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Comment by labster | Hacker News Reader

Anecdata: I don’t know how to implement a hash table, but I know how to use them. Not everyone here has a CS education background.

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If you're interested in implementing a hash table I would assume you're also generally interested in data structures and algorithms. I'd highly suggest the Algorithms, Part 1 class on Coursera. It's totally free and offered through Princeton. It covers hash tables in the last segment, albeit implemented in Java, but still very thorough and is a great introduction to common data structures/algorithms and analysis, like linked lists, union find, trees, quick sort and time/space complexity. https://www.coursera.org/learn/algorithms-part1

What level of math does one need to understand to take this course?

I've ignored math prereqs my entire life and turned out fine. If you're genuinely interested, it's not too hard to learn the math as needed. It might actually be a better way to learn, because you're learning is always in service of other learning.

I haven't taken that Coursera course, but in college, I believe only calc I and II are the prereqs for intro to data structures and algorithms. Though I know solid engineers who understand applied CS who don't have a good grasp of math at all.

> It might actually be a better way to learn, because you're learning is always in service of other learning.

Me in freshman calculus: Why are we learning these Taylor series? It's so boring, and I'll never need to use it

Me three years later in upper-division meteorology: It turns out 90% of what we do is numerical methods because fluid dynamics is hard with limited data.

It's definitely easier for me to learn things when I have an application for it.

For the data structure & algorithm courses I've seen, basically none.

The math is isn't advanced, any high schooler would've encountered it. Brush up on the basics of exponents and logarithms and you'll be fine.

Erik Demaine is the man

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0M_kIqhwbFo

I hate all algorithms courses except this one, really made me fall in love with algorithms and data structures .

If you want to go deeper, this is the next one on the topic

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvdJDijO2Ro

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