Introduction

Hello and welcome to my blog, where I will be documenting my CS 467 capstone project for my online bachelor’s from Oregon State. I got into computer science because I was dissatisfied with only having a foot in mechanical engineering. I wanted more options and have always been interested in computers, just needed the discipline and formality of a degree. If I could, after finishing this course I’d start another degree. Maybe in comparative religion or archaeology.

I chose the AI Coder project, which is really like a wrapper around any other project. My next top choices in order were Mobile Treasure Hunt, Sim Firefighter, Malware Analysis, RTOS Dev, and the fire prediction one. Each sound interesting. I am interested in making an app mostly because I was one of those guys who would bother my CS friends to make apps based on my great business ideas. Didn’t seem too hard. Now that I know some more about computer science, I know I don’t know anything about app development. Sim Firefighter sounded like a Dwarf Fortress style project, which I love. Labor of love. Malware Analysis is cool except I really struggle with network work. RTOS is cool because I love lower-level programming.

I actually met the guy sponsoring the fire projects. He was nice and told me to consider one of his projects for the capstone. I did but they’re not my top choices.

I hope to keep afloat by learning more about AI tools. It’s pretty clear AI is going to eliminate the need for most of us, so maybe the best strategy is to adapt! AI is very fascinating to me. I love playing with ChatGPT and using it to explain new ideas.

That’s about it. I’ll include a picture of my cat, Calpurnia. Kind of excited to start!