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First Java AP Computer Science Exam Complete 812

Posted by timothy from the summer-approaches dept.
BlindSpy writes "Yesterday, Tuesday May 4th, high-school students all over the U.S. took the first-ever Advanced Placement Computer Science College Board exam based on Java. The exam is given as an opportunity for high-school students to earn college credit in programming. The test is based on whichever language colleges are looking for, which signifies a significant step for Java. In past years, the exam has been based on C++ (1 year) and Pascal (around 10 years)." If you took the exam, what were your impressions?
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First Java AP Computer Science Exam Complete More

First Java AP Computer Science Exam Complete

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  • Testing times (Score:5, Funny)

    by Neil Blender ( 555885 ) <neilblender@gmail.com> on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:02PM (#9067968)
    For C++ you get 3 hours. For the new Java test, you get all day.
  • The exam takes too long to complete, and requires way too much memory as well. They should go back to Pascal, as it was more efficient.

  • Language shouldn't matter! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ajiva ( 156759 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:04PM (#9067992)
    I don't see how the language should matter in these sorts of exams. Personally I rather have the AP test be questions about algorithms, ideas and concepts. Something like:

    1) Write PseudoCode for an AVL Tree
    2) Describe the benefits of a hashtable

    etc...

    No coding, just ideas that a smart student can take to any language, whether its Java or C++ or anything else.

    • Re:Language shouldn't matter! (Score:5, Funny)

      by addaon ( 41825 ) <addaon+slashdot.gmail@com> on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:08PM (#9068049)
      2) Describe the benefits of a hashtable

      it keeps your hash off the floor.

    • Re:Language shouldn't matter! (Score:4, Funny)

      by tedshultz ( 596089 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:09PM (#9068053)
      It's hard to write pseudo code in scantron bubles.... This is a good thing as multiple choice got me this far in life...

      • Re:Language shouldn't matter! (Score:4, Informative)

        by brsmith4 ( 567390 ) <.brsmith4. .at. .gmail.com.> on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:19PM (#9068166)
        The AP exams are not completely multiple choice. When I took it in '01, half the test was multiple choice, the other half was coding. We were supposed to use C++ to write functions that did matrix manipulations and sorts/searches using object-oriented concepts.

        Needless to say, at the time, I was completely inept when it came to programming and thoroughly failed the exam. A few years later and I'm fairly close to graduating with my CS degree. Those exams are shit in my opinion.
    • That doesn't really cover "first year" CS though.

      I would imagine that creators of AP tests are trying to test what a student entering university would test out of. At my alma matter, the first class was basically coding, then data structures, then algorithms and hashing, and so forth.

      The language seems unimportant to us because it is unimportant to us, but with no knowledge of any languages, how is a student to learn the rest?

    • Re:Language shouldn't matter! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Goyuix ( 698012 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:10PM (#9068065) Homepage
      The problem with this approach is it rules out an entire class of problems such as class B inherits from class A, has such and such static methods and member variables..... what is the output of this code?

      While writing code is somewhat less effective than perhaps discussing principles and theory, you certainly need a language as a base to "measure performance" in a test like this. Not that it isn't without its own set of problems, but it is a necessary evil. You need to have a base-line to measure objectively, something that is hard to nail down using just pseudo-code.
      • The problem with this approach is it rules out an entire class of problems such as class B inherits from class A, has such and such static methods and member variables..... what is the output of this code?

        Yes, but those aren't Computer Science problems, and they shouldn't be (and aren't) on this test. At best, they're problems suited for a prep-course for a technical certification. Specifically, the AP exam (as I remember it) deals with control flow, logic and data structures. Applying those principles re
    • > 2) Describe the benefits of a hashtable If you keep a hashtable, you know who's flat you've got to knock over when you really need a toke.
    • I'm doing International Baccalaureate Computer scicence, and it does that. You write your exam code in a pseudocode that an examiner can understand. The course also requires you to to write a program (of reasonably significant size for a HS student) and have that marked, but you can use any language you want since, ultimately, the code isn't what counts - it's the documentation and the algorithms. Implementation is just picky details.

      • Re:Language shouldn't matter! (Score:4, Insightful)

        by Lehk228 ( 705449 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:23PM (#9068211) Journal
        Implementation is just picky details. It's that sort of thinking that has led to the horribly bloated and slow apps we have today, loading applications and getting work done isn't any faster than it was in the 180mhz days

        • Re:Language shouldn't matter! (Score:5, Insightful)

          by IamTheRealMike ( 537420 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:44PM (#9068392)
          Yeah, I'd agree with that. To be frank, there's a huge gaping hole in the education market for courses that teach you how to write software. Computer Science is great and all, and I'm enjoying it, but I know that a lot of what I'm being taught is pretty useless.

          OS Design? Fascinating, but ultimately irrelevant for 99% of coders. Implementing your own hashtables? Useful to gain an insight into how they work, but virtually any development platform people work in except raw C these days will provide highly tuned and optimized hashtable implementations. If anything you shouldn't roll your own, as it'll make your code less readable, more bloated and probably slower.

          But it seems looking at the course material that important topics for writing real world software is simply not taught. Where are the lectures on writing internationalized code (think character encodings, flippable UI design etc). Where are the lectures on writing code with low startup overhead? What about teaching people the merits of various toolkits? Accessibility? Version control theory? (to be fair I think this is talked about at some point on my course, but I know some that don't)

          It's possible for a student to come out of a CompSci course and be unable to explain why a containment-based widget toolkit is better than a positional one, yet can talk about VM swapping algorithms and implementing the fastest hashtable probing all day. Which would you rather employ?

