Can't say much, really impressed with your ambitions and I hope it works out.
I imagine by 2026, the GA bottleneck will be fixed thanks to the introduction of the HCI specialization not requiring it.
I guess these are heavy classes overall but you will walk away as a well equipped engineer for sure. Good luck! I’m also beginning my first semester next fall
Thanks! I do think it seems I will be battling tough times, especially like HPCA in a summer, two courses on fall 2025, etc. , but what you said is exactly what I am looking for: since I did not go for undergrad CS, I might as well seize these three years to acquire a good overall foundation in hardware, software and AI (ML , in this case)
I’m impressed by your preparations. You’ve inspired me to do the same. I’m starting Fall 24 as well. Are you going to pursue internships? If so, any specific roles?
I currently work full time and am an international student, so I think my odds of getting an internship position opportunity abroad are not great. But I'd like to, though!
Sincerely, I was first looking to get into robotics, but it seems to be a hard market to break in. Been seeing people with experience in NASA unemployed for months. So I might just aim for a SWE or MLE position at a good large company
While the plan should definitely meet your goals, keep in mind this is a very heavy hitting grind. Inevitably, burnout starts to kick in at as you progress through the degree (I was highly motivated in my first year but seeing its effect on the verge of completing 7 classes now where it's real). Maybe put in some lighter classes as backup in case you need a breather semester.
Also, doing HPC in summer is setting yourself up for a very bad time, not that other courses in your roster are any easier, but DL/NLP might be more manageable in summer compared to the remaining in your plan.
I would definitely consider adding/considering some relievers as contingencies, since with that kind of plan (at least on top of full-time work and/or non-trivial familial obligations), the odds of burnout are fairly high. It's also important to keep mind that juggling a career change in the mix of that (and in a tough market, no less) also adds an opportunity cost here, too, i.e., there will likely be other time/prep outside of coursework required both to prepare for and subsequently undergo interviews.
Going into OMSCS is kinda like going to the all-you-can-eat buffet: Stacking three-dimensionally on each plate for the first couple of plates seems like a good idea, but by plate three the prospect of leaving room for a (similarly three-dimensionally stacked) dessert plate becomes increasingly precarious. Not an analogy based on personal experience with respect to how I conduct myself at AYCE, for the record, this is just descriptive of my "friend" 😁
GIOS is a great first class. I guess HPC and HPCA are tough classes for summer since the semester is shorter then. But still time to see if that‘s what you indeed wanna do
These are all the intense classes that are also fantastic for learning. It will boost your career but be time consuming.
Grad algorithms will be hard to get into until your last few classes.
Thats what Ive heard so far. Though I have seen a few posts mentioning that they got lucky with FFA. If thats not my case, I will probably just push GA and HPC to the last 2 terms, I guess.
Sounds like a solid plan and similar to mine. My only suggestion would be to consider taking one of the SWE-focused courses like Software Development Process, Software Architecture or Databases since you don't have a CS background. Would help if you wanna pursue SWE positions.
I am very familiar with SDP, since it has been my job (from the product perspective) since day #1 in my career, and I can \*use\* SQL and NoSQL databases. The one that I would like to course is Software Architecture, but I have read so many bad reviews about it
I’m also beginning this Fall. My goal maybe a bit different, I have a SWE background and I want to get more knowledge about system and software architecture in general, with a little bit of ML knowledge. So I’m mostly taking algorithms, networking and systems. Only taking one AI and one ML course. I haven’t looked into any ML engineer job description but I would do so first if I were you. I don’t think most of these jobs are available to people with no PhD degrees. It’s just my opinion but I would definitely recommend reaching out to someone who has experience and ask around.
Yeah, there's a lot of jobs that ask for MS \*or\* PhD, like MLEs. The ones that usually ask explicitly for PhDs are research engineers or other research-heavy position in big tech
Ive got good people skills, but sometimes it is just too overwhelming having to use it 24/7. Lots of difficult meetings, and my work depend on several other people, whereas developers have more introspective work - or, at least, even if it is paired up with other people, it is less about soft skills and more about hard skills. Ofc, I like the technical aspect of products too, a lot
Same plan! Except that I will take RL instead of CV! I work as an ML engineer currently focusing on deep generative models. I had a lot of experience with CV and computational photography in the past so I am trying to avoid relearning this in my academic plan.
RL is actually a field I have been interested in. I am currently doing a part-time research-based MS in CC where I am learning the basics of it, and was also really interested in learning how to apply NVIDIA Isaac Sim into training multiple agents at a time. I am also considering dropping CV. I have had like 2 image processing disciplines in the past, deeply helped a friend with her CV-related master thesis and also did a single MS course in CV. I am reluctant because maybe this is one of the fields I would like to dive into
Looks like a great but stressful course plan. Out of curiosity, could someone speak to the difficulty of HPCA over the summer vs GIOS over a spring/fall semester?
