3.7
Quality3.8
Difficulty68%
Would Retake210
Reviews68%
Would Retake
210
Reviews
Rating DistributionOfficial
210 total ratings5
111
4
28
3
9
2
17
1
45
What Students Say
“He tries a little but not enough”
CSE421 - 3.0 rating“Due to covid-19, all courses are moved to online”
CSE468 - 2.0 ratingClass Info
Online Classes
100%
Attendance Mandatory
23%
Textbook Required
0%
Grade Predictor
Your expected effort level
Predicted Grade
A-
Grade Distribution
Common Tags
Rating Trend
Declining
-0.63 avg changeRatings by Course
CSE490
5.0
(1)CSE531
5.0
(1)CSE521
4.9
(37)CSE421
4.2
(38)CSE468
3.6
(5)Difficulty by Course
CS350
5.0
CSE331
4.5
CSE590
4.1
CSE490
4.0
CSE468
4.0
Reviews (208)
Great professor. Lectures are a bit boring but overall great course. Group projects are really tough. This class requires 20+ hours a week outside of class for projects.
Farshad is a solid professor. He is approachable and cares about helping you. His lectures are consistently good. HOWEVER, this class is a Jekyll and Hyde sort of experience. The material in class is ordered and well presented but the class project which composes nearly all of your grade is blisteringly difficult and chaotically confusing.
First time as professor but did well. Lectures may be boring but as long as you understand the material or review on your own, you'll be fine. Project heavy. Project heavy. Project heavy. Heavy project.
The professor is nice. There are 3 group projects. So finding good teammates are the most important thing of this course. All teammates will have same grade, even if either you or your teammates did nothing. But professor is very nice, and would give a big curve to protect your GPA.
Very responsible instructor.
Best Prof I take in UB although its his first semester as teaching, still doing amazing work. Clearly Slide and Lecture, Also have video recording online available. Projects are pretty hard. But Huge Curve Still Help Me To Success Out UB!!!!!!!!!
This class only has two midterms which are easy (just the questions in the exam review slides). And make sure you do all the homework's and attend every class for pop up quizzes. The only hard part about this class the group project. Make sure you find a good group that is willing to split work. Apart from that, I think Farshad does a good job!
Farshad really cares about what he does and the students he teaches. I highly recommend taking ops with him if your schedule allows it!
Great professor. Very friendly and helpful. He cares about the students, but you also have to put in the effort. OPs is difficult, not much he can do about it. But he makes it the best it can be.
You can tell how much effort Farshad puts into his work. Great professor
Farshad was very clear from the start about the responsibilities we had regard the group project. His curve was a grace from god. Make sure you show up for the pop quizzes theyre 5% extra credit, and do his HWs another EC 5%. Itll save your life!!!!
great professor!!! He put a lot of effort on the course and he helps me a lot. It was my fortunate to take his course, honestly. He is a clever and helpful man. He answer the question in the piazza quickly . I recommend his course, you will learn a lot if you put a lot of effort on it!!
Farshad really put in a lot of effort to make the class this semester successful. Lectures were long but informative to the boot (also recorded in case you missed things). The project is not too hard but super interesting and fun to work on. Him and his TAs are very helpful in office hours too. Overall, a great class by a great professor!
Farshad was a knowledgeable and caring professor who really seemed like he wanted you to succeed. But its a project heavy course and one of, if not the, hardest courses youll take in the CS department here. Lectures were not very useful for the projects, but he and his TAs helped a lot outside of class and offered extra credit and a solid curve.
pretty tough class, the 3 projects make up a majority of the grade and take A LOT of work. All the instructors give a lot of help with these between recitation and Piazza posts, and are super available with office hours. Be sure to make use of this help. Lectures can be boring but be sure to pay attention for the pop quizzes.
It's clear Professor Ghanei cares for his students. Very approachable, accessible outside of class, and patient when you have difficulty understanding something. Plenty of opportunities to win back points (pop quizzes for extra credit, exams out of 120 points but capped at 100, an extra credit project). UB needs more professors like him!
Farshad is a good professor. He helps students without any hesitation and explains material clearly.
Professor is great and caring His lectures during the online classes were amazing and created a lot of interest There are a lot of extra credits,marks given in the midterms and final exams The quizzes were bonus and it will be very helpful in improving your grade at the end Make sure the projects are done individually and AI violation will be a F
Hes a considerate and goes for an extra mile for students. His course is well organized and explains you the course details (like grading criteria etc) in the beginning of the course. You will get extra credits in exams, projects. If you put efforts, the grades will show up. Projects have more weightage and kinda heavy but doable. Exams were easy
Hes an amazing instructor. His course is well organized. Lectures are amazing. Hes responsible and considerate. Course details and the grading criteria will be discussed in the first class of the course. Exams were easy. Projects have more weightage and might take time kinda heavy but doable. The best part us extra credits. Overall he is the best
Dr. Ghanei cares greatly about you as a student if he sees that you're putting in the effort. There is plenty of extra credit available if you put in the effort (do the assignments and show up to class). For the projects, I recommend reviewing the C programming language and learning how to use the gdb debugger before taking this class.