          • Re:Language shouldn't matter! (Score:5, Informative)

            by pclminion ( 145572 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @07:02PM (#9068565)
            It's possible for a student to come out of a CompSci course and be unable to explain why a containment-based widget toolkit is better than a positional one, yet can talk about VM swapping algorithms and implementing the fastest hashtable probing all day. Which would you rather employ?

            The one who understands the difference between computer science and software engineering?

            Would you hire a physicist to design a bridge? It would be insane.

            Quit bitching about CS and go to the field you should be studying: engineering. Any kind of engineering. Good engineering practices are the same across the different types of engineering. But to expect computer science students to learn these practices is ludicrous. That isn't the point of CS, it shouldn't be the point, and I hope to God it never becomes the point.

          • Re:Language shouldn't matter! (Score:5, Insightful)

            by pyite ( 140350 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @07:04PM (#9068588)
            OS Design? Fascinating, but ultimately irrelevant for 99% of coders. Implementing your own hashtables? Useful to gain an insight into how they work, but virtually any development platform people work in except raw C these days will provide highly tuned and optimized hashtable implementations. If anything you shouldn't roll your own, as it'll make your code less readable, more bloated and probably slower.

            No offense, but people like you are the reason I'm glad I didn't major in CS. If you can't see the value of OS design and learning how hash tables work, stop, do not pass go, do not collect your diploma, it's utterly wasted on you. I'm amazed at how many CS graduates I've spoken with that have never heard the name Donald Knuth or at least borrowed a copy of The Art of Computer Programming. The fact that Computer Science is a MATHEMATICAL SCIENCE seems to elude most people who'd rather worry about how good of programmers they are than about knowing how the hell things work. None of the coding I learned came from a school, and frankly, I'm quite happy about that, as too many schools are all about the "latest and greatest" technology. The AP exam is a PERFECT example. Not sure if This Fool [duke.edu] still has anything to do with AP CS, but his AP CS book was probably the worst computer related book I've ever read (littered with errors, for starters).

            It seems no one cares how things work. The "black box" analogy was emphasized in AP Computer Science from Day 1 when I took it. The worst possible thing you can be telling budding Computer Scientists is that we don't care how it works, it just does. That's fine when you've proven your ability to perform and are working in an environment where it's literally impossible to know how everything works. It's not acceptable, however, when you know nothing and the sole purpose of a course is to teach you. OK, I've gotten myself quite angry over this post, so I'm ending it now.
            • OS Design? Fascinating, but ultimately irrelevant for 99% of coders.

            Right. Most OS Design classes teach things like the difference between a process and a thread. Certianly no one needs to know that!

            • Implementing your own hashtables? Useful to gain an insight into how they work, but virtually any development platform people work in except raw C these days will provide highly tuned and optimized hashtable implementations. If anything you shouldn't roll your own, as it'll make your code less readable, m

          • Re:Language shouldn't matter! (Score:5, Insightful)

            by diamondsw ( 685967 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @07:12PM (#9068674)
            Quite simply, those people went into business, not teaching. Those who became professors are researchers, and as such teach the fundamentals, the algorithms, and such.

            I would wager, however, that the fundamentals they teach (good algorithm design, how OS's and programs work on a very low level, data structures, human-computer interaction) will give you the base to figure out these "day to day" things, whereas the day to day things will not help you with fundamentals. People with a rigorous computer science background learn to appreciate things like structured programming, extensibility, flexibility, planning, etc. These are what make a good software engineer for decades, as languages, platforms, etc change.

            International code is an interesting example. Everything you've mentioned is API-specific, so why should they waste their time teaching me that API when it will be dead in a few years? I can learn that from reference docs. However, they should remind me not to hard code numbers, values, formats, strings, etc, just as a good fundamental programming practice. If I do *that*, then I'm already prepared for international coding.

            So to answer your question, I'd much rather employ the person who knows how to think about all aspects of a software project, plan it up front, know how it's going to interact with its environment (and internally, with itself), and I'll buy a book for them on specific API's.

          • Re:Language shouldn't matter! (Score:5, Insightful)

            by Brandybuck ( 704397 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @07:15PM (#9068714) Homepage Journal
            What about teaching people the merits of various toolkits?

            When I see a university course entitled "GTK+ versus Qt", I'll quit programming entirely and move to some remote South Pacific island.

            In other words, keep your fscking holy wars to yourself. Students take classes in order to learn valuable knowledge and skill. NOT to be indoctrinated that the Qt license is going to kill commercial development or that the OO of GTK+ is an ugly hack or whatever else the current FUD from either side is.
    • Sadly, I don't think that AP Computer Science gets up to that level of algorithmic sophistication. At least it didn't 12 years ago (!) when I took the test in Pascal. I would have been a lot less bored in the class if it had. I don't remember much about the actual exam back then except that I thought it was easy, and got a 5. I think Java is a really sensible language to teach it in, though: less messy than C++, good exposure to object-oriented programming, and far more useful in the real world than Pas
    • Not a bad idea, but you're aiming WAY to high. These are high school programming classes, not Junion/Senior College level data structures and algorithms class. I'd imagine you'd get college credit for the low-level C++ or Java programming classes, which is kind of worthless since those classes aren't even part of a CSCI major where I went to school.

