Pokorny, Cornel  

Not as bad as I thought it would be. Knows computers really well but hasnt taught the class much at all. I went into the final with a C-/D+ and pulled off a B+ because of the generous curve. Definitely easier than most the other professors but I think CPE 102 will suck royally cause he doesnt prepare you as well. But hey, its easier.

He sucks. Plain and simple. The class may not be much, but it definitely screws you over for CPE102.

This guy can teach you basics really well, but he sucks at teaching you the hard stuff. For example, in the beginning of the quarter he'll tell you how a keyboard connets to the computer. Duh, everybody knows that. And he'll tell you a mouse connects to it too. Then later on he'll briefly cover some hard ass shit and moves on. This class isn't impossible though so if you get stuck with him, DON'T GIVE UP. I failed every quiz we took(no midterms) and didn't do too well on the few homework assignments we got. He's picky on grading, I think. I ended up with a C- probably because of a fat ass curve. Pay close attention to what he's really asking for on the quizzes, that's how I messed up a lot. I had no clue what he was asking but when I asked him, it didn't make anything clearer. But overall, he's really nice and fairly approachable. If you ask him for help in lab, he'll help you and stay with you for awhile to make sure you're not doing something else that's wrong.

Pokorny is average at best. His assignments were fairly easy, but his quizzes were rather difficult. The quiz questions were often unclear and misleading. He is not a bad lecturer, even though he puts very little time into planning them. Pokorny is helpful in office hours, if he bothers to show up. The class does not require much work other than the assignments, but you will also sacrifice knowledge. He gave a generous curve at the end of the semester, which enabled many students to pass the class. Overall, this class can be grinded out, although Pokorny will frustrate you frequently throughout the course of the semester.

Pokorny is interesting. He sounds like the speak and spell toy. He doesn't understand that the students have no background and don't follow the lectures. Also, he snuck out of our lab several times...how are the students supposed to finish the assignments when there is no help? I have no idea how I got a B because I really really really failed the final. That thing is so out of right field. Half the time I couldn't even tell what the question was asking. I feel sorry for computer scientists...who wants to sit and make up commands for a machine anyway? No wonder they are weird!

Alright, I must speak: if you're an introductory CSC student considering taking Pokorny, allow me to fill you in on why you shouldn't. He is, by all accounts, a difficult man to understand. He's not exceptionally great at conveying the material, but that's okay, because he doesn't cover that much either. Although it might not mean much to you soon-to-be CSC-ers, let me just say a few things for those who might be considering a more advanced class with him: I help out so many students of his who are in the eighth week and have no idea what an object is. The eighth week! Sure, they might not soulfully understand the concept, but they should be able to work with them. He doesn't get started on fundamental control structures until halfway through the quarter (a week 2 job at worst) and he doesn't start on arrays until week 8, while covering GUI coding, which is redundant since 102 covers that material. Pokorny just plows through the book a chapter at a time without a plan or, seemingly, a care, in both respects like O'Gorman, our department's resident erstwhile a-hole (fill in the blank). Now, if you're not a major student, he's an easy teacher, but for someone who wants to be a professional software engineer, take Mammen (or Staley, if he's teaching).

Pokorny is the perfect teacher for those of us that just need this class as a support class. For you CSC people, I would agree with the other reviews to avoid him. He doesn't teach a whole lot about programming, just the very basics. Which is perfect for me becuase that's all I want to learn! I don't need to know how to convert barcodes to zipcodes (like with O'Gorman), I just want to know how to find the sum of a list of numbers. His labs and projects really aren't that bad, just a little time consuming, and they do tend to have very confusing directions. The quizes can be a little tricky, but I've heard the curve will defintely make up for that. I have yet to find out. Overall, a good teacher who was always willing to help me. I would definitely recommend him.

I like this teacher a lot. He teaches 101 very well. his programs are easy, but they teach you what you need to know. He has ten quizes, and no midterm. The quizes suck, they are full of trick questions. Make sure you read the questions carefully. I probably averaged a C on the quizes, and i got an A in the class, so they are not waited heavily in the final score. The final is simple, and I think anyone can get at least a B on it.

