Excellent Prof...however he's very tough

W01 term

Knows his stuff.

Very tough. Knows his stuff.

funny guy, and great prof...

Tough, but funny and helpful

The lectures are always good, but he is reluctant to help in assignments

Funny, smart

Best Prof I've ever had

Excellent lectures! I found the course easy. Fox and Geese were fun.

He knows his stuff, and if you work hard, you will too. Can be quite funny.

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Entertaining

Entertaining, makes the material look interesting to digest

Excellent professor with touch yet interesting and thought provoking assignments

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Intelligent and entertaining. Well-designed assignments, lectures, and notes.

great course, really interesting each class, rarely looked at the clock!

Good Lectures for a hard course. Arrrrg matey.

interesting lectures. good at relating abstract things to other abstract things.

Smart, funny, big league prof

biggest brain on campus award

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Hard course, but very well structured. Prof helps you if you help yourself.

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resident genius. .. hzp.

A great all round prof.

The man's a genious. He's helpful, clear, and interesting. Beware: he learns names fast, and will treat you based on your marks. That said, show interest and he will too.

A good lecturer, his course notes are well written, and the assignments cover the material well.

You can't handle Shallit if you are too young

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Awesome course, highly recommended, but prepare for a fair amount of work, and a few lame jokes

This is an interesting course, but the problem sets and exam are difficult if you don't work hard. Prof Shallit is very helpful when you go in for extra help.

Shallit did an outstanding job with this course. He's taken material that can be quite difficult (and boring) and made it accessible and fun. Two thumbs up!

best prof I have had since I come to unversity

One of the best professors I had in 5 years at UW. You don't want anyone else teaching you formal languages. He gave out cool prizes for people who asked good questions or answered hard problems.

Learns students' names. Knows every last detail about the material. Good explanations and he's really interested in the course material. Excellent prof.

Great professor, can explain complex topics in a very accessible way. Seems to love what he teaches and it shows by the presentation of his lecture, which are clear and concise. Takes the time to know his students by name, which really makes a difference.

Easy one of the best teachers in the school, period.

If you enjoy CS theory, then you will enjoy Professor Shallit. He delivers his helpful lectures with pride and enthusiasm. He is also encouraging and listens to what students have to say. However, his assignments may be more work than you're willing or able to undertake.

Jeffrey Shallit is an awesome professor! I'm always very impressed with his ability to capture and then maintain my interest. He also seems to care about genuinely care about helping his students to get involved and learn the material.

Holding virtual office hours via Instant Messenger at the night before the assignment is due, what more can I say about how great this prof is?

Really good for good students, but if you are as stupid as I am youll probably have a hard time working the assignments. They are tough, but he is willing to help you, always, no matter how stupid you are. :). Great guy, nice personality. A++++ will buy again....

Two thumbs up!

Very smart man...

Hardest class I've taken here (I haven't taken any of the killer courses, though). Prof was mildly entertaining. Never dreaded going to class. Teaches directly from his book, though, which is my only complaint.

The course is pretty interesting. It contains a lot of concepts that require time and practice to understand fully. So whereas the notes are excellent, there is a distinct benefit to going to the class, as the professor explains the concepts very clearly.

He presented the material, which can be a bit boring because of its abstractness, in an interesting way. It's quite obvious he is very interested in the field.

Very clear instruction. A lot of interesting stuff in lecturing. Moderate assignments.

Great course, the professor is very passionate about the material. Some of the assignment problems are quite hard. He brought us cake for his birthday :).

He's good for smart people, but may be a bit fast for those not too smart. Either way he's very good, and is probably one of the least boring profs in CS department.

Great prof. Can be very challenging though - advice to those taking this course unless you're a former IMO member, try not to take more than 2 other intesnse high level courses (eg 400 pmaths 400 CS killer courses etc.) If you battle through every problem in Sipser, you can easily get pretty close to 100%.

Very interesting (and often humourous) lectures and most assignments are challenging. FLAP textbook is written by Shallit himself and is an extremely valuable resource. Shallit is passionate about the material and is always willing to help students. I highly recommend his classes to anyone even moderately interested in the subject matter.

Very comical guy, he'd do some pretty elaborate things to be funny in class, which does make it more interesting. He goes through material fast and sometimes things he does are unclear. Teaches mainly by example.

A great time is had every lecture, thanks in no small part to the depth of knowledge Shallit has on the content of the course, and the history behind the development of Computer Science.

Awsome prof! He remembers everyones names. The lectures were really interesting. Assignments and exams were challenging but were fair.

excellent prof

Funny, Interesting. Good prof. However, he is FREAKING HARD. Assignments are WAY harder than other profs. INSANE amount of mathematics background required to deal with his questions. Really smart guy, but has tendency to cater the lecture to the smartest people in class. Crazy hard midterms, Crazy hard assignments. Take him if you want to die.

Make no mistake about it, this is a difficult course and it's being taught by someone who has extensive (and I mean EXTENSIVE) background knowledge in the area. The assignments are quite challenging, but not unreasonable. Midterm & final are pretty brutal. If you go to lectures and take notes, you should be pretty good, but effort is required.

Interesting, passionate, clear, hard assignments and exams. Told us to do what we can of them (seems to me, as if expecting us to fail) and they were all (all parts too) mandatory.

They say CS350 is hard. IMO, this class is harder. Prof Shallit knows his stuff, makes the course interesting, explains things really clear, but at the same time, those without the mathematical background will suffer.

Very hard and challenging course. But very interesting too. And professor Shallit is cool and extremely fair.

Shallit is clearly passionate about the material, and does a very good job of organizing a good lecture. Encourages active participation from class (sometimes "voluntolds" people) and answers questions patiently. About the course : he knows the material really well, but a tough grader. Get ready to hit the books :)

I think Jeffrey is a pretty cool guy. Eh kills cs problems and doesn't afraid of anything

The assignments & midterms are ok. The final is brutal. Crystal clear but unwilling to answer questions related to exams. Has a strong passion about teaching & mathematics.

Pretty good prof. Knows cs and mathematics very well and explains concepts in a very clear way. A little bit intimidating to ask questions. Try to ask clever questions. Exams were fair, assignments were kind of tricky. Very passionate and smart person in his area.

His lectures were interesting and engaging. Midterm and final were easy, but he was very tough with the marking, for both tests and assignments. Assignments were challenging. Overall, great prof for CS 341.

Awesome dude, cares for his students a lot and knows how to teach. Also humorous guy, one of the best profs.

His exam is easier compared with other professors and in the assignment, there are a lot of bonus questions.

Bunch of office hours and a lot of bonus marks in the assignment. His exam is easier compared with other professor and you are allowed to bring the cheat sheet. Algorithm is not a course for remembering.

His lectures were interesting and engaging. Midterm and final were easy and you are allowed to bring cheat sheet with whatever you want on it. You can always drop by his office every day and each assignment has 5 bonus marks. He will not directly give you the solution but will encourage you to find it by yourself. (some people may dislike this)

Jeffrey Shallit was an amazing professor. Very well written exams, and really did make algorithms an incredibly fun class.

I liked how he explains stuff and how he's really passionate about the material. Assignments can be tricky but almost always have bonus questions. Exams may require some knowledge about math otherwise it's pretty fair.