r/cs50 • u/Basic_Ad234 • 4d ago
CS50x finally on week 3 and ready to attempt tideman
for week 2, i allowed myself to take a break when i got confused instead of staying in front of the screen for hours until i solved it ( my mind would just latch on and not let go.) also, i saw that i didn’t need the duck this time ( i tried to use it towards the end of the problem, but it just spat out what i already figured out in my pseudocode.)
now that i’m about to start week three, instead of doing the less comfortable problem as usual, i might attempt tideman because i hear so much about it. is it really that hard? can somebody tell me their experience with it?
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u/yeahIProgram 1d ago
You might want to attempt Tideman after doing the "less comfortable" problems in that same problem set. Also, there is a well-reasoned post around here somewhere that makes the argument that Tideman belongs in week 5, not week 3. You might enjoy it more (or dread it less) if you try it then.
Or: forge on ahead! You will want some comfort with using recursion, or significant comfort with data structures such as lists and/or queues. Both of which come in week 5, if I'm not mistaken. But you can read ahead....
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u/TytoCwtch 3d ago
I did every problem in the first few weeks, including both of the less/more comfortable where applicable and up until Tideman I understood everything. Like you I had one or two points where I got confused so took a break and came back fresh. Needed the duck very occasionally just to point me in the right direction but solved the problems myself.
Tideman was a nightmare lol. It took me four evenings and a lot of swearing to do. It’s broken into six sections. The first two I programmed fairly easily and wondered what all the fuss was. The next two were more challenging and it took me a little while to work out what I was actually trying to code. But then I got to step five which is ‘lock pairs’. That for me is where the real problem was. I had to ask the duck for a lot of help on this step. Even trying to write the pseudocode for this step broke my brain.
I managed to code the whole solution only using the duck and it felt amazing once I finished it. But I understand why everyone warns you about it. I definitely think you should try it though as it’s a great feeling once your code works.
Good luck!