      • Re:Language shouldn't matter! (Score:4, Informative)

        by JimMcCusker ( 27543 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:23PM (#9068213) Homepage Journal
        That doesn't sound too good for your school. This stuff was discussed in my second CS class: Data Structures and Algorithms. Kinda important stuff, actually. By Junior/Senior levels, we were doing stuff with computer vision, operating systems theory, AI, computability, etc. Graph Theory was part of the third class (Formal Systems and Anlaysis), which included relational theory (write your owm RDBMS!), DFA/NDFA's, and Context Free Grammars. Most of this stuff we had to code our own implementations of, so we got an understanding of the basics. Data Structures is first-year Freshman stuff.

    • Re:Language shouldn't matter! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by skifreak87 ( 532830 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:20PM (#9068177)
      Or if they do want you to program, let you do it in one of several languages. In a software engineering course I just took, our prof would often make us do each assignment in a new language (one in C, one in Java, one in AWK). Consequently, I feel like I can pick up new languages rather easily which I feel is much more valuable than 5+ yrs coding in x-language which might dissapear in 5 years. I feel like CS exams should be about CS concepts, not specific programming languages. If you want to make students program, let them pick their fav lang for it (and if they pick C for something that'd be much easier in an OO-language, let them try).

      Make them describe concepts as opposed to just programming. Or in an algorithms/data structures class I took (very hard question), throw them an N^3 algorithm and a bunch of functoins they can us e (and the complexity for each) and make them improve the algorithm to be subquadratic and use at most quadratic space. Make them assess tradeoffs, explain concepts and demonstrate knowledge of WHY what they're doing is the best way/a good way instead of just knowing that it works.

    • I don't see how the language should matter in these sorts of exams. Personally I rather have the AP test be questions about algorithms, ideas and concepts. Something like:

      1) Write PseudoCode for an AVL Tree
      2) Describe the benefits of a hashtable

      etc...

      I never took this test (don't even know if it would've been available back in the late '80s), but I'd assume that it's designed to be a substitute for courses such as CSC 135 [unlv.edu]. Data structures get brought up in the next couple of classes (136 and 269),

  • Java? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by CowboyShit ( 777294 )
    Don't you mean Visual Java?

  • easy (Score:5, Informative)

    by will_urbanski ( 634501 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:04PM (#9067994)
    honestly, i didn't think it was that hard. If it was in C++ i would have spent much more time prepairing, but Java is so straight forward that I flew through the test without a lot of studying. Now, whether or not you have a decent teacher plays a lot into this. The questions weren't too hard or too complicated; even the more complicated ones had anwsers that could be eliminated after looking at it for a little while. I'm glad it was in Java-- C++ would have been a lot harder.

    • Re:easy (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Incoherent07 ( 695470 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:09PM (#9068058)
      Believe me, I took the test last year (the second level test), and it was a joke and a half. I finished each section with about half the time to spare. Realize that the AP subset of C++ ignored most of the features that aren't in Java... the case study might as well have been written in Java.

      And, as mentioned elsewhere in the thread probably, the AP CS exam is not really about concepts. Yes, they taught me a little bit of OOP design, but in the end it's based mostly on algorithms and how to use the language. I agree that this should not be the emphasis, but for better or worse, it's a "how to program" class, not an introductory CS class per se.

  • Rules (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:04PM (#9067996)
    REMINDER

    It is against the College Board rules to discuss the multiple choice problems EVER in your life, and you must wait 2 days after the date of the test to discuss the free response questions. Failure to adhere to CollegeBoard rules may result in invalidation of your scores, loss of privilege to take future AP exams, and legal action may be taken against you. (Those who take APs should be familiar with this statement)

    • Re:Rules (Score:5, Informative)

      by jdhutchins ( 559010 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:20PM (#9068183)
      Funny? He was being serious, people. They do say that, and FOR A REASON. Multiple choice questions are resued so that the College Board can compare how well people did year-to-year. The playing field should be level. Students who tried to cheat this way HAVE had legal action persued against them, and letters sent to the colleges where their scores were going to go saying "Sorry, no score for this kid, he cheated".

      You want the tests to be fair, and that's what the College Board wants. They make a LOT of money off of tests being fair.

      • Re:Rules (Score:5, Insightful)

        by pclminion ( 145572 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:36PM (#9068326)
        Multiple choice questions are resued so that the College Board can compare how well people did year-to-year.

        Which is a pointless endeavor, since people will share the test answers. Ever notice what happened the last time you told a teenager not to do something? Did they do what you told them? Wake up, man. Sitting around "hoping" that the kids won't talk is fucking delusional.

        The playing field should be level.

        Wow. If they manage to pull off a "level" playing field, they'll be the first to ever do so with a test like this. Face it, all tests are biased, and having students discussing the answers is just another form of bias. You plan for this, and deal with it.

        Students who tried to cheat this way HAVE had legal action persued against them

        First, if you consider the free discussion of test questions among students outside of the test-taking environment to be cheating, you have a truly draconian take on things. Second, unless the kids signed some kind of legally binding NDA, there is no law which could allow the College Board to prosecute them for any offense at all -- haven't you heard of the fucking First Amendment? Copyright can't stop them, since it is a fact that the answer to question #115 is letter D, and you cannot copyright a fact. And aren't some of these kids under 18 anyway? An NDA can't apply to them, since any contract they enter into is null and void.

        Basically the only recourse they have again people discussing the test is arbitrarily making their score zero. This is stupid, it denies reality, and is generally evil.

