EIlora: That and completing my first “real” CS class–CS107. It’s the first systems class every CS major has to take, and an abrupt shift from the comfort of Java and C++ to the harsh world of C and Unix. It’s absolutely terrifying at first–the words “Segmentation fault” become your nemesis–but it’s almost exhilarating once you get the hang of it. It’s really hard to understand unless you’re a certifiable nerd like me, but my final project–a C heap allocator–is probably one of the accomplishments I’m most proud of. I knew technology was the field for me when I started getting excited about throughput and compiler optimizations. Being excited about something that the rest of the world deems crazy is a really good indicator that you’re in the right place. Confirmed for code guenon.