Edinburgh Informatics Fourth Year

April 18, 2024

This page curates my advice for studying as a fourth year in the School of Informatics at the University of Edinburgh.

This page was created for a guidance session given to incoming fourth year students.

This page contains lots of things that are frequently given advice. However, I will repeat them because it is important.

Dissertation

  • Find a good supervisor (if you haven't already)- Willing to spend time with you in person, regularly, and responds to emails

    • Cares about you and the project
    • Can set up expectations at the beginning of the semester
    • Ask previous students about their experience with their supervisor
    • If you have issues with your supervisor, ask your Student Advisor for advice as early as possible.

  • Start your dissertation early and finish your dissertation early - Get 1/2 of your dissertation finished in the first semester. Sounds easy, but impossible to do.

    • Unforeseen things WILL happen.

  • First Semester: Get to know your supervisor, get introduced to the field, read relevant papers, ask questions, write introduction chapter, start implementation

  • Second Semester: Finish implementation, do evaluation, write, proofread

  • Make sure you proofread many times. I proofread 3 times and I still found a mistake after submitting.

Courses

  • Don't take many 10 credit courses (2 per semester is fine but not 4)
  • If you have to, take more courses in the First Semester than the Second Semester
  • Take a good mix of level 10 and level 11 courses
  • Take a good mix of exam-heavy and coursework-heavy courses
  • Notice that some courses may be shared with MSc students

Courses I enjoyed

  • Advanced Database Systems (ADBS)

  • Machine Learning and Pattern Recognition (MLPR)

  • Formal Verification (FV)

  • Modelling Concurrent Systems (MCS)- Very theoretical, and the lecturer spends a lot of time with you. My views may not be shared with many other people.

Careers

If you are looking for jobs, please start early (=this summer) and widen your search. The market for entry-level engineering roles at big name places is saturated - hundreds of people apply for a handful of spots. But it is still very much possible to get them.

Think about what you want to do long-term. What do you have (or want to have) that other people don't have? Which job do you think you would enjoy? What kind of environment do you need to achieve your goals?

Don't compare yourself to other people, but ask around to seek advice. Ask someone you know to practice a mock interviews or read your resume.

If you are hoping to pursue further degrees, indicate your interest to your dissertation supervisor/research internship supervisor. Ideally, you will find someone that is willing to teach you in depth how to conduct research and how to write. They will also hopefully write a strong letter of recommendation. My academia friends found attending conferences (with their supervisors) to be very helpful in forming connections and getting to know the people in the field.

Thanks for reading.

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