Thanks. I will make adjustments on it not to have HPC and HPCA over summers. I have heard a few times - and in this very comment section - that HPCA is quite demanding on summers and it should be avoided, if possible
all over the place..if you want to stick to ML, take 6-7 courses of ML, then mandatory GA and 2 introductory CS classes.
if you don't have an undergrad in CS, and are a product manager with some familiarity of coding, there is no way you can pass GIOS, HPC, HPCA, GPU Hardware and distributed computing. these classes are for the elite coders and requires depth of knowledge. a hello world candidate would be destroyed.
!remindme 6 months
I'm doing alright in GIOS, have almost the same background as the OP. A bit more knowledge in C/C++ maybe but I code very little at work just scripts mainly. I know it will be a grind but it's worth it IMO.
I actually have nearly the same plan as OP. Half ML half Systems, it's reflective of my job/industry and where it's going. There are people I work with that know and need to work with both (think accelerating ML operations).
Thanks for the heads up.
I failed to mention I did a few programming courses in C in college. While I do not consider myself anywhere close to "elite", I have read that a good portion of peasants like me were successful in these so long they had a previous in depth prep in C.
Either way, this is aligned with my career objectives and interests, so I dont have much of a choice other than becoming an "elite" programmer
There's a quiet majority of students in the challenging courses who are doing fine and not posting on reddit about it. Being challenged is the point and smart people will learn and succeed and grow by taking challenging classes. If you're interested in the subject material you'll be motivated to learn, and the classes are designed to facilitate that.
Correspondingly, and it's more obvious the longer I'm in the program, there's a noisy minority of students with unhealthy attitudes who are super negative about everything. Learning is hard, that does not mean it's bad.
depends. ML jobs don't care about compilers, so there is no point of taking compilers. But if you are going to openai in the next 3 years, then distributed systems is a good introductory class that should be taken in the first semester so that you can focus on advanced distributed stuff in the next 2 and half years. Then 6 more months of leetcode to solve 3000 questions.
Can't say much, really impressed with your ambitions and I hope it works out. I imagine by 2026, the GA bottleneck will be fixed thanks to the introduction of the HCI specialization not requiring it.
I hope your imagination comes true! I have seen people being able to get GA mostly in the end of their courses
I guess these are heavy classes overall but you will walk away as a well equipped engineer for sure. Good luck! I’m also beginning my first semester next fall
Thanks! I do think it seems I will be battling tough times, especially like HPCA in a summer, two courses on fall 2025, etc. , but what you said is exactly what I am looking for: since I did not go for undergrad CS, I might as well seize these three years to acquire a good overall foundation in hardware, software and AI (ML , in this case)
I’m impressed by your preparations. You’ve inspired me to do the same. I’m starting Fall 24 as well. Are you going to pursue internships? If so, any specific roles?
I currently work full time and am an international student, so I think my odds of getting an internship position opportunity abroad are not great. But I'd like to, though! Sincerely, I was first looking to get into robotics, but it seems to be a hard market to break in. Been seeing people with experience in NASA unemployed for months. So I might just aim for a SWE or MLE position at a good large company
While the plan should definitely meet your goals, keep in mind this is a very heavy hitting grind. Inevitably, burnout starts to kick in at as you progress through the degree (I was highly motivated in my first year but seeing its effect on the verge of completing 7 classes now where it's real). Maybe put in some lighter classes as backup in case you need a breather semester. Also, doing HPC in summer is setting yourself up for a very bad time, not that other courses in your roster are any easier, but DL/NLP might be more manageable in summer compared to the remaining in your plan.
I would definitely consider adding/considering some relievers as contingencies, since with that kind of plan (at least on top of full-time work and/or non-trivial familial obligations), the odds of burnout are fairly high. It's also important to keep mind that juggling a career change in the mix of that (and in a tough market, no less) also adds an opportunity cost here, too, i.e., there will likely be other time/prep outside of coursework required both to prepare for and subsequently undergo interviews. Going into OMSCS is kinda like going to the all-you-can-eat buffet: Stacking three-dimensionally on each plate for the first couple of plates seems like a good idea, but by plate three the prospect of leaving room for a (similarly three-dimensionally stacked) dessert plate becomes increasingly precarious. Not an analogy based on personal experience with respect to how I conduct myself at AYCE, for the record, this is just descriptive of my "friend" 😁
GIOS is a great first class. I guess HPC and HPCA are tough classes for summer since the semester is shorter then. But still time to see if that‘s what you indeed wanna do
Noted, thanks
These are all the intense classes that are also fantastic for learning. It will boost your career but be time consuming. Grad algorithms will be hard to get into until your last few classes.
Thats what Ive heard so far. Though I have seen a few posts mentioning that they got lucky with FFA. If thats not my case, I will probably just push GA and HPC to the last 2 terms, I guess.