        • Re:Rules (Score:5, Informative)

          by Aneurysm9 ( 723000 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @07:03PM (#9068579)
          Copyright can't stop them, since it is a fact that the answer to question #115 is letter D, and you cannot copyright a fact.

          The problem with this reasoning is that these are "invented facts" as opposed to "discovered facts." It's a piddling difference, but "invented facts" are not covered by the 17 U.S.C. 102(b) [cornell.edu] bar. Check out CASTLE ROCK ENTERTAINMENT, INC. v. CAROL PUBLISHING GROUP, 150 F.3d 132 (2nd Cir. 1998) [cornell.edu] where a court found copyright infringement in a compilation of trivia about Seinfeld. The argument was made that it was nothing but a compilation of uncopyrightable facts about the series, but the court said that, because the facts were created by the seinfeld writers, they were protected.

        • Re:Rules (Score:3, Insightful)

          by Vexorg_q ( 216760 )
          Second, unless the kids signed some kind of legally binding NDA, there is no law which could allow the College Board to prosecute them for any offense at all -- haven't you heard of the fucking First Amendment? Copyright can't stop them, since it is a fact that the answer to question #115 is letter D, and you cannot copyright a fact. And aren't some of these kids under 18 anyway? An NDA can't apply to them, since any contract they enter into is null and void.


          Having just come from taking 2 ap tests in th

        • Re:Rules (Score:4, Informative)

          by Omerna ( 241397 ) <clbrewer@gmail.com> on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @09:28PM (#9069648) Homepage
          Standardized testing is big business in America now, so let me clue you in.

          1) The test has to start in a 30 minute time frame so that the East Coast is still in the testing room when the West Coast goes in (no emailing/ IMing/ text messaging answers across timezones).

          2) Multiple choice answers are released like 5 to 7 years after the test was administered. Free Response questions are given to the teachers (tests are administered at your school) the day of the exam as they aren't reused.

          3) What can happen to people who don't play by their rules? Try getting into college without taking the SATs (same people). None of your APs will count. Maybe you'll be sued, I don't know, but I DO know that your school's right to administer ANY AP EVER can and has been revoked.

          So as much as you'd like to think "that's crap" it isn't-- at least not legally.

        • Re:Rules (Score:3, Informative)

          by odin53 ( 207172 )
          There are a number of misconceptions about law and contracts with minors in your post and in the threads below.

          Contracts with minors are certainly not null and void; generally, they are both voidable and enforceable by the minor. This is why you don't want to enter into contracts with minors -- not because it's impossible to enter into a contract with them, but because the minor has all the power with respect to enforcing the contract.

          That said, the College Board doesn't really have to worry about whethe
  • Does the College Board have any way to normalize scores between tests given in different languages? Or are they only looking for relative scores among people taking the same tests?

  • All around.. (Score:2, Informative)

    by redhairedneo ( 531104 )
    Pretty good.

    I took AB, it covered all the topics pretty well, although I wish I had studied big-oh ALOT more, there were like 10 questions on it throughout the whole test.

    The difficulty level I thought was well within the grasp of any good student. The Part IIs I thought were particularly simple, I was expecting alot more, especially after what my review book was serving up...Yet the hardest thing was traversing some trees.

  • One year? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:05PM (#9068009)
    What's the story with C++ only being the test language for one year?

    I took the test five years ago and it was in C++. Did they switch back to Pascal or not give the test for a couple of years? Or (as seems more likely to me) is the Slashdot summary wrong?

  • It sucked (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:05PM (#9068010)
    Basically, the entire test was over ArrayList and recursion, the two things we spent perhaps a good ten minutes reviewing the whole year. Screw the college board for switching to Java. In fact, screw the college board in general. Basically, there are two questions I'll tell you (there's a lot of lame laws about not talking about the test, so you didn't see me do this) 1. How many times do you want to punch Leon Schram (author of "Exposure Java" CDROM book series) in the balls? (cirlce one) 1 2 3 4 5 The correct answer to that one is circling all of them. 12,345 times. 2. How many fists do you want to use in the acts described in question one? (free response) Basically write something about "all available limbs and body parts"

    • Re:It sucked (Score:3, Interesting)

      by blackmonday ( 607916 )
      I've been programming Enterprise Java for 4 years and I'm sure I would fail this test, since I don't know anything specific about either one of those terms. And yes, I'm a good programmer. Just a thought.

  • Language lengths (Score:5, Informative)

    by Jadsky ( 304239 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:07PM (#9068022)
    The test was converted to C++ in 1999. This means that C++ was the language of the test for a full five years, not just the one mentioned in the posting.

  • Java has become a standard in many schools (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Omega1045 ( 584264 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:07PM (#9068024)
    When I was doing CompSci (about 10 years ago), they were just switching from Pascal to C++. Many of the files at my fraternity were in Pascal (so much for those "references"). However, speaking with younger students that have worked for me over the last several years, more and more of them have been taking Java instead of C or C++, and many have never seen Pascal.

    Another thing that I have noticed is that a lot of students are also taking VB in college, and some of the windows based scripting languages based on it like ASP. I have also seen a lot of PHP experience. This is especially true of engineering, and compsci related courses (not hardcore compsci).

    I am surprised that the AP exam for Java wasn't around several years ago based on what I have seen in a variety of school via 2nd hand knowledge.

  • Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) * on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:07PM (#9068025)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • I really don't think Java is good as a first language myself. It does a lot of things for you, and that's not how you should be starting.

