Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Microsoft Invests in the University of Waterloo

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the cash-reserves-proving-useful dept.

saforrest writes "Say goodbye to independent academia. In a presentation by Microsoft on Wednesday at the University of Waterloo, a new joint initiative was announced which involves the addition of a mandatory course on C# for all electrical and computer engineers. 'Completion of this course will be mandatory for students entering the E&CE program.'" Microsoft's press release is available.

6 of 681 comments (clear)

  1. Microsoft marketing gurus by Infonaut · · Score: 3, Funny
    I can see them all scratching their heads.

    Jane: "Darn it, Bob, I just don't understand. No matter how many times we ask people, 'Where do you want to go today?', they still seem to think of us as a big, bullying monopolist."

    Bob: "Well, Jane, maybe we should just change the message. Perhaps if we say, 'Where do you really want to go today?', people will respond better!"

    The guy in the corner from developer marketing meekly raises his hand. "Uh, guys, perhaps if we didn't put out press releases crowing about our ability to buy out universities, we wouldn't be perceived as bullies."

    Jane: "Bob, I think your proposal is right on the money!"

    Bob: "Hey, that's why they pay us the big bucks, right?"

    --
    Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
  2. At least C# is (probably) useful by Wraithlyn · · Score: 3, Funny

    Not to take M$'s side or anything, but at least they're teaching something RELEVANT now. When I went there, they were inflicting MODULA-3 on us. (And Pascal.. but then, I like Pascal)

    --
    "Mind, as manifested by the capacity to make choices, is to some extent present in every electron." -Freeman Dyson
  3. Re:why this is a bad idea by dillon_rinker · · Score: 5, Funny

    This sort of thing won't be happening much longer; they'll soon be running SQL Server 2000 and IIS 5.0 atop Windows 2000. The load likely will never be too high, but if there is are a lot of hits, performance will degrade much more grace*** STOP: 0x0000000C (0000000A, 0xFAADFF0D, 00000008, 00000000) UNEXPECTED_KERNEL_MODE_TRAP

  4. Job Interviews in 4 Years... by unsinged+int · · Score: 5, Funny

    4 years from now a bunch of grads will be heading to interviews...

    Grad: "I know C#! Hire me!"
    Industry: "C#. Check. What else do you know?"
    Grad: "Huh? Like what?"
    Industry: "Well, what did you learn in some of your other courses?
    Grad: "I know how to design a web page so that it only works under Internet Explorer."
    Industry: "Hmm..okaaaay. What type of degree did you say you have again?"
    Grad: "I have a copy right here..."
    Industry: "That says MCSE. That's not a diploma."
    Grad: "No, it is. There's some fine print at the bottom. See?"
    ...

  5. EULA Shrinkwrap 4 University of Waterloo Degrees? by meehawl · · Score: 5, Funny

    I can't wait to see what sort of scary EULA madness will eventually and inevitably be shrinkwrapped over the University of Waterloo's degrees. Just imagine the happy faces at graduation as they peel back the shrinkwrap on their degrees. And when MS move to a new licensing model, will all the version 1.0 University of Waterloo degrees be de-activated unless graduates pay a re-activation fee? The mind boggles.

    --

    Da Blog
  6. Re:So? by Salsaman · · Score: 4, Funny
    Yeah but how are the students gonna learn things like memory management and hardware control if they are using a managed, abstracted language like C# ?

    For the same reason, if I were to pick a single language to be taught to engineers, I wouldn't recommend teaching Java either.

    You should start with something like C that teaches the fundamentals, then when you know how a computer *really* works, you can move on to a higher level language like C# or Java.