some advice i have for future computer science students
as soon as you learn data structures & complexity, run, donβt just walk, RUN to leetcode while the knowledge is still fresh in your mind. your entire career and whether youβll get a well-paying job vs an average paying job depends on how good you are at leetcode.
build as many projects as you can, and iβm not talking tutorial projects that take a few hours, iβm talking big projects. working on a project for a month or two will get you really far.
if you donβt have an internship, do not waste your summers, learn new technologies, languages, concepts and build projects you can put in your cv.
try to participate in hackathons and coding competitions. itβs okay if you fail, but youβll learn a lot.
learn how to read documentation. most tutorials donβt even cover a quarter of what a language, framework or software has to offer. the sooner you make reading documentation a habit, the better it is. and yes i know, documentation is long and hard to read. my advice is only read the sections that are relevant to you in the moment. something i also personally do is look at the code examples at the same time as i am reading the paragraphs, it really helps easily absorb the information.
try not to use chatgpt. and if you do, then at least use it for stuff you know you can do yourself and will be able to correct if the bot gets it wrong. using chatgpt is a very slippery slope and the more you use it the less you learn.
the math is important. math teaches you how to reason and how to develop better logical thinking. just because you donβt see yourself using the xyz theorem youβve learnt anytime in the future doesnβt mean the math is useless.
be prepared to get comfortable with erros, issues, bugs and just problems in general. youβll be coding 30% of the time and debugging 70% of the time (iβm exaggerating but sometimes it feels like this is the case lol), and thatβs okay, itβs how we learn and the sooner you embrace it the better. if youβre someone who easily gets frustrated, then this is a heads up.
learn as you go. there is no such thing as waiting until you know everything before you start on a project. the only way and the best way to learn in this field is practice, so build, build, and build.
these are all the ones i could think of for now. feel free to comment your thoughts and questions <3