Due to covid-19, all courses are moved to online. The professor does not speak things clearly. Points are not clear enough. Moreover, this course uses ROS based on the Linux system. Without any instruction of Linux system and python, we started right away. There is no extra materials for ROS other than ROS-wiki. It makes every lab so hard
This class was interesting, but also very tough. The projects that make up most of your grade are very hard and time consuming. Though I must say, Professor Ghanei and the TAs were very accessible and super helpful when it came to the projects.
He is a quality professor, lectures slide are good and he explains the concepts well. His projects are good but challenging where most students have difficulty with them but the curve is fair. The written HWs are not that engaging and the tests seem kind off tedious, requiring you to memorize formulas youll probably forget after the class is over
He's an amazing person and truly cares about his students (cliché I know but seriously). I'm sad I didn't get to take this class in person because although he is a great individual, I don't think his teaching style translated well online. He seems to try to make a connection to his students but the nature of remote learning makes this difficult.
Professor Ghanei teaches material that's very hard to understand and doesn't teach it very clearly. He goes over a lot in class but does not explain it well. On Piazza, his feedback is terrible. He references textbook pages even after being ask for a clear explanation and attacks students when they point out a mistake in TA actions or unfairness.
Prof doesn't explain well in lectures and the material is hard to understand. He seems like a nice guy but the way he teaches and addresses problems is not it.
Farshad Ghanei doesn't try hard enough to help his students and makes the exams so difficult because he doesnt explain well.
He tries a little but not enough. His lectures get hard to watch and his tests don't make you feel any better.
bro this class is so hard.
Professor Ghanei seems okay at first but I feel like sometimes hes not very knowledgeable in the class. Makes lectures difficult and projects terrible.
had a pretty hard time with this prof. Surprised i made it out alive
This class is hard but he was a nice guy
Farshad Ghanei does not show the least bit of interest and does not help students on Piazza. He gives half answers and does not help with material and lectures are pretty bad.
He may have sounded like a good prof, but wait till you get deeper into it.
dropped this class and thank god i did
He pretty much didn't teach well. Couldn't understand a lot of the material.
The lecture isn't mandatory but it pretty much is with how far you fall behind after one missed lecture. He doesn't explain well either, he just keeps going. I'm still in the class now but my grade doesn't look promising.
The Professor isn't bad but doesn't seem to be great either. His accent can be hard to understand sometimes and I had trouble understanding the material.
very difficult. Professor does not explain very good and I have trouble with it. no good
dont do it
The difficulty of the homeworks does not even compare to the project assigned. The homeworks are way too difficult and graded way too harshly.
Professor seems like a nice guy but his teaching is not up to par.
not good
very demanding course
I love professor Ghanei! He is understanding, knowledgeable, and helpful. The course is a bit difficult, but he makes it accessible. Definitely recommend :)
Farshad is always available outside class. He is caring and respected.
He makes a ton of mistakes not only in the assignments too. Its frustrating to worry about and think about until it is corrected.
Prof had to make so many adjustments throughout the semester and him and his TA's are rude when answering questions.
Easily the most difficult professor I've had to learn from.
Prof Ghanei doesn't provide much helpful feedback and the TA's respond with attitude sometimes on piazza. Not very helpful in that aspect.
My friend took CSE341 this semester and was reminded of my time in CSE590. Especially difficult professor.
Although, some of the instructions were unclear the class overall was more than fair with a lot chances for extra credit. Most of the time the bonus points aren't even needed because the project and homework were tolerable.
Farshad's been wonderful this semester. In spite of online learning and the removal of spring break, he worked hard to listen to feedback and accommodate students' needs. I also had him for CSE341 and in both classes there was plenty of Extra Credit to make up for any off days. He was also extremely helpful in OH, which there were plenty of.
Absolute angel of a professor. Can be a bit dry with lectures but is very open to answering questions and ensuring that students feel comfortable. Tons of extra credit so doing well in a 300 level CS class isn't impossible.
Good professor and gave us a lot of extra credit. The material is kind of boring but as long as you do the readings on time you'll be fine.
Amazing lectures.
Listened to our feedback and changed the course appropriately. Idk why so many people gave him a low rating this semester, literally half the class got an A because he was very generous with extra credit. Lectures were dry and I didn't get a lot out of them, but overall great professor, would definitely take a class with him again :)
Not the easiest class, but the professor obviously cares about the students if you go in to ask questions about course material or get help on the projects. TAs are decent, sometimes helpful sometimes not, but it can be hard for them to help you debug your code since they didn't write it, so that is understandable.
