pset2 crack.c, competence question

Question

Thank in advance for any reply,

Im currently on crack.c in pset2, I have so far completed all other problems leading to this one. It seems like this problem is a few notches more advance then the prior, and I'm just curious. Should I really be able to complete this problem based on week 2 , or even week 4 lectures. Or is it sort of a, try this if you want, but chances are you'll need to come back once once you finish a few more lectures. Just asking because I just finished lecture 4, and so far I understand everything crystal clear, but this problem still seems too tough for me.

Answer 1

The 'more comfortable' problems seem to be geared toward people who have at least a little prior experience in programming. The entire problem can be solved with arrays and loops (in under 100 lines of code), so you don't need anything specific from subsequent lectures. As you complete more lectures and problem sets, you'll gain some of that experience and may find these problems to be easier.

As the professor stated at the beginning of the class,

what ultimately matters in this course is ... where you in week 11, the end of the semester, end up relative to yourself in week 0

Give every problem a try, if you like, you'll be surprised how much you can learn even by failing to finish a problem. Keep a list of the programs you couldn't finish, and come back to them at the end of the course.