Ask HN: What do you wish you knew when you were a CS student? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: What do you wish you knew when you were a CS student?

As an entrepreneur, I wish I knew that university is a great place to network and build business relationships. That aspect has vastly more value in the long term than anything you learn in courses.

Yes, very much agree -- building long-term relationships as soon as possible makes all the difference.

It’s not worth trying to get really high grades or be top of the class.

Focus on understanding the material and getting “good enough” marks.

This will be really obvious once you’re out of school 3+ years.

I now look back and think “why the hell was I trying so hard, that shit means nothing now”

It’s hard to understand that though if your identity is based on being “the smart one”.

You’re much better off putting that time into LeetCode or side projects or just having fun.

The second thing is it’s much much easier to get into a specific area of software development as an intern.

So if you’re interested in something specific that isn’t web dev like ML/graphics/compilers try to intern in that area.

It’s a lot harder to switch areas once you’re not a new grad because you’re expected to be able to just deliver without months of ramp up.

As a current CS student who’s getting tired of stressing out over grades, thank you. I think I was starting to have this realization but someone else putting it into words really helped.

> Focus on understanding the material and getting “good enough” marks.

This is a good advice but it's a bit like telling a kid her seashell collection is worthless. Perspective is by definition something you develop over time.

That you've thirty years to get good at programming, but only four years to learn the fundamentals (linear algebra, stat, graph theory, number theory, etc.).

... probably that learning Smalltalk and Lisp would elevate my thinking and make it much easier to think about languages I've had to learn since.

Also, watch the SICP video series https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Op3QLzMgSY if you haven't yet read the book -- it's quite a gentle introduction.

Good luck!

I wish I had planned my career when I was a student. Take advantage of career services, internships and all the other resources a university has to offer you.

Don't worry about making the "wrong" plan, you can always change later. But having a plan is far better than having nothing.

For some strange reason, I was convinced there was ZERO money to be made as a programmer when I graduated HS in 1981.

The right play would have been to attend the local university extension, and do a few startups while I still had no debts, and could live with my parents.

Keep better contact with all my friends. Work at the friendships ... I was too driven by the learning.

That one day that new api or programming language you're just learning will be considered not only obsolete but dangerous.

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