6 ms·

coursera is killing me with courses I want to take.

by riggins 13y ago

DannoHung 13y ago
I just wish you could take the classes at your own pace. I'm getting very little out of the "certifications" or whatever. And the TA's/Discussion forums tend towards pretty useless because of how disorganized they are.
- srom 13y ago
  Download the resources and you'll be able to take the class at your own pace. There are several tools for that purpose on github. e.g this one: https://github.com/dgorissen/coursera-dl https://github.com/dgorissen/coursera-dl As a special gift, it's allow you to archive the courses for later review.
  - dombili 13y ago
    Another note: If you can't make that tool work (I know I couldn't), you can also use something like DownloadThemAll. It works great.
  - DannoHung 13y ago
    Mainly I just want the graders to stay up. I've taken 2 programming courses and having the auto-grader feedback really helps in figuring out how I'm doing assignments incorrectly.
    - pallandt 13y ago
      I think the main reason why any reasonably complex grader is not allowed to run after the course has officially finalized is cost(s). While for users it's free to take the course, the offering company probably has to pay fees to whatever IaaS they're using to run the grader(s). I would imagine to make it 'cost-effective' for their purposes, they'd be interested in as many people as possible benefiting from the grader's functionality if they're being charged by the hour for example or some other block-allocation unit. I would suggest giving Udacity a try as well. Most of their courses do not have deadlines. For example, here is a great course they offer on web development: https://www.udacity.com/course/cs253 https://www.udacity.com/course/cs253 , co-authored by one of the Hipmunk and Reddit creators.
      - DannoHung 13y ago
        I'll take "Features I'd be Willing to Pay For" for $100 please, Alex.
- fantnn 13y ago
  Agree 100%, it's maddening. A lot of the people that would get the most out of these courses don't have time to adhere to a strict schedule like they expect you too. I wonder if it has to do with colleges realizing just how disruptive it could be to there business model.
  - jjindev 13y ago
    At some point they must cycle (with TAs?), right? How else to amortize fixed costs?
  - dimfox 13y ago
    Couple months ago, I met Andrew Ng at a meet up and asked him why there's deadline for the courses (comparing to Udacity model). He said they did a study, courses with deadlines tends to have more students. I found that it's very plausible. I still have couple of Udacity classes half finished, thinking I can always come back later, while working furiously on Coursera's deadlines...
- dorkrawk 13y ago
  I've done this with Coursera classes. I just sign up for them so that they're always saved in "My Courses" and go through the video lectures at my leisure. I miss the grading and a lot of the live discussion, but the notes and lectures are certainly valuable.
  - tomku 13y ago
    It's worth noting that some classes do actually disable access to the lectures and course site for students after a cut-off date. I can't speak for all of the classes from these schools, but all the classes I've taken from Princeton, Johns Hopkins and U-Penn through Coursera do that. They do allow you to download the videos, so if you're planning on taking a class from one of those schools at your own pace, just be sure to download the lecture videos and slides before the end date.
  - te_chris 13y ago
    The problem with that is not all of them actually stay open when they're completed. I've tried that too but have found a couple have actually closed when I was finally ready to take the lectures.
- michaelrbock 13y ago
  Being able to go at your own pace (and course content quality) is why I think Udacity is a better course provider than Coursera (even though Udacity is clearly loosing in market share).
- wcbeard10 13y ago
  I believe their Discrete optimization course is at least somewhat self-paced. [1] Also, not sure if all of the Stanford/edX courses are, but Medical Stats is, and it's been really helpful for keeping my attention. [1] https://www.coursera.org/course/optimization https://www.coursera.org/course/optimization [2] medstats.class.stanford.edu

coursera is killing me with courses I want to take.

by riggins 13y ago

coursera is killing me with courses I want to take.

I just wish you could take the classes at your own pace. I'm getting very little out of the "certifications" or whatever. And the TA's/Discussion forums tend towards pretty useless because of how disorganized they are.

srom 13y ago
Download the resources and you'll be able to take the class at your own pace. There are several tools for that purpose on github. e.g this one: https://github.com/dgorissen/coursera-dl https://github.com/dgorissen/coursera-dl As a special gift, it's allow you to archive the courses for later review.
- dombili 13y ago
  Another note: If you can't make that tool work (I know I couldn't), you can also use something like DownloadThemAll. It works great.
- DannoHung 13y ago
  Mainly I just want the graders to stay up. I've taken 2 programming courses and having the auto-grader feedback really helps in figuring out how I'm doing assignments incorrectly.
  - pallandt 13y ago
    I think the main reason why any reasonably complex grader is not allowed to run after the course has officially finalized is cost(s). While for users it's free to take the course, the offering company probably has to pay fees to whatever IaaS they're using to run the grader(s). I would imagine to make it 'cost-effective' for their purposes, they'd be interested in as many people as possible benefiting from the grader's functionality if they're being charged by the hour for example or some other block-allocation unit. I would suggest giving Udacity a try as well. Most of their courses do not have deadlines. For example, here is a great course they offer on web development: https://www.udacity.com/course/cs253 https://www.udacity.com/course/cs253 , co-authored by one of the Hipmunk and Reddit creators.
    - DannoHung 13y ago
      I'll take "Features I'd be Willing to Pay For" for $100 please, Alex.
fantnn 13y ago
Agree 100%, it's maddening. A lot of the people that would get the most out of these courses don't have time to adhere to a strict schedule like they expect you too. I wonder if it has to do with colleges realizing just how disruptive it could be to there business model.
- jjindev 13y ago
  At some point they must cycle (with TAs?), right? How else to amortize fixed costs?
- dimfox 13y ago
  Couple months ago, I met Andrew Ng at a meet up and asked him why there's deadline for the courses (comparing to Udacity model). He said they did a study, courses with deadlines tends to have more students. I found that it's very plausible. I still have couple of Udacity classes half finished, thinking I can always come back later, while working furiously on Coursera's deadlines...
dorkrawk 13y ago
I've done this with Coursera classes. I just sign up for them so that they're always saved in "My Courses" and go through the video lectures at my leisure. I miss the grading and a lot of the live discussion, but the notes and lectures are certainly valuable.
- tomku 13y ago
  It's worth noting that some classes do actually disable access to the lectures and course site for students after a cut-off date. I can't speak for all of the classes from these schools, but all the classes I've taken from Princeton, Johns Hopkins and U-Penn through Coursera do that. They do allow you to download the videos, so if you're planning on taking a class from one of those schools at your own pace, just be sure to download the lecture videos and slides before the end date.
- te_chris 13y ago
  The problem with that is not all of them actually stay open when they're completed. I've tried that too but have found a couple have actually closed when I was finally ready to take the lectures.
michaelrbock 13y ago
Being able to go at your own pace (and course content quality) is why I think Udacity is a better course provider than Coursera (even though Udacity is clearly loosing in market share).
wcbeard10 13y ago
I believe their Discrete optimization course is at least somewhat self-paced. [1] Also, not sure if all of the Stanford/edX courses are, but Medical Stats is, and it's been really helpful for keeping my attention. [1] https://www.coursera.org/course/optimization https://www.coursera.org/course/optimization [2] medstats.class.stanford.edu