Go Learn Some Stuff: Free College Lectures

[No Limit]

I found this over the weekend when messing around with mediaportal's streaming videos. And this is totally awesome, full semester long lectures on virtually every subject from such universities as Yale, Stanford, UCLA, as well as others:

http://academicearth.org/subjects/

I wasn't aware of this, some of you might have been, but I figured it was worth a post.

 

[Krynn72]

Holy shit. You are God for finding this No Limit. There's some fantastic stuff in there.

 

[Raziaar]

Computer science. **** yeah. In the past I think I started a thread or somebody else did on a matter similar to this, but the videos were kind of limited. Hopefully this isn't as limited as those ones in the past.

Also the video footage in those ones in the past made it hard to learn. Bad quality/angle and stuff.

 

[StarBob]

Wow... I'm at work so I can't really check it out, but this is pretty nice. I can brush up on some of the computer science crap I ignored early on and learn something new.

 

[Shem]

Well, this is neat.

 

[Krynn72]

Watching an hour and 12 minute video on the Colosseum and Contemporary Architecture in Rome.

**** YEAH

 

[No Limit]

Computer science. **** yeah. In the past I think I started a thread or somebody else did on a matter similar to this, but the videos were kind of limited. Hopefully this isn't as limited as those ones in the past.

Also the video footage in those ones in the past made it hard to learn. Bad quality/angle and stuff.

These are full semester long courses. So you get what you would get from the classroom aside from any hand out materials. I also didn't have any major issues with quality although sometimes when they used the screen in the electrical engineering courses it was a bit hard to see but didn't degrade the lecture in anyway.

 

[Raziaar]

These are full semester long courses. So you get what you would get from the classroom aside from any hand out materials. I also didn't have any major issues with quality although sometimes when they used the screen in the electrical engineering courses it was a bit hard to see but didn't degrade the lecture in anyway.

Yeah. I'm excited about this. I've tried finding full semester courses for computer science in the past, but have had no luck. But now I can watch. YAY!

 

[Raziaar]

I'm confused. This computer programming course is called CS106a.

I've never been to college, never understood the naming conventions. 106a makes me believe I'm like... not where I should be, even though the lecturer says you don't really need any prior knowledge for the course except knowing how to turn a computer on. I mean, obviously I'm far beyond that at the moment, but where can I find a list of previous courses that I may want to look into first?

Or do the numbers not mean a whole lot? He briefly mentions CS105 and CS106x... and then CS106B He's describing them briefly, but uhh...


EDIT: Whoops double post.

 

[Warped]

All info should be free imo. its the teaching service in America at least that has been out of hand with running obscene salaries and everyone is greedy these days. I stopped going to school because it was costing way too much for my budget but someday I may go back to a community college and finish my Criminal Justice/Computer Information Systems Degree

 

[No Limit]

You can get a description of Stanford's courses here, cs stands for computer sciences:

http://cs.stanford.edu/courses/

anything 100-199 is for undergraduate which should be right up your alley. If you watch the introduction video they should also explain what you need to know to take the class, if he just gives the course numbers as you suggested above you should be able to find those courses on the above link to see what they cover. CS105 for example is introduction to computers which I'm sure you don't need.

Normally they have course catalogs that show you a road map for which courses you should take when for a perticular degree but I can't seem to find that on the Stanford website, I would assume it has to be on there somewhere.

 

[Warped]

You can get a description of Stanford's courses here, cs stands for computer sciences:

http://cs.stanford.edu/courses/

anything 100-199 is for undergraduate which should be right up your alley. If you watch the introduction video they should also explain what you need to know to take the class, if he just gives the course numbers as you suggested above you should be able to find those courses on the above link to see what they cover. CS105 for example is introduction to computers which I'm sure you don't need.

Normally they have course catalogs that show you a road map for which courses you should take when for a perticular degree but I can't seem to find that on the Stanford website, I would assume it has to be on there somewhere.

I took one of those introductory courses in College and it was mandatory, I think I learned like 5 new things the entire class but they were just new hotkeys or something. Such a waste of my $500

 

[Ravioli]

Thx for sharing, great stuff.

 

[Viperidae]

All info should be free imo. its the teaching service in America at least that has been out of hand with running obscene salaries and everyone is greedy these days.

If you spent 10 years getting a masters degree, how much would you expect to be paid once you started working?

 

[MJ12]

Was excited. Then I looked at how few videos there are

Still a cool idea.

 

[No Limit]

Was excited. Then I looked at how few videos there are

Still a cool idea.

I guess it depends on the topic. But the topics I looked at (electrical engineering and physics) there seem to be enough classes on there for you to learn a lot of new things.

 

[Warped]

If you spent 10 years getting a masters degree, how much would you expect to be paid once you started working?

I'm talking about knowledge in general. everything is on lockdown

 

[Raziaar]

This guy who is doing this Computer Science 106a class is great. I mean it's an easy easy easy class, but the way he speaks and teaches makes it enjoyable. Certainly not a Ben Stein of the teaching world.