      A person who learns to code first in C learns a few fairly important things a Java programmer never needs to think about, and also some things that will make learning Java much easier. A C-experienced person going into Java understands what pointers are and how the use of pointers affects how Java works. They understand memory allocation and the need to deallocate the mem

  • Surprised I'm (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I was sure they were going to go with Forth this year.

  • I say great! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Rosco P. Coltrane ( 209368 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:08PM (#9068048)
    The more Java programmers the schooling system churns out, the more work for us old-style programmers who know C and assembler.

    You'd be surprised how much the industry is sick of Java programmers, and on the lookout for good low-level engineers, or people who can do Forth or COBOL.

    It's the current schooling system that allows me to keep a dot-com salary, so don't change anything for me thank you very much.

    • Re:I say great! (Score:3, Insightful)

      by agent dero ( 680753 )
      I beg to differ, it's GREAT that Java is being taught (i took the test, btw)

      It's a simple language (relative of course) and allows teachers to teach good concepts, such as, recursion, algorithms, and Object-oriented program.

      Honestly, if colleges were turning out graduates only with Java experience THEN you'd be right, but from my understanding, java is only freshman and sophmore level in college.


      Don't worry, i'm coming for your job anyways ;)

  • CLEP and Test Out (Score:4, Insightful)

    by _Sharp'r_ ( 649297 ) <sharper@@@booksunderreview...com> on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:09PM (#9068051) Homepage Journal
    The AP tests are decent, but it's been my experience that taking a CLEP test is easier, faster, less expensive _and_ tends to get your more college credit for the same amount of knowledge.

    The next best thing is taking classes to fill up your "full-time" requirements of a certain number of units per semester and then testing out (by taking the final and passing) of the classes you already know. Many on Slashdot could probably get a lot of CS classes passed that way, for example. Those credits count towards "in residence" requirements as well. (The colleges want those tuition bucks, they don't care if you had to go to the class or not as long as you paid them for it.)

    AP tests are probably the third best way, but not as useful as the above. I took and passed AP English (5) and AP U.S. History (4) in H.S. and got a lot more credits out of their CLEP counterparts.

    Also, if you are good at tests and already fairly knowledgeable, check out Western Governors University [wgu.edu], a fully accredited University that does all classes via certified testing. That means if you know your stuff you could pay for one sememster and then test out of a four-year or master's degree. Difficult, but possible.
    • I got my ass kicked by the Humanities CLEP. Maybe I should have studied.

    • Re:CLEP and Test Out (Score:3, Informative)

      by MagicDude ( 727944 )
      CLEP credits aren't always as useful as AP credits though. First of all, living on the east coast, I've never even heard of CLEP credits until I went to college. Also, in applying to medical school, many schools that accept AP credits for prerequsite classes like Physics and Calculus, won't accept CLEP credits. If you had CLEP credits, you would have had to take those courses again to apply to medical school.

  • Back in 95 I took the AP Pascal exam. That was the first year of the "new" exams, so we didn't know what to study. I think I got a 2. I never went to college anyway, so I guess it didn't matter.

    Good thing it didn't matter; what do people still use Pascal for anyway? At the time, C++ was an elective course (I took it the following year) with no available AP exam. Java wasn't even invented yet. These kids today have everything.

    -Jem

  • Should we be able to talk? (Score:5, Informative)

    by agent dero ( 680753 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:11PM (#9068082) Homepage
    I took it yesterday in the morning, as I think everybody did.

    Overall, I think it was relatively easy (not to toot my own horn or anything)

    Comparing to what i've seen of C++ and it's AP Exam, I _think_ the ease came mostly from the ease of Java itself, and the APPENDICES!

    Most of the good heartly case-study code was included, along with a 'cheat-sheet' with method headers for the ENTIRE case study.

    I'll get back to you in a month or two with my score, then we'll see how 'easy' it was

  • I took the last Pascal exam... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Dr. Bent ( 533421 ) <<ben> <at> <int.com>> on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:11PM (#9068088) Homepage
    My graduating class was the last one to take the Pascal AP exam. When I got to college, all of the classes were taught in C++, and I started in a second year class based on the AP credit I got from the exam. I was expecting it to be very difficult, considering I had never had C++ before, and it was...for about a week. Then I realized that a Stack is a Stack and a Linked List is a Linked list and once you learn the syntax of the particular language you're working in, Computer Science is really language-neutral.

    Computer Science is not about programming. It's about finding solutions to problems using computers, which is a very different thing. Moving the AP exam to Java seems like a good idea to me, but I doubt it will have any real impact on the curriculums of the schools that make the switch. The principles and concepts taught in any decent Computer Science undergrad program were just as valid and relevant 50 years ago as they are today as, they will be 50 years from now.

  • I remember when starting Uni in Autumn 1997, Java became the mandatory module instead of C++... so much so that we were really the guinea pigs because the lecturers hadn't taught it before.

    Most of us were wanting C++ modules to be bought back as an option, but were denied... and when I did get involved with C++ I found it made it harder learning the memory management issues (i.e. pointers) going from Java to C++.

    Mind, Java has certainly progressed from being regarded as a 'university fad' programming lang

  • A Great Idea... (Score:5, Funny)

    by bobej1977 ( 580278 ) * <rejamison@NOsPaM.yahoo.com> on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:12PM (#9068098) Homepage Journal
    They should fully specify a nice big project, like an accounting system or a 3D shooter. Then rip it into day-long chunks and farm it out as the AP test. Say 10 people all get the same chunk, to ensure that at least one guy will get it right.