Small class, interesting material. Learning ROS can be difficult, but once you get a hang of it, the projects are totally manageable. TAs were helpful for initial learning. Professor obviously cares about students and was very accommodating for concerns, especially regarding online learning challenges.
The class material is by no means "easy", but Professor Ghanei does everything to make your learning process as straightforward and easy as possible. An absolute gem to the computer science department.
Professor Ghanei emphasized teaching students so they have a strong understanding of the material. His class assignments are very engaging and fair, and I would definitely want to take a class with him again.
One of the most caring professor at UB. He was caring and tried to make the class less stressful for the students. His lectures are great place to ask any question. Get started early on the homework since they count a lot towards the overall grade. I got a C because I did not do well on the homework. The project was not too difficult but TA helped.
Great professor, it was his first semester teaching 341 and he made very fair adjustments.
He definitely cares his students and tries to make the grading policy more reasonable to reduce their stresses.
Good Professor. Requires little more organization (since it is his first offering, it was really good).
In the beginning I participated in every lecture and even though they were a bit and it was hard to stay focused, they were pretty informative and professor Ghanei answered every question. After the midterm, I switched to only reading Zybooks and it was enough to keep up with all material. Projects were fair, lots of extra credit opportunities.
Amazing professor that teaches well and provides us with so many extra credit opportunities.
Farshad, if anything, is a professor that genuinely cares for the students. He is willing to accommodate and alter the course that best allows the students to pass. Regardless of how you feel about the course material or his teaching methods or even the tas, the 1 thing you can count on is Farshad's willingness to always help the students.
A professor who cares about his students. The lectures were super easy to understand and the programming assignments were not too hard. Professor gives a lot of extra credit as well. 15% bonus from zybook and participation. Near the end of the semester, the professor allowed for a lot of makeup and extra credit.
Very nice person who is really care about his students. This course is not very easy but you have a lot of opportunities to get extra credit, which can help you easy A.
This was an overall easy A class. The professor made it so that 50% of the students got an A. Saw that most kids did bad on a test and adjusted it by 35 points. The lectures were easy to follow and understand and it was easy to learn the material. Pretty good class overall.
So I took him for 341 and it was online and he was very lenient in this class, he gave so much extra credit that I kid you not more than half the class got an A. I didnt watch lecture and just read the textbook and got an A
Even though the material was tough, the professor made it very digestible.
To be honest i have no idea why there were bad ratings to begin with. Professor Ghanei is amazing and wants his students to pass challenging if you dont try of course. He gave so many examples and easy to understand slides. There was A LOT of extra credit like what professor gives 15% in EC, would definitely take a course with Prof Ghanei again.
The material was very interesting. A lot of the material piggybacked off of cse 220. The professor pleasantly answered all questions, so if you are ever curious about something feel free to ask.
One of the best professors. Highly recommend to take him. Super helpful in class and outside of class. Very accommodating and understanding when it comes to personal situations. We used zybook which was very helpful. His programming assignment is in parts so easy to do. He gives so much extra credit on exams so theres no way you cant pass.
Great project and extra credits. But the only thing you should be caring about is the exam and the rest should be fined. He would take good care of you. Also, don't start your study late and project.
The materials are always hard as for any college classes, but this the professor that counts. If ur taking a 300/400 course with this professor, dont worry about the grades just stay honest and try your best he have a really fair grading system. He also gives you chances to make up your mistakes.
Professor had 15% worth of extra credit assigned in the first syllabus and later added very generous curves to the midterm after the class struggled. Very fair class project as well which is manageable especially with the help of the TAs. The Zybook readings are essential and will clarify anything that was unclear from the lectures.
Really solid professor. Amazing personality and solid teaching skills. He can get distracted at times but that is mainly due to students asking questions not closely related to course content and quite irrelevant.
Grading for CSE 341 was clear and fair, projects were perfectly placed between being challenging but enforcing the concepts fairly. Dr Ghanei's use of the zybook online textbook was incredibly helpful for learning and going over complex concepts.
Good teacher, class was pretty easy as I think it was his first time teaching it. Honestly I wish there were more programing problems throughout the course. Some students claimed it was hard but that was them doing nothing. I expect this teacher to become more refined (in a good way) as he gets more comfortable teaching and gets more experience.
One of the best professors. Highly recommend to take him. Amazing personality and solid teaching skills. Just be honest and give it your all; he has a fair grading system. He also allows you to make amends for your errors. Lots of extra credit opportunity. Also, don't start your study late and project.
Professor Farshad is extremely based, the subject itself isn't super easy relative to other CS classes but he made it very doable in terms of making it through with a good grade. The class format emphasizes true knowledge gain/meaningful learning over rote memorization which I highly appreciated.
