Great and passionate lecturer. Made the class very interesting and approachable!
I took this course with hesitation, but it was absolutely great. Course has improved across the board. No complaints: the homework assignments were challenging but clear and fair, the professor and TAs were helpful during lectures, office hours, and outside of class. 10/10 Greatest professor redemption arc I've ever seen, kudos to Professor Feng.
Class was very straightfoward. 6 homework assignments for 100% of the grade. Homework gradescope results were available, so it's easy to know how you're doing in the class. Generous with late days as well, 10 days for the entire course. He has definitely heard the feedback and improved a lot. I highly recommend this professor now!
I took this class with worries, but it was one of the best CS classes I've taken at UCSB. The class materials are seriously interesting and helpful in other classes. I feel like I now have a better understanding in some of the features in programming languages. 6 hws sum up the total class grade with 10 free late days. No exams.
Yu Feng improved significantly. His class structure is now very fair. Some pros are that there are no exams, graded only on assignments, with 10 late days. I would save them mostly for hw4. TAs are always available and nice. Cons are lectures sometimes get tedious, TA's feedback occasionally too vague to be useful. BE SURE to use manual for hw.
Great enthusiastic professor, clear lectures. Only 6 programming assignments, which followed a bell curved shape in terms of difficulty, had 10 total late days you could use. Cares about his students, asking for feedback throughout the quarter. One of the best professors I've ever had, makes the difficult topic of PL approachable and interesting.
Great class. Lectures were interesting and clear. No exams, just programming assignments, which were very fair. The professor and the TAs were friendly and helpful.
Feng has seriously improved and is nothing like what people have previously rated him. For this course, we had 6 projects and 0 tests. The class is curved, with 10 FREE late days. It was extremely easy to get an A, and the homework wasn't too hard
Good guy. Clear lectures and very well structured and planned course. Loved ocaml
Worst professor I've ever had. If you suck at recursion, you'll get really good at it. Wouldn't recommend him to anyone at all unless you like mind games.
He assigns us a final that takes me 3 days to complete, with 26 small questions total, during the moment when coronavirus issues torture us everyday. The simple short answer question worths the same points as hard code questions, which is totally unfair. You wont get partial credit for MC questions either, if you choose one of them wrong.
If you are a top level programmer and are looking for a challenge, this class is for you. I attended every single lecture learned almost nothing(because he's bad at teaching). Gave vague responses to piazza questions, if any. Taught class as if we had already learned the material before. Gave contradictory responses on piazza, caused much confusion
Too many assignments. Most assignments take several days. They are more like a final project. Plus, almost every time you need to learn a new language. Don't take his class unless you absolutely love PL. He also publically criticizes students in class and online. Not good for your mental well being. I hope he doesn't get tenure.
Yu Feng has done something incredible. He has completely strangled my enthusiasm for anything related to programming languages. Taking his class has made me reconsider my plan to get a master's in CS, if people like him are who I'm going to deal with, and classes like his are what I'll have to go through.
After hearing about CS162 from several students who took it in the past, I went into this class with a genuine interest in programming languages. This man completely smothered any excitement I had for the subject not only because of his inability to properly convey new course material, but also because of his huge, manipulative ego.
Yu Feng claims expertise in the program security research field, yet he cannot help but shove his insecurities in your face. Take for example his regular routine of using class time and Piazza posts to speak at length about his research and work experience. He also overhauled course structure so that it closely follows his line of research.
This guy is actually the worst. Avoid at all cost. Biggest ego and will accuse you of plagiarizing over one line of code. Actually worst professor I've ever had at UCSB.
Spent half a hour in lecture talking about all the students he caught cheating, and how he did it. Lecture is barely over an hour. Students are desperate to actually learn the content, but lectures barely cover anything in depth, and the professor knows this--he says in lecture he only expects 2-3 students to finish the homework. 70 are enrolled.
AVOID!!! I would say that I admire his passion for the subject but himself is just so offensive and condescending. He would harshly criticize the entire class more than 30mins and keep interrupting others who disagree with him. When people said they cant go to office hour because of work, he is like Not my fault. Bad. Just bad.
He's really offensive and most of his lectures are not helpful at all. He always spend 15 minutes before every class talking about homework assignments and tells us that the homework is too hard for most people to finish. Exam grading is harsh and even if you wrote things correct that was marked wrong by him, don't expect him to add the points back
He is just rude. Don't consider any recommendation and suggestion from students.
Lectures are confusing and always make people hard to concentrate. Exams are extremely harder than what has been taught and grading is extremely harsh. HW assignments are hard even for the TAs. Always disappoint students by saying "Only 3-5 students will be able to figure this question out". In a word, AVOID!!!! Worst professor ever had.
After every one of his lectures, I need to remind myself why I haven't kil led myself. He somehow drains meaning out of my life even through his Piazza posts. I often find the two course TAs, who are forced to attend every lecture, with dark circles under their eyes also acting very depressed.
This wonderful human being spends more time writing posts on Piazza about his research and updates on his headhunt for plagiarizing students than answering legitimate Piazza questions. which he writes in a sentence or two. Expect him to bless you with biweekly detailed content on how he'll punish students caught by his plagiarism system.