Although the class is poorly structured and definitely way too much work, I have to say I appreciate how I was taught to learn the material: with the steep learning curve from covering new topics every week. I am currently in my first software engineering internship and I have to say that the thought process from 35L has allowed me to acclimate to the steep learning curve of the tech stack used in the company I am interning at.

The assignments are tough since everything is new; I suggest to go through fire and take cs33 too at the same time (I did this plus cs33 Eggert): this is because later on, the linking and threads concepts overlap between these two classes.

For the final, it is luck as your TA writes it. I would suggest printing TA slides, assignments (using small font like 4 point font), ascii table, emacs reference card, regex cheat sheet, and Computer Systems: A Programmer's Perspective (literally, the CS33 textbook). Again, go through fire and take cs33 too since I wouldn't have been able to answer some questions on the final had I not learned it in cs33 or has the book as reference.

Good luck, and I came to UCLA with ZERO programming experience and I was able to pull an A going through 10 weeks of fire and suffering. You can do this; just put in ALOT of work! I certainly think it is very helpful for internships and software engineering in general.

This class is supposed to teach you the basics of software and languages used in upper division courses. You certainly will learn them, but saying that you are "taught" them might not quite be right.
First important thing to know is that the course is not taught by the professor - he only writes the assignments, and possibly the slides as well. The actual instruction is done entirely by the TAs, and as such the class is heavily dependent on whether you have the good fortune to end up with a helpful TA. Most of them like to read off the slides, and office hours can be difficult to make sometimes (assuming the TA even shows up to them, which I found they frequently did not.) The end result is having to brute force your way through things with Google. That being said, it's still important to show up to your Lab section; some TAs may divulge hints for how to do the assignments or what will be on the final.

Assignments vary greatly in difficulty. The simplest ones might take half an hour, the hardest ones could take the entire week. The good news is that the late policy is generous, costing you 2 ^ (n-1) % for a submission n days late. The bad news is that the assignments can often be very vague, and it's hard to know how to even start without ripping the answers from previous years off Github. Cheating is widespread, as the assignments don't change much (if at all) from year to year, but if you do choose to pull answers off Github, be warned that you do so at great risk: the assignment numbers are swapped, and slight details are usually added or removed each time. Not to mention that you don't actually learn anything if you just copy the answers.

The final is worth 50% of your grade, but it is open note and open book. The questions and grading are entirely at the discretion of the TA, so again, your mileage may vary. Linux commands, regular expressions, shell scripting, and C make up the core of the points, so make sure you have those down pat.

I scraped by with an A-, but I probably just got lucky with my TA and section (got one of the few that wasn't filled with CS majors.) The curve can be pretty harsh - some quarters they actually may curve downward. I wouldn't recommend this class to anyone who doesn't need it, but the material is undeniably useful, even if you have to struggle a bit to understand it at all.

I think the material in this class is really good. It gives you exposure to a lot of software that will relevant your future classes and jobs (i.e. Linux environment, etc.).

That being said, this TWO UNIT class is a lot of work and honestly pretty hard, since I'm assuming most people who take this class have never used Linux, git, ssh, threads, dynamic libraries, or done C programming (i.e. malloc, realloc, and free). A few people I'd assume would've touched on python a little bit, but not enough to make the project associated with the language any easier. Because of your noobiness, you're most likely going to find your entire quarter consumed by this TWO UNIT class because learning something new every week is really hard. A good number of people cope with the workload by just cheesing the class and using online sources to make every project rather trivial... but that kinda defeats the purpose of this class, which is to get acclimated to a lot of software at the steepest learning curve possible.

So that being said, I would say that the time and work that you put into this class is worth it because you learn a lot. It is kinda lame because Eggert could do a much better job at structuring the class to make it easier for the noobs who didn't know what they were getting into (i.e. be more elaborate in his specs). After all, I was one such noob. However, it is definitely a good class to take, and you'll realize this even more so as the years pass by during your journey to becoming a software engineer.

N.B. The finals are pretty random because they're all made by TAs. Some of them were jokingly easy while others were 60% the level of a typical Eggert exam. When I took it, I think had the hardest final (my TA was Lauren Samy). Honestly, it doesn't really matter, because if you know the material and did all the projects legitimately, you'll do fine.

I hate to say it but you learn a lot from this class. However, you get the information forced into you in the most difficult way possible because most of the time, your TA isn't that good. The only resource you have is the powerpoint which is definitely insufficient so you're kind of stuck if you don't know the materials. At least for CS 33, you get a book to read. This isn't so. I wished the TA is better or at least provide some book for you to study so you don't get stuck doing something that should have been very basic. The projects themselves are really hard and very time consuming. TA office hours are not bad, depending on the TA you go to. Overall, this class is very informative but it could have been a lot easier if the classroom was taught correctly.

Overall, this is a good class. You learn many valuable skills from a broad range of topics like git, multithreading, python, regex, and emacs. However, it is run quite poorly. You never see the professor, and only learn from the powerpoints given by your TA. My TA had a strong accent and I could barely understand him.

The projects vary in difficulty. Some take < 4 hours, some take 12+ hours. You are mostly left to figure out how to do the projects by yourself.

The final is written by your TA, so the difficulty depends on your TA. I thought my final was easy, but my friends in other sections said theirs was hard. You are graded on the curve of your section alone though.

A big problem in this class is the grading. Don't expect to get the grades back for assignments until after the final. And don't expect to find out what you got wrong. The grading policy lets you turn assignments in late for barely any penalty though, which is nice.

My advice is to start the projects early, even before the quarter starts (the website for past quarters is online, and it hardly changes from quarter to quarter.)

