William Farmer - McMaster University, Hamilton, ON

Professor: William Farmer

Department: Software Engineering

College: McMaster University, Hamilton, ON

Rating # 1

Overview:

• Course: CAS701
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 1.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: No
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: No
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Terrible. Half semester wasted with no direction on textbook. Then penalizes for trivial stuff. Come on, let us get good examples to work with so that it is Complete waste of time. Avoid course as has ZERO increment in knowledge. Forces you to use LaTex which is a pain to use and days are wasted on it.

Rating # 2

Overview:

• Course: 1JC3
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: No
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Be careful with the second test!!

Rating # 3

Overview:

• Course: COMPSCI1JC3
• Grade Received: B+
• Overall Rating: 1.0
• Course Difficulty: 5.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: No
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

1a good program is the program satisfy all the requirement, then giving subjective mark for coding assignment.2"no official textbook", but his pdf include no knowledge basically, "google yourself"4sharing his life story, emphasize Education delivers marks, but marks do not deliver education Don't take if you care mark.

Rating # 4

Overview:

• Course: 1JC3
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 5.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: Yes
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Very passionate. Great course if you actually want to get better at coding, but wouldn't recommend as an easy elective.

Rating # 5

Overview:

• Course: ENG1D04
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 2.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: No
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Very hard tests, considering what is taught in class and tutorials. He once claimed he just wanted to teach us the basics of programming, rather than questions specific to a language. Following this, I asked him why he made his tests so specific to the small nuances of Python syntax, & he avoided my question. Hard course if you don't have prev. exp

Rating # 6

Overview:

• Course: 1D04
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 2.5
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

The lectures are dry and boring but you have to go or you lose serious marks. Is a very confusing course if you don't know what you're doing beforehand and don't put in the work.

Rating # 7

Overview:

• Course: ENG1D04
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 1.0
• Course Difficulty: 5.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Worst Prof. Lectures are of little help in learning programming. Course should be renamed to "Computing History and Nomenclature". Attendance is also marked which is just unnecessary. Also course is worth 4 credits making it one of the most expensive courses, but the student gets very value back.

Rating # 8

Overview:

• Course: 1D04
• Grade Received: A
• Overall Rating: 3.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Famers lectures really seem useless, and he drills in the history of computer science way to much for an intro course. Not many of us will be software engineers Farmer! Also the automarker software used for lab feels very hit and miss.

Rating # 9

Overview:

• Course: ENG1D04
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 1.0
• Course Difficulty: 5.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Really tough for beginners , attendance is mandatory which sucks because they are really useless anyway. Not enough practice questions available , no past tests or exams available.

Rating # 10

Overview:

• Course: 1D04
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 3.0
• Course Difficulty: 1.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

The only criticism I have is that attendance is marked. For students who have done software before this was the most boring class ever to sit through, and it was always in the evening.

Rating # 11

Overview:

• Course: ENG1D04
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Very organized slideshows. Be prepared to know some random trivia from lectures for the tests.

Rating # 12

Overview:

• Course: ENG1D04
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 1.0
• Course Difficulty: 5.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

:(

Rating # 13

Overview:

• Course: SWENG2S03
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 1.5
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

Spends the majority of lectures sharing (irrelevant) anecdotes instead of teaching, and skims over important areas (while offering poor notes on top). Often dismisses student corrections to his errors, only to admit he was wrong the following week. This creates lots of confusion.

Rating # 14

Overview:

• Course: ENG1D04
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 2.0
• Course Difficulty: 5.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

A terrible prof. Lectures are very slow and difficult to understand for new programmers. Farmer tends to drift off topic easily, and tells jokes that simply aren't funny. Marks are deducted for missed lectures, which is ridiculous when there are also labs (3h) and tutorials (2h) for this class. Tests are also unnecessarily hard.

Rating # 15

Overview:

• Course: ENG1D04
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 1.5
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

Respectfully his classes are garbage, he is boring, confusing and easily diverts his attention from 1 place to another. Class thus doesn't pay attention and as a programmer I don't think he is doing a good job in teaching the course.!

Rating # 16

Overview:

• Course: CAS701
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

Bill is a pretty good prof. He tried to simplify an extremely difficult area for those new to it. More verbose notes would be useful considering that no textbook was recommended for some key topics of the course. The examples provided in class are important for newbies to logic.

Rating # 17

Overview:

• Course: SFWR4C03
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.0
• Course Difficulty: 2.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

Tests are dead easy. A good chunk of your grade is for attendance, but he tells such great stories that it's worth it.

Rating # 18

Overview:

• Course: SE2F03
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 2.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: N/A
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

He is neither talented nor a helpful prof. He penalizes for not going to class which is a torment. Messes up while doing problems on board or does it in a complicated manner. Lost interest after going to a few classes. Who let him be a prof??????

Rating # 19

Overview:

• Course: CAS701
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 2.0
• Course Difficulty: 5.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: N/A
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

If you wish to have life for the first term in McMaster, don't take it...He's really very strict with marking.

Rating # 20

Overview:

• Course: SE3I03
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 5.0
• Course Difficulty: 1.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: N/A
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Farmer is a cool prof. 3I is real easy... don't even need to go to class except for the fact that attendance is taken. Stories about the Mad City rock.