3 ms·

Just out of curiosity, which school did you go to that provides a 3-semester long AI course? Seems like you'd be able to go into quite a bit of depth there.

• bevan 14y ago
  I went to Middlebury. There was an AI class, but the 3 semesters were research with my late professor Tim Huang. The department at Middlebury was small, but I doubt that I could have received a better CS education elsewhere. The opportunity to do one-on-one interesting research so early in my college career was invaluable. All three semesters were Go-related, but I didn't focus on the same thing during each. The first summer was spent scoping the lay of the land. Reading the papers, implementing naive "improvements", and a lot of testing. Our best result was achieved by implementing someone else's we'd read in a paper. It was a humbling experience. The second semester started with finding ways to visualize the algorithm in action. Since the improvements were so nonintuitive I felt I had to find a better way to understand how it worked and what my changes were doing. Easier said than done. The third semester was more varied. I did more testing and playing with parameters. I also ported a version to the iPhone (we wanted to be the first and best on there- this was before ios 2 was released). Then my professor and I started a company that was initially related to Go and iPhones but later pivoted substantially several times. I'm very thankful for the opportunities I had at Middlebury and the chance to work with Tim Huang.
  • int3 14y ago
    Sounds like a great education. I've been meaning to explore the research opportunities at my school; hopefully they will work out as well as yours did. Thanks for sharing, and sorry to hear about your loss.