   What is involved in thermodynamics, how evil is it?
  Next year, I am going in university, in computer science. Here, if you want to do computer science, you have to go through generic engineering classes. This includes things like calculus 3, thermodynamics and chemistry for engineers. I keep hearing rumors about how evil and tough thermodynamics is, and how 80% of the students fail the course, and eventually abandon computer science completely because of that. I must mention that I live in Canada, so things might not be the same way in the US, or even in other Canadian provinces than mine.One question remains: What is thermodynamics? What does it involve... I have a vague idea, that it somehow talks about the... movement of heat... But what is involved? What kinds of calculation, how is that class divided, how difficult is it? Do that many people fail it?   Looking for a serious game project?www.xgameproject.com
  It''s basically PV=nRT on steroids, or ''How your car''s engine works, and why a turbocharger makes it go faster''. It''s tough, but interesting. At least, it was interesting until four weeks into the course it turned into ''how to read your steam tables'' and I lost interest (and a lot of marks)... hopefully in Canada the course doesn''t turn into ''applied thermodynamics for steam turbine engineers''. ;quote:Original post by Max_Payne  I keep hearing rumors about how evil and tough thermodynamics is, and how 80% of the students fail the course, and eventually abandon computer science completely because of that. I heard the same stuff about C++. YOU CAN DO IT! YOU CAN DO IT ALL NIGHT LONG! ;  In Belgium you get thermodynamics as well if you do engineer, I had it both in a seperate course called "thermodynamics" and also in chemistry... but it wasn''t all that hard.  Probably depends on the university and the prof. ;  Does it involve many many complicated integrals?   Looking for a serious game project?www.xgameproject.com;quote:Original post by Max_Payne  Does it involve many many complicated integrals?It can, but probably won''t.  Mostly a lot of adding and getting data from eight gajillion different charts.  Each of which have metric and US versions, and none of which can be used alone.  They all fit together like some insane puzzle.CM ;  No clue. Thermodynamics wasn't required for CompSci at my school. That said, it may not be the subject itself, so much as that particular class. At the university I attended, "Architecture and Assembly Language" had a 50% fail rate. Why? Because the professor was a... ahh. Ahem. I can't remember if GameDev mods are fussy about language. Well, anyhow, he failed students because he wanted   to fail students, and he structured his course accordingly. I suspect the department let him get away with it because they had to have some   way to narrow the field -- freshman classes were huge. This professor and his Assembly class were just a convenient way of eliminating some of the less bright and less persistant students.I took the equivalent of his class at another college, where I could get credit through the local Five-College system, and learn from a teacher who wanted to teach me, not fail me. Odds are, that doesn't help you much... but I think you're headed in the right direction. Forewarned is forearmed... just find out as much as you can, and go in expecting to work harder than normal. A lot of that 80% probably didn't know there was an "80%," going in. If you can juggle your schedule so that you've got some light-weight classes that semester, and not, say, two other engineering requirements, that'll help.Finally, one failing grade isn't the end of the world. Well, unless things work differently in Canada.  But presumably you could retake it, and have a much better shot at passing it the second time around.Good luck.   "Sweet, peaceful eyelash spiders! Live in love by the ocean of my eyes!" - Jennifer Diane Reitz [edited by - Logodae on March 22, 2004 10:02:07 PM];  I''m not in college, but when I did thermodynamics stuff in my physics class getting data from tables and putting it into equations, usually equations that weren''t very nice.  I can see from the other posts that it''s probably not a lot different in college. ;  There is more to thermodynamics than looking stuff up in tables.Otherwise the Homer Simpson quote (when Lisa makes a propetual motion machine), "In MY house, we obey the laws of thermodynamics," wouldn''t make much sense.It, in a nutshell is basically comprised of:Energy cannot be created nor destroyed.In most machines, there is a good ammount of waste heat produced.Objects require a small ammount of energy to melt/evaporate/submission.Objects require a small ammount of energy to combust (my favourite part of chemistry).Chemicals require a certain ammount of energy to start a reaction--sometimes it is just stirring, sometimes it is half the blocks power supply (which I am very sorry for).Once you are well versed in theory, then you should start looking stuff up in tables, and it will make sense too!   -=-DakeDesu :: More woman than you can handle... wait, does this signature make me look fat?Variables Coming sometime in the near future. Yes! Before Duke Nukem Forever comes out (quit asking that!)Sliced Bread I really need to do more coding on thisOkay, love you, goodbye! ;quote:It can, but probably won''t. Mostly a lot of adding and getting data from eight gajillion different charts. Each of which have metric and US versions, and none of which can be used alone. They all fit together like some insane puzzle.Thats reassuring. Here we *very rarely* bother with american units, the only unit we''ve ever used is the "horsepower" for problems related to energy. If there are no tough integrals, then it shouldnt be that difficult, mostly a matter of knowing what you''re doing and how to do it.   Looking for a serious game project?www.xgameproject.com