I cannot stress this enough- on top of being an all-around good person, he is an excellent professor. And I believe he can only get better from here. He is open to what students have to say and never gives less than his best, he's understanding, and he's one of the reasons this past spring semester was less overwhelming than it could've been.
Professor Ghanei was very kind. You could tell he really cares about his students, making sure that they understand the material and are feeling good about the class. He uses zybooks which explains things more in depth after watching the lectures. The project was easy but still helped us learn machine language better.
Although it is not an easy course relative to other CS classes but Dr. Ghanei made it doable in terms of making it through with a good grade. He clearly cares about the students if you come in to ask questions about the topic or for assistance with projects. The TA are very helpful. Don't start the projects late as they are very time consuming.
I took CSE468 with Farshad in the Spring semester and saying this as a graduating student, he's without a doubt one of the best ones in the department. We had weekly quizzes every Monday that were pretty easy, the midterms + final were fair and doable, but the coding assignments can be pretty tough so pay attention in lecture and ask questions
You can come to UB, Just for this course. Best course in UB by far. Projects are excellent. Professor is friendly and willing to help if stuck. Grading is Fair have lot of chances to score extra points.
Amazing professor during the Covid pandemic, online synchronous lectures were straightforward and very informative. Homework is designed to make sure you understand the concepts taught in class without feeling like a large part of your week. Project is very manageable and the recitation slides that were provided were extremely helpful for it.
There's a lot of HW no doubt and the project is heavy but it's all worth it. You get to learn so many things in depth and the TAs are insanely helpful as well. My group had a little misunderstanding related to grading and it had crossed the regrading deadline when we realized. He still ensured that we got the grades for it. All hail Lord Farshad!
Only problem with this class is it was co-run with Winikus. Many things went wrong throughout the whole semester. I genuinely believe Farshad is a competent guy, unfortunately he kind of stood on the sidelines as things fell apart. I see a lot of good reviews for this guy and I believe them, I just wish I had that guy show up for 341 as well.
Excellent professor ! Makes you work for the grade ! If you follow the instructions you are gonna get good grade
Course is very lengthy. Takes lot of time to do. But can learn a lot
I will rate Professor Farshad as an excellent professor. Even though the course is a little tuff, he made it look so simple with good assignments and quizzes and two exams by reducing the burden.
Professor Ghanei explains difficult concepts very well. On top of the projects, there are weekly quizzes/hw so you need to study the material on a weekly basis and not let yourself fall behind. The class is difficult but you'll learn a lot of interesting concepts regarding OS. Professor Ghanei is also very caring outside of the classroom.
Farshad is an excellent teacher. The course is very well structured. Projects are not straightforward and that really helps you learn the subject. There were lots of office hours even just before the exam. A lot of students maybe complaining about the workload but the coursework is easy.
grades are consist of zybook homework, in-class quiz, project, midterm and final. it was overall a very informative course, learned a lot from it. However, I'm not sure if the flipped class is really the best choice, cuz it makes students spending too much extra time watching lectures and doing zybook homeworks, as well as preparing for quizzes.
Farshad strives to be immaculate and is very meticulous from what I could tell, which is exactly what you need in a Prof teaching such hard courses. Except maybe 1 or 2, TAs were useless and mostly tried to prod me towards the impl they did for projects. Farshad is approachable and caring but dont expect any spoon-feeding. Start early on projects!
Great course. The projects give an in-depth understanding of several topics. Professor is very supportive and fair. Accessible and grades clearly.
Would suggest taking this course only if you want to study operating systems. If you are legitimately interested, this is going to be one the best courses you take at UB. Good luck
Assignment(zybook), quiz(about video and slides) and group project. Projects are time-consuming but you can learn a lot.
I had two group projects which were pretty heavy, along with that there was a zyBook assignment due every week, which will take up 3-5 hours, also there'll be a quiz every week.
Dr. Ghanei is a really great professor and you will really enjoy his class. The only downside is that you have to be really good at managing time if you are taking his class.
Professor was very good.
Highly recommend. The project is really helpful, it deepens your understanding of the concepts and gives you the opportunity to design a real-life operating system. The professor is inspiring, responsible, strict and sometimes sarcarstic. TAs are also awesome. They devote so much time! We have not only office hours but also OS Friday.
The course is well-structured with excellent projects that will assist us in learning the internals of the operating system.
I believe project grading should be done within a week from final deadline. This gives closure/feedback to the student's performance. As the project grades (final ones with penalty) are provided at the end of the course, it caused disappointments in many fellow students I know.
Quizzes, Assignments and Midterms/finals are not so hard to score well if you know the concepts good enough. The projects are really vast and tough, you will need to put a lot of time and effort. The OS Fridays helped a lot to get through the projects. Keep in mind there is no spoon feeding they just guide you.
