5 ms·

I have no idea how 'Machine Learning' from Ng is not mentioned. It's fine in teaching you introductory (although it seems to cover more basics than a lot of ot

by Nowado 6y ago

I have no idea how 'Machine Learning' from Ng is not mentioned. It's fine in teaching you introductory (although it seems to cover more basics than a lot of other courses do, somehow) ML. But more importantly, it's a well designed course. You can see how each piece uses previous pieces and how it solves problems and edge cases not covered earlier.

iou 6y ago
Yes!! Though I did it a long time ago and I'm not sure if it's been modernised for current ML norms?
- Nowado 6y ago
  AFAIK it wasn't. Ng just makes new courses for new methods. That said, I'm yet to see better coverage of that topics (If someone knows, I'd really like to get them. I forget pieces every now and then, and having more efficient refresh method is always welcome).
  - visarga 6y ago
    I hope everyone was referring to Andrew's blackboard course: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UzxYlbK2c7E&list=PLA89DCFA6ADACE599 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UzxYlbK2c7E&list=PLA89DCFA6A... instead of the one that started Coursera: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPLop4L2eGk&list=PLLssT5z_DsK-h9vYZkQkYNWcItqhlRJLN https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPLop4L2eGk&list=PLLssT5z_Ds...
omarhaneef 6y ago
I appreciate his attention to pedagogy. Even small things like noticing that students learn better with Matlab/Octave than with R or Python is the kind of observation that takes a combination of knowledge, effort and caring about teaching.
- BoiledCabbage 6y ago
  I could be wrong, but I think it has nothing to do with that, and now to do with the course being so old that R and Python weren't the standard ML languages yet.
  - shuckles 6y ago
    You are right. Recent offerings of the course are in Python: cs229.Stanford.edu.
    - budoso 6y ago
      I still think that for learning the math behind ml Matlab still makes the most sense though. It takes the focus off the programming itself and enforces the matrix concepts. Although python is the undisputed king in that regard so unfortunately it makes more sense to teach that
      - omarhaneef 6y ago
        This is probably right. But I am surprised there isn’t a python library that is equally expressive.
    - xenocyon 6y ago
      That's not the entire explanation for Ng's use of Octave though. At the birth of Coursera in 2012, R and Python were already clearly established in the field of data science. R was the dominant open-source language for data science, with Python very close behind (and already gaining ascendancy among folks who identified with "machine learning" rather than "data science"). I remember Matlab/Octave being more associated with academics/students in EE (signal processing, wireless communications, and the like); if you want clear insight into matrix operations, Octave is great. I think Ng made a very conscious decision at the time to eschew built-in functions and not get distracted by trendy languages - hence the use of Octave to learn how to implement algorithms at the most basic linear-algebra level. Even at the time his decision was not well understood nor popular - way back then I remember people asking "Why Octave instead of R or Python?"
qorrect 6y ago
I can still hear him saying multivariate. Amazing course.
Triv888 6y ago
it was mentioned 3 hours ago (by you)
rich_sasha 6y ago
Interesting, I found the course disappointingly shallow. I did do it soon after it came out, maybe it got much better with time. I also have a background / job in statistics, though not ML as such. While it does talk through the basics of ML, it is really barely a taster. It doesn’t leave you with any skills, other than, if you buy a book and work through it, you will know what a “decision tree” is ahead of time. With something like ML, the real value is in the deep nitty gritty, building intuition about methods you use, fighting the unfair battle against broken data etc, and all those things were missing to me.
- Rapzid 6y ago
  Have you tried the deep learning courses? They steer away from statistics and proofs, but all the math required to build a convoluted network is covered. Lib use is very low level at first; not too far removed from doing it all from scratch it you really wanted to waste the time.
  - rich_sasha 6y ago
    I haven’t done the deep learning courses, only the Machine Learning one.
  - rskirkpatrick 6y ago
    I have as well. I wish it would have been a little more challenging but in the end, I still learned a lot.
kdmitry 6y ago
This was the first course I did on Coursera and it is by far the best introductary course for machine learning I have ever seen, but my sample size is pretty small ;)
- amiyokc 6y ago
  I agree it's the best out there from the few that I've see that gives you fantastic intuition into what's going on. I see it as the best "invitation-to-further-exploration" available.
- shp0ngle 6y ago
  It's good, but also very, very introductory.
exyi 6y ago
Just btw, I find a machine learning course at Charles University by Milan Straka better (deeper, more entertaining). Maybe I have bias, I'm studying at that school. "Thanks" to COVID, it's online and public - https://ufal.mff.cuni.cz/courses/npfl129/2021-winter#lectures https://ufal.mff.cuni.cz/courses/npfl129/2021-winter#lecture.... You'd be interested in the EN lectures, CZ stands for Czech. You just won't get any certification, of course.

by Nowado 6y ago

iou 6y ago

Yes!! Though I did it a long time ago and I'm not sure if it's been modernised for current ML norms?

