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Preparing for PhD in Computer Science

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  • 16-11-2009 1:18pm
    #1
    monosharp
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,981 ✭✭✭


    Hey guys,

    So I will be starting a PhD abroad next year at a good University and I'm a bit nervous about it.

    I have a 4 year BSc and a years work experience. I haven't worked in IT for the past 2 years.

    So I want to try and prepare myself for study again. I need to try and refresh Maths, Programming etc in the olde brain.

    Anyone in a similar situation ? any advice ? What should I do ?

    Mods if this is better in Postgrads then please move.


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    #2
    satchmo
    Registered Users Posts: 1,481 ✭✭✭satchmo


    Depending on the subject you might not be actually writing much code, so don't worry too much about getting back up to speed. And the code you do write will probably be throw-away just to test a theory/solution, so don't worry about it being production quality or even particularly well-written.

    What's the PhD going to be in? You'll probably spend the first year or so just doing background work, trying to get a grip on the subject and up to speed on the previous work. So this is probably where you'd best spend your time now so you can hit the ground running.


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    #3
    fergalr
    Registered Users Posts: 1,922 ✭✭✭fergalr


    What is the subject area?

    I started a CS PhD program about 6 months ago. It's been really busy, always lots to do.

    I've had to do a good bit of coding so far. Some time spent writing complex, high performance algorithms in C, with an emphasis on scalability and efficiency. Other times I've been writing prototyping code in Python, and a little R and Matlab.
    The programming requirements can be quite different than in industry; less like team based software engineering, and more in the way of tight and fast algorithm implementations for working on large datasets, or quick and dirty code to test an idea. I think its a lot of fun actually - its a nice change from always working in a large shared legacy codebase.

    There's a lot of reading to do - more reading than you'll ever manage.

    I'd say that at the start (and I'm still early enough in) invest time on whatever the fundamentals of the area is - learn the hard maths or other underlying background thoroughly, because you'll be in the area a while, and are going to need it - and you might be more tight on time later.

    I'm still learning how to do this though - I might give different advice in a few years. ;)


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