Hello World!
What Is This Site's Purpose?
Hey there! I'm Yazan and Software Engineering student at York University. The purpose of this personal project is to cover FAQs and advice from myself as a student, to prepare Software Engineering students to be successful in their degree such as courses, roadmaps, etc. Even if you aren't in Software Engineering, I'm sure there is some things here to take away.
Why Did I Make This?
Engineering has an overwhelming number of courses you will take, including courses specialized for us that other non-engineering students will probably never take. So, there isn't much information on what to expect in these classes, other than the course code and name. I'm here to bridge this gap for my fellow engineering students.
I am hoping this to be a long-term project until I graduate, as I expand on more knowledge and experience moving forward.
⚠️ Warning: This is an unofficial guide unaffiliated with York University. So, expect the information here to be based on my own opinion and experience.
Course Rating Criteria
I'm going to rank classes similarly to this video from Tamer Shaheen: Ranking Engineering Courses from Easiest to Hardest, who ranks his mechanical engineering classes in a tier list. Similarly to his video, I will ask these four questions:
- How difficult is it to grasp the course content?
- How is the workload?
- Do you need to know the material for future classes?
- Is it useful in the real world?
🛑 Note: I will NOT be rating classes based on how the professors are. Professors run classes differently, so a manageable class might be harder than it needs to be (the opposite is also true). This also assumes these courses are done the way and topics that is supposed to be taught.
Next, I'll categorize these classes using the following:
- 😎 S-tier: Essential in the real world, ignoring difficulty.
- 🙂 A-tier: Useful and doable.
- 🤔 B-tier: Difficult, but worth the effort of learning.
- 😒 C-tier: Not very useful but doable.
- 😢 D-tier: Nice to know but not worth your time, just grasp the foundations.
- 😭 F-tier: Difficult and completely useless, makes you question why you did engineering in the first place.
Contributing
I have written a lot on stuff in this guide, so there's room for some errors like grammar or outdated information. If so, feel free to open a pull request!
If you find this guide helpful, consider starring it on GitHub!
Last updated: Jan 6, 2026