Good teacher for us non-programmer types. His programs are very simple and straightforward. They get straight to the point and help you learn exactly what youa re supposed to without trying to confuse you first. There are no tests and only a few HW assignments (where a good share of your grade comes from). The weekly quizzes are tricky, I guess because he's got to make sure you know the little intricacies somehow. Bottomline, if you go to class everyday, and go over the recent material before the quiz, you'll do fine. Make sure you don't rely solely on the lectures though. He asks a few questions that we only found in the book to make sure you do the reading.

I can easily see how he's bad if you're a CSC/CPE/SE major, seeing as he only teaches the basics, but if you're an EE just needing this course as a support course, he fits the bill just fine. He's the only CPE101 prof. who doesn't give out lab midterms or lab quizzes; instead there are weekly quizzes which make up the bulk of your grade. The quiz questions can be quite tricky and vague, so be sure you read them carefully (our class usually averaged anywhere between 30-60% on them); the quizzes are worth anywhere between 7-14 points. Homework projects are given usually once every two weeks (worth 6 or 7 points), and they aren't that bad (except for the third one - which a lot of people couldn't solve). Each lab is worth one point, and the final is worth anywhere between 25-30 points (about the same value as 3 or 4 quizzes). At the end, he applied an insane curve that allowed many students to pass the class. Personally, this is probably the reason why I got a B, since I REALLY failed the final...... most of the questions weren't that bad until we hit the last question (where we had to write a whole program by hand) and the shit hit the fan (and that I averaged a C-/D+ on the quizzes). If CPE101 is the only programming class you're ever going to take, then take it with Pokorny, but otherwise, if you're a CSC/CPE/SE, I'd recommend someone else (other than O'Gorman, though).

Well i just took my first midterm in this class and I have to tell you that it was just about the worst test i have taken in my life. The questions are vague and not specific and when you try to ask him for any sort of help he acts surprised. He also makes the midterms based on what he tried to show us in class and not the ideas behind it. Like he said list the three diffrent steps to do a certain thing as we did it in class. Ummmmm yeah, I knew how to do it but he wanted his damn steps what a waste of a quarter. Man, If sound bittter its cause i am. His miterm is 36 percent of the grade and programming assignments are each only 8 and you only have two. Hopefully the common final is better cause its not just him writing the test.

Teacher is very lazy and unorganized. Always late to class. Does not prepare you to take the comprehensive final. Don't be fooled by my grade. The only reason why I got a B+ was that I went to Liu's lecture which did prepare me for the 45% final. By the way the final was out of 150 points and our lazy professor's portion was only worth 25pts of that. Usually CPE professors have the discretion to make their portion of the exam worth half of the total points. I think Pokorny made his portion worth 25pts because he was tooooooo lazy to write a longer test. Pokorny, if you are reading this take my advice and quit teaching. Its obvious to me that you don't care about your students or your job. If industry won't take you back, then maybe retirement or a career change is in order. By the way YOU SUCK! so that he did

"I HAVE A DREAM...........THAT ONE DAY TEACHERS WHO DO NOT CARE ABOUT THE WELFARE OF THERE STUDENTS WOULD DISAPPEAR FROM THE FACE OF THE EARTH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! If YOU TAKE HIM HERE IS A FREEBEE QUESTION FOR MIDTERM "13) If you want your code to react whenever a certain graphical component on the the display produces an event, you have to do three things to your program a) b) c) " pretty f-ckin vague and this is one of the better questions!

This instructor doesn't know how to teach. He keep reading the textbook during the lectures. You will not learn anything from this instructor. His lab is terrible. He plays around with his Graphical User Interface (GUI) programs during the lab. His midterm and final exame are not very hard, but his questions are very confused. He event doesn't know how to test his students. You are very hard to answer his questions in the midterm and final exame because his questions are not clear, and stupid questions. If you take him, you should study very hard on your own way, otherwise, you will be have troubled in the common final exame. Please don't take him. I don't know why CalPoly has this kind of professor? He doesn't care about his students at all. He might never think how he became a teacher.

This class was a joke. The first day he walked in, sat down and just started reading out of the book. He would sometimes get out of the chair and write something out of the book on the board. The labs are a complete joke as well all he does is type code and you copy it down. His midterm doesnt prepare you at all for the final and his quizes are on random nonsense. I would avoid Pokorny if you can, try taking Stearns. If you are already good at programming and want a class that you never have to show up for, this is the one for you.

Pokorny is a nice guy. he is lazy in that he only assigns 2 labs and 2 projects durring the whole quarter in comparison to about 10 labs and 5 projects in all of the other classes. But if you check out the other teachers websites you can do their labs. I only put in about 5 hours week in this class and thankfully, he curves grades at the end of the quarter because i would of gotten a c-...