You learn nothing from Professor Eggert. You learn everything from TA's slides, so this class would have been much easier if you had a good TA.

Assignment specs are vague and slides usually do not cover everything you need to know. Everything is fast-paced and basically I forgot most of them after the final. However, I do really remember how to use man command and google...

Assignment 2, 3, 5 are very very very very time consuming. Please please please start early. Note that you only lose 1% of that particular homework grade, which counts just 0.05% of your final grade if you submit one day after the due date. Thus, if you have something malfunctioning on the due date, fix them completely and turn them in a day later.

Finals are not hard are very similar to practice finals, but make sure you really understand how to use Shell Script, Python, C. You should also FULLY understand how to use regular expressions and posix thread. Please please please prepare for the final because it counts 50% of your grade.

Eggert is a fast-paced professor who goes beyond the bare minimum. His classes are hard, but you will learn a lot.

Everything everyone had said about this class is true. But I really liked it. It's the "computer science sampler plate". You look into 9 different CS elements/programs/systems during the class. I thought it was very simillar to my previous tech internship experience.
My TA was very good and I learned a lot from her (Lauren Samy). Like in all CS classes, if you don't like your TA, GET OUT and get into another TA's discussion. Fast.
The projects were tricky, but they're not huge, like in CS31 or CS32.
No midterm and the project 10 presentations were really interesting.
You will be doing yourself a favor is you know Linux before you get in here. Just become familliar with basic navigation in the terminal and you'll have a good foundation. You'll be using Linux to get a round almost always.
The final wasn't horrifying, but it was long.
Like I said, overall, I liked this class.

All the below and probably above comments about 35L are very accurate. This is a tough class. Enough said. You have to make work in groups for all the labs because I believe that they will be unfinishable if you don't.

Like all the complaints about grading, lab grades just pop up on your gradebook and that's it. Maybe if your TA is nice about it, they might put the averages on Piazza. Oh wait, the TAs grade the labs AFTER the final. Ohhhhh...so that's how I learn from...uh...what?
Furthermore, the final was absolutely disastrous. Apparently each section had a different amount of points on the final. I think one section had 100 points while Section 5 (my section) had 180 points. To put it concretely, I got 33% on the final but managed to get a B in the class which I am very satisfied.

Maybe if the grading wasn't horrendous and your sanity wasn't on the line, then this class would have been enjoyable AND useful. I mean in retrospect, I think I learned a lot about Python and scripting and Git. No kidding. But with all the grading and ridiculous assignment specs, it's just too much!

And about them specs... like the commentor below put it, Smallberg's specs are a godsend compared to this crap. Thankfully, Jerry's (TA) slides helped sooooo much because he walks you through the assignment. I mean how does Eggert expect a n00b to breeze through Git or master Python language in ONE WEEK?? How does he expect to know how to even START the assignment? Without Jerry's slides, this class would have been even more hell.

On the Googling aspect of the class, my friend and I thought about proposing to change 35L's course title on "How to search in Google." I'll let your imagination run from there.

Some positive things? I thought the SSH and buffer overflow assignment was really cool and the last paper assignment. It's always good to flex some of the writing and analysis muscles of the mind.

All in all, this is a class where NO ONE of higher seniority teaches you (i.e. a professor or TA). It's the random people on the web who give you the best guidance. Don't get me wrong, CS35L has great material to teach us but it was poorly poorly POORY designed and executed. Someone else should take over.

This is more an evaluation of the course rather than the professor, who I may mention did not respond to emails very well and did not interact with the class at all.

This course is a disgrace. For the amount of useful content this course aims to provide, I cannot believe teaching of the material and handling of the class was so poorly executed. It really is sad because these skills are actually really valuable if you are interested in working in industry.

I understand that TA's are given a fairly big responsibility in this class, but the presentations they made were not at all very useful. Furthermore, when my peers and I went for help on labs, we were at many times told to go and google what we needed help in. I understand that "this is the way the real world works", but I am certainly not paying over $3,000 worth of tuition every single quarter for this bs.

Specs are pretty shitty and LADEN with vagueness everywhere. They make Smallberg's specs look like godsends. Don't expect the TA's to clarify what you need - in many cases they will not be able to.

The grading is lazy and cryptic. The syllabus does not clarify how projects are graded, and I received grades for labs MANY WEEKS after I turned them in (the quarter has ended, and I only recently received my grade for lab 6/7). For a TA who is getting PAID to do this job, this is unacceptable service. It cannot take that long to grade labs, and the feedback is required when labs for one week require segments from labs for previous weeks (ex. lab 7 depended on lab 5, which a lot of people ended up failing).

I have to this day been unable to inquire about how labs are graded. Some (I speculate) are graded solely for correctness (no mention in the syllabus), others are graded for answers to questions (subjective, but one can only provide an answer accurate enough to what the vague spec asks), others are mix and match combinations, but above all, grading scheme is NEVER revealed. When projects are worth 50%, this is unacceptable. When I asked the TA's about how much a particular error will penalize me, I was told to never worry about it too much. Most labs ended up turning out well, but I ended up getting an F on lab 5 AFTER being told this same story - again absolutely unacceptable.

Averages are NEVER posted for projects or the final, so you have NO idea how you are doing relative to your peers. Did I also mention that your final has the potential to be exceptionally difficult depending on your TA? Example: Has anyone seen a for - else statement in Python before?

Overall, this is the WORST CLASS I have ever taken as a STUDENT - not just an undergrad. I truly expected better from the CS department for such valuable material, and it saddens me to know that this same issue will continue every single year.