and the “fake” software they use with funny gimmicky names have probably changed since I took these classes, but reading the current catalog descriptions, the content and approach has pretty much remained the same. </p>

<p>good luck!</p>

2995

<p>@BeaneathJanssStep: When did you graduate? Seems like most of the courses you took have changed a lot…</p>

<p>Some additions on top of your post:
CS111: Extremely coding intensive. You’re allowed to work with a partner and you’ll have 4 projects dealing with operating system concepts. The last project is pretty fun - you have to learn how to defend and attack others peers on a p2p server.
CS180: Professor this quarter has two programming assignments and weekly quizzes.
CS181: Yup, Greibach is still teaching it. However, the TA (Brian Tagiku) is one of the best TAs I’ve had, so I find the concepts extremely interesting. Also, we now use an application called JFlap so we get to emulate NFSA and DFSA, regexps, and grammars by computer now.
CS131: If you take it with Eggert, you learn 6 different programming languages and have to complete a project or two for each one. The languages include: OCaml, Java, Prolog, Python, Scheme, and one more…</p>

2996

<p>Yeah, I’m not too surprised, it would be very bad for the department if they didn’t keep up. '98 was my year, just as the internet was taking off. Sorry if my course descriptions are way out of date! My memory’s not what it used to be, ha.</p>

<p>Yeah, that’s the prof, I can’t believe Greibach is still there. 8am was a bit too early to be going over that sort of material for me =)</p>

<p>I remember the fake linux for cs111 now, Minux I think… I’d say the class is about 50/50 with more importance placed on theory though. </p>

<p>It’s good that they’re teaching scripting languages now, python is very much an industry standard it seems.</p>

2997

<p>Hey guys, after reading some stuff about EE/CS careers. I need help to choose what I really want to major in.</p>

<p>Right now I’m an EE, but I pretty much went into it without knowing much. I’m taking EE1 and CS31 for spring 09. I find both courses enjoyable and both courses are very easy and come naturally to me.</p>

<p>The two top options are EE with CS pathway, or Computer Science and Engineering. I enjoy Math and I’m looking to also obtain a double major in Applied Math, which seems to aid both EE and CS majors. Another option would be to take EE with the CS pathway and double major in Computational Mathematics.</p>

<p>I’m interested in making money, at the same time I want to enjoy what I’m doing as well.</p>

<p>What kind of things to EE and CS majors do? Their career paths etc. The advantages/disadvantages and all that. Could someone please help me out without the EE bashing. I really just want become more informed of the majors and careers to make the best choice. </p>

<p>Thanks</p>

2998

<p>Me too. High five!
All I can think about is all the raves that they have down in LA.
I hope they don’t reject me cuz I got a D this Fall.</p>

2999

<p>Missing a Black Sandisk Cruzer 2gb Flash Drive. If anyone saw or took it in the 2nd floor seaslab or ENG IV CAD LAB last week, please return it. My contact info can be found in the resume folder in the drive.</p>

<p>I’ve already asked the seas help desk, boelter lost and found and CAD lab admin. </p>

<p>Normally I wouldn’t care much for missing flash drive cause they are cheap, but my simulation files for my project are in it…</p>

3000

<p>^Normally I don’t return flash drives, and this is no exception! :mad:</p>

<p>:( [right]:D[/right]</p>