The way Pokorny presents the material is to read to you out of the book, which does not help you get a better grasp on anything. The class is very boring! There were only two small labs, two programs and one midterm the entire quarter. I do not feel that the labs helped me understand how to write the code. In lab, he would just write code for you on the overhead and you were expected to copy it down. This does NOT help you understand problem solving, and it does NOT make things easy when you have to program on your own. All in all, I found the lab useless and the lecture nothing I couldn't have figured out on my own from reading the book. In office hours, Pokorny was horrible. He made me feel like I was bothering him. I do NOT recommend him to anyone.

pokorny doesn't lecture well. he has a heavy accent and his labs are useless. you just sit there are watch him type. His exams are pretty difficult and i don't feel that he adequately prepare students to take the common final at the end of the quarter.

This guy doesnt care about anything. The only reason why he is even teaching the class is probabaly becasue of the money he gets out of it. If you go to office hours and if he is there, then its your lucky day! He responds to emails 4 to 5 days after they have been sent. You dont learn anything in the lectures or the labs (which he does for you) and when time comes to take the common final, you are just screwed! Even if he was the only teacher teaching the class that i was suppose to take then i wouldnt take that class that quarter just to avoid him! He is a bastard so dont even think about taking him!

Pokorny can be quite boring. I dont believe he prepares you as well for the common final as other professors. He grades on a curve though, and only asigns two programs. I didnt find it to be diffucult, if you need to read the book outside of class, so be it. You should be doing that anyway.

This class is very much geared toward what you want to learn in it. Pokorny kind of just looks at the course description of what you are supposed to know and checks off things that he's lecture on as the weeks progress, and if you want to learn something specific...you just ask him, right in the middle of class. Lectures are fairly clear and fairly interesting. The labs are all very small, and there are 4 or 5 projects that can be done in a few hours, no matter how good you are. Good teacher to take if you learn quickly and don't need a lot of work to get things straight. If you prefer doing a lot of work and a lot of labs to learn things...Pokorny is not for you.

pokorny's teaching skills are below average. he is poor at communicating. i wasted time showing up for what i thought was my alternate final time but he told me the wrong time for it. and he didn't care either when i pointed that out.

During lectures he sat in front of the room and read from the book. Occasionally he would get up and write a thing or two on the board. He went to the lab the first few weeks but we never did anything. Then he assigned a "lab monitor"...half the time the lab guy had no idea what he was doing so he'd write code on the board and then we'd compile it and get errors and he'd write something else...and the tests are hard, if you couldn't tell by my grade:) Take someone else if you can.

He sat in front of class and made comments about Chad all day.

This teacher reads out of the book, and sometimes gives quizes right after not explaining something well. Never goes to the labs to help you and is hard to find during office hours. I do not recommend.

This profesor makes tons of mistakes and talks in a monotone voice during the lecture and thats all you get of him. The labs are run by an assisstant who is not informed as to what was lectured and often had to wing it. His quiz and midterm questions are often confusing. I would not recommend this guy to anyone because he is never there and often stares off into nowhere blankly when asked a question, then fails to answer it.

He got a bit of a accent, it's not too bad though. However, he never was in lab and his assistant there was never well informed on what should be happening. His test are way too long. Answer the questions you can answer the quickest. He gives a pop quiz about every two weeks, so watch out they add up. Take someone different someone who knows how long a test should be.

He really knows his stuff, but his lecture is sooo boring! For the first 7 weeks he just sat up front basically reading from the book. In the last 3 weeks, when he was teaching us stuff that wasn't in the book, he became more interesting. He would always help people who didn't understand and made sure they understood. He had 4 fairly easy programs, 3 of which involved simply changing some code from one of the previous programs. His midterm wasn't too hard, but his final seemed a bit tedious, and it took me almost 3 hours to finish it, working non-stop. I came out of the class knowing the material well.

This professor read to us from the text, was regularly late to class, didn't show up at all a few times. He had no structured labs, was even less help in his office hour. His grading policy for programs seemed less than fair. I was unable to program for him because most of his teaching was in pre-standard C++ and we are reading about and using standard C++.