There is a lot of work to be done however, there's no uncertainty involved. If you work for it, you will clear this subject easily. The professor is really knowledgeable and passes on that knowledge very well. You will need a decent programming background for the projects though.
Really heavy projects. Overall good learning experience.
Prof. Farshad is a great professor. Yes, this is a heavy load course and worth taking if one is really interested in OS. If the student follows professor's instructions precisely then the student can get through the course with less hiccups. Time management is the key.
Professor Ghanei is one of the most awesome professors I have ever met. The way he handles the course logistics is really to be appreciated. Pintos projects are part of the course so get ready to work closely on those. But after completing the course, the knowledge a student gains is really helpful for facing interviews of top companies.
The course is very well structured and gives many opportunities to score. It is however time consuming, especially the projects which are to be done in parallel with class lectures. There are plenty of resources and help available from TAs. This course is a must take for anyone who likes to learn by practice. The grading is pretty generous.
The course is very good and I advice to take it. Professor has made sure that the students get a complete understanding of concepts through various ways( Quiz, ZyBooks assignments). The project part is very interesting and professor has structured the project submissions over the course of the semester in a student-friendly way to avoid the stress.
Professor Ghanei is one of the best professors at UB. I would definitely recommend to take at least 1 course with him. There is so much to learn from his work ethic. Coming to the course CSE 521, it is definitely not a walk in the park. You will have to work hard but the best part is that everything is organized well by the professor.
You will have to work for it but the assignments, projects and quizzes are clearly charted out and by the end of the semester you would be very confident in the subject. Just do the homework on time and one revision before the exam will get you through. But the projects can be tricky and heavy as well.
CSE 341 is suppose to be a fair course with no labs involved. Till Spring 2021 (included), it was how it should be. In Fall 2021, Farshad just followed Jenn's way of handling CSE 341 which is totally different from how it's supposed to be. Thankfully, this Spring 2022 it's going back to how it was in Spring 2021 and earlier.
Good course, prof made the class easy.
Good: 1. No nonsense. 2. His youtube video lectures are very helpful. Do take notes. 3. good response outside the class - Os-Friday, OH or Piazza. Like professor like TAs 4. Has a lot of grading components, so you can make up for your grade. Can be better: 1. A lot of work might not correlate with understanding the subject. Especially Zybook.
Projects are heavy but grade distribution is great. Lots of opportunities to get good grade even if you can’t complete project.
Professor was always approachable. Very helpful and would go to any extent to explain the concepts. I thoroughly enjoyed all of his lectures.
Overall, a solid professor at UB. He is a pretty captivating lecturer, and provides lots of examples while going over class material. The material isn't overly challenging from a conceptual perspective and the exams are quite fair. The hardest assignments by far are the programming assignments, but are also quite doable.
Very good professor, unlike most of them at UB the professor is very active during class. Classes are very fun to attend.
The course structure is horrendous, you need to be already proficient to an extent in ros in order to successfully navigate through the course as it is not covered in class and 65 percent of the coursework is programming assignment using ros. The class would cover theorey concepts and algorithms which are pretty straightforward, but ros wasn't.
I am not sure why the course doesn't have a prerequisite mentioning the need of ros, since it was expected that students can pick it up within weeks. The pain point is that there wasn't any teaching of ros, though the ta and professor were always there to answer queries but expecting one to learn ros from documentation is a farce.
Great teacher and professional but garbage courses avoid unless you need it as a requirement. Of all the students I interacted none were willingly taking it they were compelled by their program requirements. I found earning curve too steep and there wasn't much support within classroom either when it comes to learning Ros, Exams were very easy .
Man I don't know what to say the course was a dichtomoy with the exams being trivially easy but the programming assignments being very tough. The assignments will take a lot of time from your schedule but on the contrary you need not study for exams and still should get more than 90 percent. Rough to take it as a grad student with 3 other subjects.
Lectures are all fun and easy but a high school student would have taught me ros the same way. It is like if someone in your freshman year gives you a Denis Ritchie textbook and expects you to learn c. Almost everything in cs is documented and is on net I don't understand why do I need to pay 3000$ for a class to learn from documentation, sad.
The professor is good but the course is not. I would be open to taking another course with the professor just not this one as the expectation is not conveyed clearly, only proficiency in python was expected but a more realistic requirement is to have some knowledge of Ros beforehand or else the course regresses from being fun to being a pain.
Simple assignments in beginning(very helpful) + bonus quiz. Did not teach anything about ROS, be learnt by self/internet. Taught simple theory in class. Doesn't seem reasonable to pay $3000 for this course, for something to learn 95% by self/internet. Gave many of assignments with only 1 week of time. And 3 midterms with no time for preparation.
Professor is very inspiring and he gives his best to make you understand different concepts.