    Bada-bing-bada-boom. The one day project! Massively parallel programming! Now, if only I can find away to harness the power of bajillions of people sorting playing cards in solitaire to crack encryption codes! Muahahah!!!

    [coughs] [takes medicine] Alright, I'm okay now.

  • I took the test both in Pascal, and then again the next year in C++ (I believe the 98-99 school year was the one in which the exam was in C++).

    Anyhow, the Pascal exam focused quite a lot on whether you understood basic algorithms and data structures.

    The C++ exam, in contrast, focused on whether or not you knew C++.

    For the record, I got a 4 the first time, and a 5 the second.

    Alan
  • I took this exam in 1998, at which time I had not seen a line of Pascal for about three years. My school didn't have a class for the exam, so I just took it on my own. I "studied" for about half an hour the night before, finished the exam early and got a 5 (the maximum possible). It was a joke, but it did get me out of the first semester of Computer Programming at university, so I'm very happy I took it.

    As for the debates on whether this qualifies as "computer science", I think it's a moot point. Kids in e
  • I took it back in the pascal days. Useless, really. At least going to UCSB the best it'd do is give you credits. It wouldn't get you out of any required CS classes...I don't think.

    As far as I could tell, for engineers, math, gov't and history AP were the only tests worth taking unless you plan to be low on units (which is tough as an engineer). Possibly lit, not sure what you got for that. Even chem wouldn't get you out of the required chem for science/engineering majors, it'd just give you credit for

  • polyglots only? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by moviepig.com ( 745183 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:16PM (#9068145)
    Java, C++, or Pascal. Hmmm.

    If the intent is to measure a grasp of computer fundamentals, why not use a toy language comprising the programming primitives common to all three? (Such a toy language would would be simple enough to be defined on the spot ...including only, say, assignments, conditionals, loops, and maybe a simple I/O.)

    But, if the intent is instead to measure proficiency in a particular language, then why not offer all three?

  • C++/Java (Score:5, Insightful)

    by wan-fu ( 746576 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:16PM (#9068150)

    The C++ exam was definitely not only one year in the running. It was for many years, probably 5+ or so, Pascal being supplanted in the mid/late 90s. I took the exam years ago and I think it's a good move to bring the AP to Java for a number of reasons.

    The biggest reason is the computer science AP when administered using C++ required students to learn the "AP" libraries. That is, they actually developed their own versions of the important data structures that most people use. I think this was mainly due to the fact that most people see the STL as bloated and under-utilized. On the other hand, everyone uses the Java libraries and this cuts out the need to learn additional code (not to mention that the AP code like apvector, apmatrix, etc. wasn't even written that well).

    Of course, teaching Java does seem to abstract memory management too much, and this is a negative as a result of moving to Java for the AP exam. However, this is outweighed by the consideration above and the fact that I think it's genearally "more fun" for students to learn Java.

    By "more fun" I mean that every student will be able to write applications at home or at school and be sure that it will run elsewhere regardless of what system they have. I remember as a TA for a high school programming class that sometimes code wouldn't work going from home to school to other machines at school (e.g. Visual Studio->CodeWarrior->KDevelop) and often, people who wanted to do more advanced things with graphics were limited by the libraries (though I guess we could've done stuff with Allegro or something of the sort). With Java, there's instant gratification in being able to drop in an import for awt and swing and immediately get GUI feedback.

    Finally, because it's most important to learn theory in these courses, Java makes for better teaching in comparison to C++. Stronger typecasting, no multiple inheritance, etc. makes Java a language that is "better" in terms of teaching computer science theory (though it's not necessarily better so in practice).

  • C++ ? good god ... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by vlad_petric ( 94134 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:19PM (#9068163) Homepage
    Pascal is reasonably clean, but C++ ... ? c'mon.

    Top reasons I hate it:

    Operator overloading - the most abused feature, as it makes coders feel "in control". It's very rarely useful for non-library stuff (container/matrix/numeric code that's already coded), but it manages to screw up projects very easily through abuse.

    References. They're simply idiotic. You can't really do useful stuff with them, as they can't be NULL, . Java references are fine, C++ references - a pointless feature meant to save you a "*" or "->", that doesn't really offer any advantage over pointers, but manages to make code unreadable if you use pointers, statics and references at the same time.

    Memory management. Either you are a high-level language and you do GC, or you're low level (like C) and you fully control it. C++ manages to get the worst of both worlds here, as object orientation w/o GC is a big mess. (leaks because "ownership contracts" are not respected are very common)

    Templates. I do think generic types are a good idea, but what's the f* point of making the template sub-language Turing complete?? (Yes, you can write partial recursive functions to be evaluated at compile time ...). Furthermore, if you allow member functions to be templated individually of the class, things can get really tricky.

    Multiple inheritance. Everything's ok, until you get a piece of code that works when you inherit A then B, but fails if you do it the other way around. Happened to me ...

    My point - C++ for AP ? Worst idea ever.

    • That's Funny... (Score:5, Informative)

      by HopeOS ( 74340 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @08:45PM (#9069412)
      All the reasons you dislike C++ are the reasons that I'm a fan. I use many languages, but C++ in particular gives me more leverage overall.

      1. Operator overloading - mandatory for best use of templated functions and algorithms. If people make poor decisions with respect to what they overload, that's hardly a problem with the language. I would consider not being able to overload an operator a problem with the language.