Dr. Pokorny was an alright teacher. I just wished he was more clear in his lectures, program description, and study guides for midterms and the final. He's not a very hard teacher but you must do all the programs. He curved the grades for our class. He doesn't really tell you what chapters to read so you have to do that yourself. The programs in the beginning of the quarter are easier, but towards the last programs it is pretty hard.

The teaching method of him reading the book page by page and explaining what is read is helpful, sometimes boring, but helpful. Tests were hard. The lab portion of the class I decide not to go to after awhile because it was a big waste of time. He would type code faster than most could copy it down then compile the code making the code he typed not visible. Only reason got an A is because of a curve and this was my 5th computer language.

THIS IS THE WORST TEACHER EVER! You will learn nothing. He reads directly from the book, assigns only three programming projects (which he does most of in class for you) and has one midterm. The bad news even gets worse - YOU LEARN NOTHING AND 45% of your grade is based on the common final. GOOD LUCK

The only good reason to take this professor is to get a good nap in. He comes to class and reads to himself, out loud, from the book. He is no help in lab, which is for the most part you copying his program. If you want to pass his class you better sit in on another professors class.

This professor is the worst csc prof. that i have had so far!!! He is a bastard that does not care about his students at all!! He just reads off the book in class and then never shows up for his office hours!! Steer away from this guy, take Liu or Paulson instead....you will learn with them....but with him, the class will be a good nap time!

Dr. Pokorny is awesome! He presented the material clearly and the assignments are of reasonable difficulty. His grading was fair and generous. He also provided a lot of helpful hints and actually the codes for the assignment during the lab. I have no problem in catching him during his office hour, except he was busy having lunch sometimes. I would recommend this prof. to anyone.

He cannnot teach but is a nice guy if you go to office hours. Just learn from the book or go to another teachers class if you want to learn anything from the lectures.

This was absolutely the most poorly taught course that I have ever taken. He does not assign any reading, and each lecture is randomly put together at the last minute. He does not follow a syllabus. He covered certain material more than three times throughout the quarter and did not bother to plan anything. He would simply look randomly through the book and lecture on information that he deemed important. He gave "weekly" quizes(six or so), that counted for most of your grade. I assume that there were no midterms because he did not want to make the effort to write them. Each quiz took about 5-10 minutes. On the "syllabus", which he did not even bother to proof read or include useful information, it listed the final exam as 15% of the total grade. On the day of the final, he informed the class that it would actually constitute closer to 30% of the total grade. The final took less than an hour. As for programming assignments, I probably spent an average of 2-3 hours doing them and this is only the second programming class that I have ever taken. If I had a guess, I would say he spent less than two hours preparing all the material for the quarter. No review sheets, no hand-outs, nothing. Cal Poly engineering supposedly has a great reputation; however, this professor is terrible. I received an A in the class and I don't feel that learned anything. To sum it up, I paid about $300 to take this class, and I learned everything from the $50 book.

The other postings pretty much have it right. He doesn't spend much time preparing material for class, or lab, and class can become very boring. The best way to get through this class is to skim the book and then ask him questions during class, to get a more thorough explaination than the book provides. Personally I hated the textbook "Big Java", because it wasn't organized, at all,(even the table of contents is wrong). Big java is a big book that could use a whole lot of slimming down through editing. Dr. Pokorny himself knows the material very well but he forgets that his students do not. fyi: The common final was much more difficult than the quizzes.

About an average teacher. Most of your grade is based on weekly quizzes. Labs are worth 1 point, "assignments" (really homework, but they are easy enough to finish in the lab) are worth about 7 points. There is no midterm. I liked Pokorny's style of giving many small quizzes and no midterm. Maybe its just laziness rather than intentional volition, but it works. The labs are long but I only stayed for the whole period once; he doesn't mind if you leave early. If you prefer, you can get the lab handouts, leave and do the work at home if you have Java installed (I didn't, but its an option). If you struggle in CSC, this teacher might not be for you if there are better choices. I only took Pokorny because I knew it'd be easy for me (not to brag) and would rather take better instructors in harder classes. Take that to mean what you will. However, Pokorny really isn't that bad. He's not evil or anything, just isn't a very engaging professor. Definitely take over O'Gorman if thats the only other teacher available.

I would recommend this teacher to anybody.

Pokorny made me LOL so hard I had to punch a kangaroo, which are like spiders, but worse.

