What did you do this past week?
This past week I finished my Collatz Assignment on time. I went to the FoCS Career Night and the Career Fair. I met some former classmates at those networking events whom I haven’t seen for a while. That was unexpected, but really, really nice. I am taking this class called Probability Models with Actuarial Applications right now for my Applied Statistical Modeling certificate. That class has a bunch of unfamiliar actuarial notations (unfamiliar to me) tied into probability and statistics. I went to my stats professor’s office hour for clarifications about hazard rate and mean excess loss function on Friday. She basically redid the entire calculation and proof for me. It was great to hear those concepts explained so clearly on such a fundamental level. I redid the office hour problems afterwards since Math isn’t something I can learn by solely watching someone else do it. I also reviewed some of the basic Probability concepts in preparation for the upcoming exam for that class.
What’s in your way?
I am trying to gain better focus on the tasks at hand and improve my time management skills. Sometimes my to-do list gets super long and, with a million tabs open in my browser, I just lose my focus. Sometimes I fail to make full use of the daytime and end up staying up super late. I need to work on that, but I think I shall relax first. My roommate shared her idea that “It’s okay to not be okay.” So just stay calm, acknowledge the things I didn’t do well on, think about how to NOT make the same mistakes again, and move on with tons of patience and faith.
What will you do next week?
I am very sure I will burn a lot of hours at my favorite study spot in the Kuehne Physics, Mathematics & Astronomy (PMA) Library next week because of all these deadlines and exams coming up and all the new stuff I need to learn. I will meet with my team to discuss Project #2. There are some interviews awaiting as well. It’s just another busy week. Coffee has been helpful, but I will absolutely get more sleep.
What was your experience of Project #1: Collatz (the problem, the overkill requirements of submission, etc.)?
I thought I could finish Collatz earlier, but I ended up finishing it Tuesday night, which was also very okay. The point is to learn. Gitlab issues are great in keeping things in order. Carefully following the specs without adding wrong assumptions is important. One wrong assumption got me stuck for a while.
After I passed the last testcase on Hackerrank, I spent some time at the office hour to make sure I met the submission requirements. I am okay with them since, I guess, that’s what real-life software development processes look like.
What made you happy this week?
You can notice my response to the questions getting shorter and shorter because I really want to finish this blog post and go ahead to complete my Data Mining assignment. Yet, I want to mention that I did a stock pitch for Uber this Saturday and it really improved my ability to organize messy information and communicate them clearly. All disciplines require these skills and there is no way I can get away without acquiring them. I am seeing the massive growth potential in myself because there are just so many things I am bad at. That is so much delight.
What’s your pick-of-the-week or tip-of-the-week?
I am so glad I am finally at the last question. A friend shared this website with me and I think it might be useful for upcoming projects. https://tympanus.net/codrops/