And he speaks with such a clarity that I really like. I haven't had to pause and go back in the video to replay a part because I didn't understand what he said... which I have to do quite frequently in movies or whatever due to some hearing issues when people don't speak entirely clearly.

 

[No Limit]

Are you actually learning good stuff from it? I'm currently watching the physics and electrical engineering lectures but the math in there is killing me. I wouldn't mind watching some of the programming lectures so I could expend my knowledge to making actual C applications instead of the interpreted language applications I've been doing all these years (memory management and the concept of interrupts always fried my brain).

 

[Raziaar]

I haven't learned anything new from it yet, since I know this stuff and a lot more. I'm going through it all anyway though. At some point he'll throw around some concepts and methodologies I might not have heard of, in which case I will learn.

And this is Java too, not C#, but they're so similar in syntax it doesn't bother me that much.

 

[Krynn72]

All info should be free imo. its the teaching service in America at least that has been out of hand with running obscene salaries and everyone is greedy these days. I stopped going to school because it was costing way too much for my budget but someday I may go back to a community college and finish my Criminal Justice/Computer Information Systems Degree

****ing communist!

 

[Solaris]

I agree, Education should be totally free and state funded. It would be fantastic for the economy. We could offer clever people from rival countries citizenship if they come over and teach for 5 years. We would educate our workforce and create a braindrain in the competition.

 

[Krynn72]

Nobody would teach if they weren't getting paid.

 

[Raziaar]

Check it.

I saw it as I was watching the course and so I recorded it. Amusing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcClguIXJoI

 

[Escaep]

I agree, Education should be totally free and state funded. It would be fantastic for the economy. We could offer clever people from rival countries citizenship if they come over and teach for 5 years. We would educate our workforce and create a braindrain in the competition.

Look at how our public schools are then rethink that.

 

[Viperidae]

Look at how our public schools are then rethink that.

Because the USA is the shining example of public education?

 

[Raziaar]

That was his point I think.

 

[Stigmata]

Nobody would teach if they weren't getting paid.

>state-funded

Also, the American public school system is a victim of bureaucracy, not socialism. It's constructed by a bunch of people who don't understand cause and effect, or the difference between correlation and causation.

 

[Asknoone]

Was excited. Then I looked at how few videos there are

Still a cool idea.

There's a boat load of lectures on Milton.

 

[Viperidae]

That was his point I think.

I get it. But that's like saying 'look it didn't work in one country out of dozens! it must fail 100% of the time!'

 

[Kaptain H]

If you spent 10 years getting a masters degree, how much would you expect to be paid once you started working?

Ugh, don't remind me.

 

[unozero]

I hate to say it...but thanks No Limit
I really should be going back to school myself...I'm only have like 8 units or so and I could at least have AA.

 

[MorganFreeman911]

+Rep Points to NoLimit. Have my babies.

 

[dfc05]

Mildly interested in watching the Chemical Engineering course. It looks a little like an intro course that I never took when I went through ChE because everyone knew it was a waste of time. From the topics, I am guessing they will go through all these applications that make you think that chemical engineers are special, or that they get to do cool things.

In my second ChE class, my prof went straight to the point and told us, exactly like this: "I'm going to tell you why chemical engineers are special. We separate things."

And that is the awful truth. So you have the chemical engineers that go work for companies like BP, and the chemical engineers that hate that stuff and go work for an environmental consulting company, only to find that even then you are still working for companies like BP. And so a portion of the class goes to med school or grad school (occasionally defecting to environmental engineering) or goes into random businesses like managing hotels (I knew a dude who did this).



Yeah... well if there are some good comp sci ones maybe I will take a look if I have time (which I don't ). I coincidentally stopped at the section on pointers in both Java and C++ five years ago. I probably don't remember anything in either of them.

 

[Raziaar]

Apparently this has been out for quite a while. I was beaten to uploading this by over 2 years

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mI5nQl67I7M




When I was in school, elementary and middle... I never really developed a bonding with my teachers and didn't understand it. I actually kind of loathed them. It's kind of weird, now that I'm an adult I do feel a sort of liking towards them, as I'm learning this stuff online.

I think this guy is pretty awesome, he makes learning the stuff fun. Jason Busby from 3dbuzz is another individual who I've sort of developed an affection for, for similar reasons.

 

[Raziaar]

Starting CS106b now. 106a was 95% of stuff I already knew.

I'm so psyched that I have the full CS106b(Programming Abstraction) course to cover, and then Programming Paradigms(CS whatever the hell it is).

This is all way more than I could have ever hoped for. I don't get the actual college experience or the benefits of it, but at least I can learn this stuff for free, at very professional level.

Woot.

EDIT: Dammit... double post.





Oh. Here's something of note. Trying to see if there were better quality videos of these lectures, I went to youtube.com/edu and found the lectures for the course I'm on, and the quality seems to be slightly better. I can read stuff a bit easier, it's a bit more crisp. It's like 240p to 360p or whatever.