Everything other than the logistics is perfect. The content is challenging, but you will learn a lot of useful knowledge. The exam is out of ~130 but cap at 100, with unlimited written cheatsheet. But my professor emailed me and asked me to put a realistic rating: This class has the worst logistics among all courses I have ever taken at UB.
Farshad knows what he's talking about, and explains most concepts well. He encourages student participation, which makes lectures more engaging. He can also be lenient in terms of grading. Overall, a very friendly and approachable professor.
Informative and well structured lectures. Tests were not too difficult. The projects were not too hard (provided you knew Python, Linux, and how to read documentation). The project work was very slow in the beginning but picks up at the end.
The professor is highly knowledgeable and is extremely good at conveying his thoughts/materials in class. The materials/course is well structured and easy to understand.
Professor's teaching style includes rehashing important operating system concepts, doing practice questions in class, and posing various questions through out lectures. I would strongly recommend that any future student picks up a copy of Operating System concepts and reads the appropriate chapter before lecture and learn how to write scripts.
The professor and class were great. The content of the class was truly enriching, and the projects helped me understand the material deeply. I was unaware going into the class that all the projects are group based, and I am lucky my team was strong and abled. My only complaint is quizzes were posted online with little warning with short due dates.
Professor Farshad is a very well-mannered and amazing professor, I took CSE 468/568 with him, and the whole course was well structured from the beginning. His lectures are also good and he interacts with the class so if you have any doubts you can ask him during the lecture or even after the class. He also gives extra credit assignments.
I took CSE468/568 with Dr. Ghanei, this spring. He was a great lecturer but the assignments take a lot of time so be prepared for that.
Professor Ghanei is the MOST understanding professors you will ever have. Curriculum is not tough, however, assignments are tough; he knows this. He has provided MANY chances to not just pass but to get a B or higher Lectures: fun and interesting Assignments: starts easy and gets significantly challenging Exams: VERY easy if you listen to lectures
The professor's professionalism is not in doubt, and the recorded videos are easy to watch. The assignments are required reading a lot of documentation. One or two of the assignments were particularly painful, taking up all my free time for almost a full week. Several of the later assignments were of moderate difficulty.
Horrible course, the assignments have no relation with what is being taught in the class, a freshman could structure the course better.
Farshad puts up a hard class, and he more than makes up the difficulty in his willingness to work with students. I have never had a professor more ready to help during and after office hours. Farshad's class is the first group-project heavy class I have ever had that has a system for dividing grades. He puts up hard classes, but they are worth it.
Fairly sayin, this course is very very difficult, but he is a good professor. Midterm is easy if you good at memorizing concept. project will take you a lot of time, because he expects you learn them by yourself outside of class. His lectures are interesting and clearly recorded. Probably won't get a good grade, but I think he's cool...
Doesn't grade any of the labs, literally it's the last 3 weeks of the mf semester. Gives out hella assignments and labs with little to no instructions. Idk what the UB CS program was thinking when they got this guy to teach a curriculum class like 341. Take anyone but this man, this class is so bad it has me lost for words wtf.
He's probably better for other classes. CSE341 in Fall 2022 was horrible. Labs weren't graded. TAs never had any idea what was going on. Projects were released late and without any explanation. Posts on piazza went unanswered for days on end. He is helpful enough on OH however.
extremely disorganized. doesn't grade anything. Have not gotten back any grades besides midterms. No labs, hws, or projects have been graded and given back to us. Last week of the semester, no idea where I stand. Terrible instructions on everything. Rarely any office hours. Releases projects with terrible instructions and no time to do them.
Terribly disorganized
Imagine being given the last of three projects (which you need points on otherwise you fail the entire class) in the first half of the last week of classes... Course uses outdated buggy technologies. Very large courseload. The only thing going for this class is that the exams aren't too bad.
Farshad is one of those professors that thinks you are only taking his class. Endless assignments and tight deadlines. Class was well paced at the start but fell apart around the first midterm. The cherry on top is that this core class in the CSE department has BARELY any office hours available to understand the mess that are his projects.
This class is an absolute mess. Avoid at all costs if you want to keep your sanity. Never seen a more disorganized class in my college career. This semester is a lost cause, but I hope UB CSE can intervene in future semesters.
He killed my soul. He thinks you are only taking his class and has insane workload: pre-lab, in-lab, post-lab, zyBooks, HW Assignments, projects, two midterms and all of that with just 2 weekly office hours. This class was designed on pure arrogance, the carnegie rule doesn't apply on farshad's class. The other section of 341 was way reasonable
The day of judgement comes near for what this class did to my mental and physical health.
Bro has the worst instructions on my momma
He is not GANG GANG GANG. He one of the opps now.
nah mans a homie on god. just the vague instructions, TAs with no help, no office hours, no feedback on tasks. Class isn't bad just workload be crazy fr fr.