I didn't feel that I learned much in this class. The professor is pretty boring and spends days on topics that were already covered in CPE 103 and CSC 141, without getting too much deeper. I spent most of the lecture fighting to stay awake. You'll get an easy B and an attainable A in this class, but you won't learn much.

This class feels more like review than anything else. He only requires you learn the very basics of things presented in class. And that's a good thing, because I had no idea what was going on in a lot of cases. He has only weekly quizes, one programming lab (which you can do in teams and is very easy) and then a fair final. You shouldn't have hard time at all with this guy, but if you need help it's best to ask in office hours because his lectures aren't good at all.

Wow this guy is boring...and the class was not at all what I expected. I was hoping for some OpenGL, but we spent the first half of the quarter making our own 3D displaying system thing in regular Java. It sucked. And there is a quiz every week, that gets annoying because sometimes it doesn't seem like you've learned enough in the week to take a quiz, but he just asks random questions anyway and most of the class fails. Based purely on points, I went into the final with a high D, and even if I aced the final I techinically could have only gotten a C-. Bu tI ended up getting a B-, and I'm SURE I didn't ace that final. So take it how you want--he's boring and you don't learn much, but you can tell he's really trying to teach well and (almost) feel bad for him sometimes for being so boring and hard to understand. Yet, he grades pretty darn easily...so, look for a better 471 teacher but don't be scared to take this guy if you have to.

Pokorny is a nice guy and he knows his stuff. The class however is most likely not what you're expecting. The first half of the course was Linear Algebra applications using Java. The second half was learning how to not have to know what we just learned using Java3D. I might just be biased, but I did not want to learn Java3D, and I did not want to take Linear Algebra again. Now on to his teaching skills... wait what teaching skills? Pretty much he lectures about random things that have to do with Computer Graphics very generally. These lectures are extremely boring, but here's the best part, you have to know those things inside and out if you want a good grade because 80% of your grade is based on those little worthless factoids. the other 20% is based on very very simple programs. It is a good basics class if you're not familiar with linear algebra and if you're very desparate to learn some Computer Graphics, but I think taking it from someone else would be better. Pretty much I learned very little, and I got a bad grade for not memorizing tiny facts.

Avoid this professor/class combination at all costs; you will not learn anything useful. Other professors teaching Graphics teach it in OpenGL while Pokorny teaches first in straight Java (you learn how to do some rudimentary software rendering), then in Java3D. None of the five programs was very complicated. I finished a few of them the day after they were assigned. I attended lecture less than a third of the time, missed a number of quizzes, took the final in under an hour, and scored an A-. Take somebody else for this class if you actually want to learn about graphics.

I don't really recommend Pokorny, but I've had far worse professors in my day. He teaches the material all right, and he's quite good in office hours. The class isn't very hard--the programs and labs are easy, and I didn't have too much trouble with the final (I think I got every question right and I only studied for a few hours). The one annoying thing is that the quizzes don't really follow from the material Pokorny actually teaches--you need to learn every single detail of everything to do well on them. This being said, the class has no midterms and there is a curve. I said I don't recommend Pokorny, but I don't disrecommend him either. If you want to start a career in graphics this isn't who you want to take right off the bat, but he's not bad if you just want to get a feel for the area.

Pokorny is a good teacher, in spite of all the mediocre ones out there. His grading policy was fairly easy. Programs were basically counted as credit or no credit. The tests were open notes, but there was a lot of information. He reviewed for the exams in class, and overall there wasn't much time spent outside of class except in lab programming or at home.

Geez, people seem to be ripping into Dr. Pokorny pretty hard here. Maybe he's not very good in the 100-level classes, I don't know. I enjoyed him for 473. His lectures made what would seem to be an insanely complicated topic (writing your own raytracer) into something easily manageable. I was worried about the math but he gave you any equations you need. His programs were quite mild in terms of time commitment. His tests were very basic if you attended lecture regularly. I learned a lot about advanced rendering from him and would recommend him.

Pokorny isn't much of a professor, I pitty anyone taking him for any of the 100 classes. However he does teach one class well and thats csc 473. If you like really cool graphics stuff, this class is really interesting. For Most of the quarter he teaches you how towrite the source for your own raytracer instead of reading to himself like he normally does. His tests were pretty decent for this class, not too tough and there was only 4 assignments that were cake. But with all the nifty stuff I've said about him, he still is Pokorny, his office hours if you do go aren't helpfull. In fact he'll tell you to study for stuff that isn't gonna be tested on.