CS4536/CS536 : Background Survey

This brief survey gathers information on your background and perceptions of programming and programming languages. People often struggle to learn material that contradicts their existing beliefs about related concepts. I therefore want to understand what you already know/believe about programming and languages in order to target parts of the class accordingly.

The survey should take about 10 minutes to complete.

Answers to all questions are required with the exception of one marked as "[optional]".

A Bit About You

• First Name/Want to be Called:

• Last Name:

• If you ever work on CS assignments in WPI-maintained labs, as opposed to on your own computer, which labs do you use? This will help me make sure course software is available where needed. You can leave this blank if you use only machines on which you can install software.

• What areas of CS most interest or excite you?

• What interested you in taking this course?

• Have you ever written a CGI script (for processing web forms)?

  Yes     No, but I know what CGI is     I don't know what CGI is

• Which of the following languages have you used before (enough to know the basics and write a small program)?

  Scheme/Lisp     ML/OCaml     Haskell     Prolog     Java     Javascript     C     C++    

• What, if anything, do you wish you knew more about regarding programming languages? [optional]

Perceptions and Beliefs About Programming and Programming Languages

If you are unfamiliar with the terminology in the later questions, select the "not sure what these terms mean" option.

• All real modern programming is done in object-oriented languages.

  Agree     Disagree

• From a programmer's perspective, all programming languages are basically equivalent.

  Agree     Disagree

• If a programming language were truly useful, then a large company (like Microsoft) would write a lot of their code in it.

  Agree     Disagree

• The more lines of code a program contains, the more complicated the task that it performs.

  Agree     Disagree

• Efficiency is the most important attribute of a programming language.

  Agree     Disagree

  If you disagreed, what other attributes do you consider at least as important?

• It is important to know whether a language is interpreted or compiled.

  Agree     Disagree     Not sure what these terms mean

  If you agreed or disagreed, explain why

• Manual memory management is usually preferable to garbage collection.

  Agree     Disagree     Not sure what these terms mean

  If you agreed or disagreed, explain why

• What is the benefit of strong typing in a programming language? (if you don't know what strong typing is, leave blank)

• When faced with a new programming language, what metrics or questions do you use to evaluate the language?

A "no binding for field ..." message when you submit mean that you failed to choose an option for one of the multiple-choice questions. If you get such a message, use the back button to come back to this page and continue.