      2. References are required for any function that returns a "left-hand value." If that phrase does not mean anything to you, then you are not actually discussing C++ references at all, merely glorified pointers. Since left-hand values cannot be NULL by definition, your misunderstanding with regard to their purpose seems likely.

      3. Memory mangement is identical to that of C. The addition of the new and delete operators is nothing remarkable - they just call malloc and free. They are also overrideable on a per-class basis if that is not good enough for you. If by "memory management" you mean "takes complete control of object lifetime" than no, C++ thankfully let's you do whatever you want with your objects.

      4. Templates are very powerful. They allow with a single declaration the ability to generate code optimized for a given problem. If you are complaining that the mechanism is too powerful, well, some of us like the extra capacity.

      5. As for multiple inheritence, I use it frequently. Some types of inheritence are unfeasible, some are unimplementable without substantial performance penalties, and most are simply doable. If you're having trouble, and your inheritance tree is sound, then file a bug report for your C++ compiler.

      Genuinely, most of your complaints misrepresent C++ as something it's not, namely a high level language. If C is one step from assembly, then C++ is maybe a step and a half. That's by design.

      If I want rapid prototyping, I'll use PHP or Python. I'm not sure what Java gets me other than a sandbox and some friendly exceptions when things go wrong. That's nice, but I don't write weak code, so all that padded insulation does me no good at all.

      -Hope

  • I was a taker (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Medieval_Gnome ( 250212 ) <medgno.medievalgnome@org> on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:20PM (#9068179) Homepage
    I took the AP AB Computer Science exam, which covers all that would be covered in the first year of a college level CS class, as opposed to the A exam which just covers just one semester. Most CS classes in high schools are just A level, so taking the AB involved doing stuff on my own (ick).

    Before this class, I had been programming for a while, and was self-taught in QBasic, C, C++, Perl, some Java, and Python. So my perspective might be a bit on the 'too easy' side.

    That said, I thought the exam was really well done. It covered simple things (giving a 'mystery' method and making you figure out what it does) up to more complicated things (binary trees, recursing through them). Something else they covered, which I think is critically important, and also think wasn't covered under C++, is the efficiency aspect of programs. Some questions would ask which is more efficient, quicksort or insertion sort (easy answer), while others would get a bit harder, giving the runtimes of two unknown sorts on a random array and on a sorted array, and making you figure out which sorts they used. All efficiencies were in 'Big O' notation, not being as in-depth as Art Of Computer Science, but what can you expect from high school students?

    Also, there was a marine biology case study [collegeboard.com] which was a larger body of code to deal with and worked our abilities to deal with things that we can't see the source for. This was also present in the C++ version of the AP exam.

  • C++ test (Score:3, Insightful)

    by IceFox ( 18179 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:25PM (#9068231) Homepage
    I took the test the first year it was C++ and got a 5 out of 5 points on it, but when I got to school they gave me 2 credits (i.e. almost nothing) for it. It was a real let down putting all that effort into it and getting so little (scholasticly) in return. Of course knowing C++ while still in high school and being able to explore compsci on my own I think very valuable.

    -Benjamin Meyer

  • I took the C++ AP test out of spite (Score:5, Funny)

    by defile ( 1059 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:37PM (#9068334) Homepage Journal

    The math department head at my high school said I had to take calculus in order to take the C++ class. I said calculus is a bullshit prerequisite for C++ (since, you know, C++ has nothing to do with calculus). She refused to make an exception for me.

    At the end of the year I demanded to be allowed to take the test to prove to her that the prerequisites were garbage and that the school was probably too clueless to teach C++ anyway. She couldn't refuse (the AP classes are not mandatory) and so I took the test, although she insisted that I reconsider and that I should take the classes and that I'm otherwise wasting everyone's time.

    It turns out that I was the only one in my entire school to show up for the test.

    I scored a 5 (the highest score). Came in and stapled that to her forehead.

    Spite: it's what's for dinner.

    • Calc is a prerequisite for live (Score:4, Insightful)

      by bluGill ( 862 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @10:55PM (#9070167)

      Calculus isn't required I'll give you that. However there is a reason you were told to take it: it teaches you a lot more than any other class. Learning that you will need latter in life, but you won't realize it. I never use calc itself in life, I couldn't do a simple derivative anymore. I use the thinking abilities calc gave me every day.

      You are wasting everyone's time by not talking calculus. Most of all your own.

  • not that it really matters (Score:3, Informative)

    by Samari711 ( 521187 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:41PM (#9068365)
    I took the AP exam when it was C++ and the only credit i ended up getting was a buisness programming class. The CS departments aren't going to give you much credit for the exam unless everyone's required to take an intro to programming freshman year or something like that. The stuff covered in the AP test is pretty much amounts to learn the language and get a broad overview of some important topics. once you get to school they cover everything in a lot more depth. it's definitely good experience but don't think that you're going to be getting out of any useful classes if you're a CS or Computer Engineering major.

  • Huge disconnect (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Viking Coder ( 102287 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @06:44PM (#9068397)
    The huge disconnect here, in my honest opinion, is that the vast majority of Computer Science students are only going after a Computer Science degree because it's the only way to get a job as a computer programmer - but the universities are all treating Computer Science as some form of abstract mathematics. Heck, some universities have Computer Science as a Liberal Arts degree.

    Real computer programmers need to understand pointers. Java does not teach you how to effectively use pointers. In fact, it makes it harder to learn pointers, because you learn such bad habits.

