Talk:SE250:lab-5:sshi080

Comments from John Hamer

• why 1000 samples? You were asked to justify your choice. This is important. If you get it wrong, you risk gathering worthless data. How confident are you in your choice?

• 50/1000 — this is a very, very low load factor. I think you have no idea why these numbers.

Simply generating results and formatting them in a table is not adequate. The lab had a task: to rank the hash functions from best to worst. If you had addressed this task, you would have realised that you actually do need to understand the numbers that are produced.

You are expected to write a reflective essay on the lab. That means writing down what you understood, what you didn't understand, what you did, why you did it, and strategies you used to cope with material that is not clearly explained anywhere. Coping with unfamiliar material is the normal state of affairs that you will encounter throughout your working life, and you need to develop the skills to deal with this.