This class is a literal joke. For Christmas, everyone fails!!! But for real none of us would've known because we never got grades back until the last week!!! So cool getting no feedback but doing bad blindlessly. Not to be dramatic but I'd rather drink salt water for all of 2023 than do this again.
A very difficult class with a huge work load and so many assignments. It feels like 3 classes wrapped up in one.
Others covered the issues for the most part. Insanely disorganized, somewhere on the order of 4 weeks behind the syllabus by mid-November. The SystemVerilog project in particular sticks out as particularly unpleasant. I expected more from UB, especially after some great prerequisite classes. Pray next semester's session is seriously improved.
Farshad is a genuine a cool guy, but this course was terribly organized. The excessive workload left no time to dedicate to other courses. The instructions on the assignments were awful, led to endless questions on piazza and plenty of wasted hours going in circles. The endless assignments, tight deadlines and helpless TAs led to mediocre results.
Useless TAs I ever had, two TAs site there and do nothing, Lab works are all by self-study. Projects are super complex and without help.
Knows what he's talking about and presented lectures clearly. But the sheer amount of work was ridiculous with little return value. Drowned by the end. No time to study for exams. There was an unplanned dropping of grades, reducing the value of the work even further, but likely saved many from failing. Wouldn't be necessary with a smaller workload.
Where do I even start, this class was a complete disaster. The labs started out okay, but evolved into very complex assignments that took all day to complete. The projects were piled on like crazy with short deadlines. I get this is CS / CE, but this amount of work with very little help (mans has like 5 TAs with barely any OH) is ridiculous.
Just take a look at other student feedbacks from fall 2022...
You won't learn anything in his lecture but assignments are interesting.
Farshad is a great professor who really values student feedback and works with you to help you succeed. The course was really well structured although it could be a bit disorganized at times. The TAs are all great as well and went above and beyond to help my group get back on track when we were stuck. Examples/demos in lecture, so worth it to go.
The course work is bit heavy and demands more effort from the students. But in the end, we can end up learning a lot. Lots of self learning involved
Very tough grading and very tough assignments. You will learn a lot but this course will take more than 50% of your time
Prof. Farshad is very organized about the course and its project structure. Lectures are very well taught. But the project is a bit tough with tight deadlines and consumes a lot of time which results in spending less time for other courses. The TA's are helpful in guiding us throughout the project.
Professor, has great deep knowledge about the course. And teaches really well, but just give some extra time on assignments.
During lecture and office hours professor Ghanei is extremely passionate, caring, and effective. Emails and questions are answered very well by him. But, the class was a mess. Workload not distributed well; projects delayed weeks. TAs are very unhelpful. Lab handouts had glaring errors. Tools outdated when unnecessary (ex. qtSpim and Icarus 0.10.0)
Farshad is a terrific professor. He knows how to teach and make concepts intuitive, and is passionate about it. However, his class organization skills this semester were rough at best. The workload was staggering- I took time from other classes to get an A in this one. The projects were very difficult, with one assigned in the last week. Bad TAs.
With extent of knowledge, comes the clarity to teach.
Farshad taught really well, the course curriculum is interesting. The projects requires time and efforts but are challenging and interesting. Overall, a great course!
Professor Ghanei teaches well, he is very clear about the evaluation criteria and expects from students to complete the assignments and projects by own for better learning.
Our Professor Dr Ghanei is one of the best professor I have ever been guided under. Please try to take up the course under him as he gives you the best of understandings.
He is overall one of the best computer science professors at UB. If you put in the work and attend lecture, you will get a lot out of his classes. As of my most recent cse421 experience, I found it to be a hard course with generous grading. Tests were designed to help boost your grade, since the homework was mind-bending and time consuming.
The course I took (Robotics Algorithms) was an introductory course, so it covered many different concepts at basic level. Assignments - very interesting but extremely challenging, you'll get around 12 days per assignment so start early Prof. is approachable and helpful with the assignments. The lectures are very clear and understandable.
Great, passionate, caring, and approachable professor. Structure/workload is what makes the course difficult/frustrating. Unfortunately, poor lab partners == significantly more work. Nothing was graded until the end of the sem, this was stressful/anxiety inducing. However, his grading is extremely lenient/fair. Work hard + attend lectures + OH == A
Overall a good professor but the projects are alot of work, and tight deadlines means if you get behind its very hard to catch up and your grade might go down. But Dr. Ghanei gives ways to get extra credit which may help balance out a bit. The office hours were all towards the end of the week so if you need help and miss a deadline good luck
The content was a bit different from what I heard from other students that previously took CSE 341, but I did enjoy the use actually writing with an assembly language instead of just learning about it. The 1 hour long labs felt rushed and incomplete. The homework was sporadic. 4 homework assignments over the semester. With 3 of them in two weeks.