    Garbage collection is nice, but the majority of computer programmers don't have access to it. Universities should offer Computer Science and (Applied?) Computer Programming degrees, and the AP tests should similarly be targeted for Computer Science (Java, maybe) and Computer Programming (C++, definitely - with exposure to other things as well; Java, Python, Scheme, Lisp, Perl, whatever.)

  • Are Pointers malloc() and free() Computer Science? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Soong ( 7225 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @07:08PM (#9068643) Homepage Journal
    Because people sure aren't learning them from Java. C hackers are getting harder to find.

    I just had a thought. It seems to me that the old dichotomy of CS, Systems and Theory, have spawned a bastard child: Vocational Programming. It's probably a natural progression as the field matures. This third class of people in the CS world don't understand either end of the old spectrum well enough to fit in. Java might just be the perfect language for Vocational Programmers.

    Now the questions are: Do we like this direction? Is it the right direction? What's broken, what would be better?

    • Re:Are Pointers malloc() and free() Computer Scien (Score:5, Insightful)

      by pHDNgell ( 410691 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @10:44PM (#9070086)
      Because people sure aren't learning them from Java. C hackers are getting harder to find.

      Good riddance. I'm getting annoyed by this constant assertion that C is the only real programming. It's just inappropriate for most of what people are doing with it.

      For any chunk of C code using malloc() and free(), there's a smaller and faster OCaml equivalent that's garbage collected.

      For fun, go to the Great Computer Language shootout and download the java, c, and ocaml fibonacci code (same algorithm). On my machine, the ocaml version is the fastest, followed by the java version, and then the C version. Including startup time, the java version is always faster (user and real CPU time) than the C version.

      I write enough C, but OCaml isn't the first language that's produced faster code than I've been able to produce with a C compiler, nor is it the first that's made it easier to write reliable apps than unreliable apps.

      What I really don't understand is the way people refer to free() and malloc() as if they're some sort of fundamental elements of programming that are required to be taken seriously. You know they're library routines, right? Should I not take someone seriously who doesn't use sbrk() directly in their code?
  • Let's not confuse programming -- the practice of using a computer language to do one's bidding -- with computer science -- the more generic, language agnostic study of computers. That's why the exam is called AP COMPUTER SCIENCE and not AP Programming. I wouldn't say that the use of Java on the exam is a great boom for Java per say, just a recognition that it has many features that are useful, and not available with previouis languages in this exam setting.

    I think this misconception causes many students to inappropriately major in CS in college because "they like programming", or "they like computers". And some of them, from my experince at engineering school, end up in other majors as a result. Not all though, but enough for me to feel I should comment...

  • Legally, I'm not supposed to say anything, but... (Score:3, Informative)

    by Mirkon ( 618432 ) <mirkon.gmail@com> on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @07:33PM (#9068844) Homepage
    I took the test last year in C++ and this year in Java (my school offered no other way for me to learn Java).

    The Java test was a lot harder than the C++; while last year's was largely about more general computer science concepts and basic, universal programming practices, this year's (at least the AB exam) was almost entirely on higher data structures like hash maps and binary trees.

    Of course, they didn't skimp on the recursion either.

  • Much more than 10 years (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Aidtopia ( 667351 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @07:40PM (#9068894) Homepage Journal

    I took the Computer Science AP test in Pascal in 1985. I doubt that was the first year it was offered (although I was the first from my high school ever to take it). So Pascal has been used in this test for much longer than 10 years.

    While I agree that those pursuing a CS degree should be more interested in a theory-based test rather than a programming-based one, it is useful for those going into other technical fields who need some programming experience that they can apply.

  • Some sample questions (Score:3, Funny)

    by gonz ( 13914 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @08:04PM (#9069089)
    1. Write a function called "swap(x,y) that has the same effect as the pseudocode "t=x; x=y; y=t;".

    2. Define a new data type called "TableIndex" which is a synonym for the "int" basic type. (If your programming language does not support "typedef," a macro is an acceptable substitute.)

    3. Illustrate how to parameterize your swap() from #1 so that it will work with any basic type (e.g via function templates or macros).

    4. Create an array of integers, and illustrate how to resize the array. (Since dynamic-casting is obviously poor programming practice, feel free to utilize class templates if the language does not natively support resizable arrays.)

    5. Write a function that accepts a variable number of floating point arguments and returns their average.

    6. Without relying on a compiler from another programming environment, show how to call some simple functions from a C DLL.

    7. A mobile robot has 3 states, "roam", "sleep", and "evade". For a collection of 100 robots, demonstrate how an array of function pointers could be used to represent these states.

    Uh... hold on a sec! Java doesn't HAVE pointers, typedefs, templates, macros, resizable arrays, ability to call C functions, argument lists, or function pointers! :-D

    Cheers,
    -Gonz

  • AP Tests (Score:3, Interesting)

    by MicroBerto ( 91055 ) on Thursday May 06, 2004 @12:58PM (#9074969)
    Just a general comment to all those in high school and planning on going to college:

    TAKE AP EXAMS!! TAKE A LOT OF EM AND STUDY HARD!

    I passed out of about 35 credits for college becaues I had an awesome AP exam showing, and many were offered at my school. 15 credits of math, 5 for computer, 10 for history... then some spanish I got credit for.

    Not only will you save money, but you'll be able to skip menial stuff and get into your major courses earlier - and will get yourself a more spread-out schedule so that you don't have to cram a ton of classes in because you "lost" freshman year.

    I have it on easy street now for my last year because of AP exams. And the history classes i missed are HARD to get A's in, i hear. So take the time, study it, get a 5, and forget it :)

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