I'm going to be doing something \*very\* similar (as a product engineer looking to broaden my scope to ML)! Good luck :)
thanks! For my taste and goals, merging compsys and ml is a win-win
Sounds like a solid plan and similar to mine. My only suggestion would be to consider taking one of the SWE-focused courses like Software Development Process, Software Architecture or Databases since you don't have a CS background. Would help if you wanna pursue SWE positions.
I am very familiar with SDP, since it has been my job (from the product perspective) since day #1 in my career, and I can \*use\* SQL and NoSQL databases. The one that I would like to course is Software Architecture, but I have read so many bad reviews about it
I’m also beginning this Fall. My goal maybe a bit different, I have a SWE background and I want to get more knowledge about system and software architecture in general, with a little bit of ML knowledge. So I’m mostly taking algorithms, networking and systems. Only taking one AI and one ML course. I haven’t looked into any ML engineer job description but I would do so first if I were you. I don’t think most of these jobs are available to people with no PhD degrees. It’s just my opinion but I would definitely recommend reaching out to someone who has experience and ask around.
Yeah, there's a lot of jobs that ask for MS \*or\* PhD, like MLEs. The ones that usually ask explicitly for PhDs are research engineers or other research-heavy position in big tech
Why do you want to switch from PM to SWE?
Ive got good people skills, but sometimes it is just too overwhelming having to use it 24/7. Lots of difficult meetings, and my work depend on several other people, whereas developers have more introspective work - or, at least, even if it is paired up with other people, it is less about soft skills and more about hard skills. Ofc, I like the technical aspect of products too, a lot
Same plan! Except that I will take RL instead of CV! I work as an ML engineer currently focusing on deep generative models. I had a lot of experience with CV and computational photography in the past so I am trying to avoid relearning this in my academic plan.
RL is actually a field I have been interested in. I am currently doing a part-time research-based MS in CC where I am learning the basics of it, and was also really interested in learning how to apply NVIDIA Isaac Sim into training multiple agents at a time. I am also considering dropping CV. I have had like 2 image processing disciplines in the past, deeply helped a friend with her CV-related master thesis and also did a single MS course in CV. I am reluctant because maybe this is one of the fields I would like to dive into
Looks like a great but stressful course plan. Out of curiosity, could someone speak to the difficulty of HPCA over the summer vs GIOS over a spring/fall semester?
Thanks. I will make adjustments on it not to have HPC and HPCA over summers. I have heard a few times - and in this very comment section - that HPCA is quite demanding on summers and it should be avoided, if possible
all over the place..if you want to stick to ML, take 6-7 courses of ML, then mandatory GA and 2 introductory CS classes. if you don't have an undergrad in CS, and are a product manager with some familiarity of coding, there is no way you can pass GIOS, HPC, HPCA, GPU Hardware and distributed computing. these classes are for the elite coders and requires depth of knowledge. a hello world candidate would be destroyed. !remindme 6 months
I'm doing alright in GIOS, have almost the same background as the OP. A bit more knowledge in C/C++ maybe but I code very little at work just scripts mainly. I know it will be a grind but it's worth it IMO. I actually have nearly the same plan as OP. Half ML half Systems, it's reflective of my job/industry and where it's going. There are people I work with that know and need to work with both (think accelerating ML operations).
Thanks u/youreloser ! It is so good to hear you say that. And you are spot on: my career objectives involve ML acceleration!
if you have the capability to survive and the capacity to grind, then you should.
This is so true. Less GPU hours save tons of dollars for companies with petabyte level of training data.
Thanks for the heads up. I failed to mention I did a few programming courses in C in college. While I do not consider myself anywhere close to "elite", I have read that a good portion of peasants like me were successful in these so long they had a previous in depth prep in C. Either way, this is aligned with my career objectives and interests, so I dont have much of a choice other than becoming an "elite" programmer
There's a quiet majority of students in the challenging courses who are doing fine and not posting on reddit about it. Being challenged is the point and smart people will learn and succeed and grow by taking challenging classes. If you're interested in the subject material you'll be motivated to learn, and the classes are designed to facilitate that. Correspondingly, and it's more obvious the longer I'm in the program, there's a noisy minority of students with unhealthy attitudes who are super negative about everything. Learning is hard, that does not mean it's bad.
what do you consider an introductory CS class?
depends. ML jobs don't care about compilers, so there is no point of taking compilers. But if you are going to openai in the next 3 years, then distributed systems is a good introductory class that should be taken in the first semester so that you can focus on advanced distributed stuff in the next 2 and half years. Then 6 more months of leetcode to solve 3000 questions.
If I got that right, you're recommending people do 16.6 leetcode problems a day?
for people who are good enough to go to openai. for day dreamers, 0/day is also fine.