Nowado 6y ago
AFAIK it wasn't. Ng just makes new courses for new methods. That said, I'm yet to see better coverage of that topics (If someone knows, I'd really like to get them. I forget pieces every now and then, and having more efficient refresh method is always welcome).
- visarga 6y ago
  I hope everyone was referring to Andrew's blackboard course: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UzxYlbK2c7E&list=PLA89DCFA6ADACE599 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UzxYlbK2c7E&list=PLA89DCFA6A... instead of the one that started Coursera: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPLop4L2eGk&list=PLLssT5z_DsK-h9vYZkQkYNWcItqhlRJLN https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPLop4L2eGk&list=PLLssT5z_Ds...

omarhaneef 6y ago

I appreciate his attention to pedagogy. Even small things like noticing that students learn better with Matlab/Octave than with R or Python is the kind of observation that takes a combination of knowledge, effort and caring about teaching.

BoiledCabbage 6y ago
I could be wrong, but I think it has nothing to do with that, and now to do with the course being so old that R and Python weren't the standard ML languages yet.
- shuckles 6y ago
  You are right. Recent offerings of the course are in Python: cs229.Stanford.edu.
  - budoso 6y ago
    I still think that for learning the math behind ml Matlab still makes the most sense though. It takes the focus off the programming itself and enforces the matrix concepts. Although python is the undisputed king in that regard so unfortunately it makes more sense to teach that
    - omarhaneef 6y ago
      This is probably right. But I am surprised there isn’t a python library that is equally expressive.
  - xenocyon 6y ago
    That's not the entire explanation for Ng's use of Octave though. At the birth of Coursera in 2012, R and Python were already clearly established in the field of data science. R was the dominant open-source language for data science, with Python very close behind (and already gaining ascendancy among folks who identified with "machine learning" rather than "data science"). I remember Matlab/Octave being more associated with academics/students in EE (signal processing, wireless communications, and the like); if you want clear insight into matrix operations, Octave is great. I think Ng made a very conscious decision at the time to eschew built-in functions and not get distracted by trendy languages - hence the use of Octave to learn how to implement algorithms at the most basic linear-algebra level. Even at the time his decision was not well understood nor popular - way back then I remember people asking "Why Octave instead of R or Python?"

qorrect 6y ago

I can still hear him saying multivariate. Amazing course.

Triv888 6y ago

it was mentioned 3 hours ago (by you)

rich_sasha 6y ago

Interesting, I found the course disappointingly shallow. I did do it soon after it came out, maybe it got much better with time. I also have a background / job in statistics, though not ML as such. While it does talk through the basics of ML, it is really barely a taster. It doesn’t leave you with any skills, other than, if you buy a book and work through it, you will know what a “decision tree” is ahead of time. With something like ML, the real value is in the deep nitty gritty, building intuition about methods you use, fighting the unfair battle against broken data etc, and all those things were missing to me.

Rapzid 6y ago
Have you tried the deep learning courses? They steer away from statistics and proofs, but all the math required to build a convoluted network is covered. Lib use is very low level at first; not too far removed from doing it all from scratch it you really wanted to waste the time.
- rich_sasha 6y ago
  I haven’t done the deep learning courses, only the Machine Learning one.
- rskirkpatrick 6y ago
  I have as well. I wish it would have been a little more challenging but in the end, I still learned a lot.

kdmitry 6y ago

This was the first course I did on Coursera and it is by far the best introductary course for machine learning I have ever seen, but my sample size is pretty small ;)

amiyokc 6y ago
I agree it's the best out there from the few that I've see that gives you fantastic intuition into what's going on. I see it as the best "invitation-to-further-exploration" available.
shp0ngle 6y ago
It's good, but also very, very introductory.

exyi 6y ago

Just btw, I find a machine learning course at Charles University by Milan Straka better (deeper, more entertaining). Maybe I have bias, I'm studying at that school. "Thanks" to COVID, it's online and public - https://ufal.mff.cuni.cz/courses/npfl129/2021-winter#lectures https://ufal.mff.cuni.cz/courses/npfl129/2021-winter#lecture.... You'd be interested in the EN lectures, CZ stands for Czech. You just won't get any certification, of course.