Horrible time management, didn't care half the class failed 2 out of 3 tests. He cared if you talked to him one on one but it was very clear that this class was his last priority. 2 out of 3 projects were received late, and we only received 4 home works when we were supposed to have many more.
Professor Ghanei is confident in the topics he teaches and is extremely friendly and open to questions. He is accessible outside of class and is very willing to help you. You can tell he is passionate about his teaching. Highly recommend him for CSE341 and also CSE421 (I'm taking both with him).
Has zero respect for your time, despite saying thats his focus in lecture 1. Will promise to release homework/grades/info on a certain date, and is DAYS late with no apology. It's as if his class is a second priority once he's out of the classroom, his Tae Kwon Do hobby or something else takes precedent. Decent teacher, does not care about you.
He is a great teacher and tries to ensure that everyone participates. For him, participation is key to understand the projects and assignments given.
Dr. Ghanei is an excellent professor. His lectures are awesome. He cares for students a lot. and really patient with questions. do not be shy about asking him the question in class, because he is kind our age and he understands your concerns. He is sharp in teaching and really smart. I would like to take his class again.
I like the guy, but this has to be one of the most disorganized and unnecessarily difficult classes I've taken. Project and Lab directions are confusing and TAs are no help. Everything just takes longer than it has any reason to and it feels like this class doesn't respect the fact that I have more on my plate.
Unorganized, late, confusing setup, and condesending at times. Textbook is a required/paid zybook. Exams are very fair, but nothing like the labs, exams, lectures.
The class is very disorganized, he has some oddly specific requirements like asking a question or having a cheat sheet with specific requirements. His explanation imo isn't the most intuitive which makes the class a lot harder than it actually is and it is very clear that he doesn't care about his class the moment he's out of the lecture
The class seems harder because it is hardware programming. It is not what we usually see in C or C++. but actually, if we study books, do HW, and labs, and do projects by ourselves, it is not that hard. Professor cares about different levels of students and helps students if they want to get help. His tech is execellent.
Farshad is a great professor who clearly knows his stuff. At times though, the class does seem heavily disorganized and a bit all over the place. I feel like CSE341 isn't Farshad's priority, but needless to say, the grade is heavily in favor of the student and how he/she prepares for the material. Would be nice to have piazza questions answered.
Unbelievably disorganized management of CSE 341. Has the most unfair and perfectionist grading policies for projects and exams. On projects, we're graded on not only grade correctness but also code comments and how unnecessarily intuitive our long report papers for the projects are. Good luck to anyone with this professor next semester.
Prof. is available and approachable for questions. He has a good knowledge of the subject and has an amazing way of explaining even difficult concepts in a very relatable way with examples and demonstrations.
You will learn a lot of things, but the thing you will learn the most is patience.
Very nice Professor and explains things well. A lot of extra credits on the exam and labs. Fair difficulty of the exam especially when practice exam were provided. Only issue is that the project 2 was released at the last week of the class but was still manageable.
Truly an exceptional professor, he cares for his students and efforts to ensure understanding of the concepts. I have gained a clear awareness of both my strengths and areas for improvement. This class was not only informative but also engaging. Additionally, TAs go above and beyond to provide thorough responses to our queries.
Wildly disorganized. Knows what he's talking about but a bad teacher overall. Often did not put out assignments on time without moving the deadline. Can't blame the TA's for being ineffectual considering how the teacher operated this semester. Maybe I caught him during a rough period, but this was unacceptable. Avoid if at all possible.
For Operating Systems, Farshad Ghanei is very knowledgeable and organized, for other courses not so much. The course is fairly evenly distributed. But I had several good groups where the work was amicably divided up, but this was luck of the draw. The TA's were very helpful and effective.
MIPS is kind easier than C and C++. I enjoyed. I like to read the book and bring some questions before class. Professor Ghanei and TAs were really wanting to help if we ask questions.
The 341 staff, including Dr. Ghanei and his TAs, were amazing and so helpful in OH. Grading was fair and lectures were so captivating. Dr. Ghanei shows genuine interest in what he teaches and that radiates to students too! I learned a ton about assembly and how computers work, and the workload was manageable as long as you kept up with deadlines.
The labs in the ZY book greatly assisted my understanding of MIPS coding. If ZY book could offer more immediate feedback on student exercises, it would also be highly beneficial for my Verilog coding. I would prefer if the class had three lectures a week in one hour. because one and half hour lecture often feel overloaded and become exhausting.
I think the professor is very knowledgeable at what he is teaching. He also cares for the students as long as they are doing their part for the class.
Teaches based on the textbook, good at explaining complex concepts.
grades were often received later than expected.
excellent prof. care about students. HWs and exams are not that hard. will take his class again.
Expected way too much out of students regarding projects, made asking questions in class almost shameful. He would laugh and judge when basic questions were asked making it so students who were behind fell even further behind
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Textbook Required
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