Personal Introduction

Hi everyone! I hope you're doing well.

My name is Parinay Rana, and I secured AIR 102 in GATE DA 2026 with a GATE score of 812.

If you had told me during my GATE DA 2025 attempt that I would write a post like this a year later, I probably wouldn't have believed you. I had appeared for GATE DA 2025 with barely two months of preparation and no proper plan. I had some exposure to the syllabus, but my concepts were nowhere near solid.

This article isn't about a perfect strategy. It's simply a collection of things that worked for me, mistakes I made, and lessons I learned along the way. Take what helps you and adapt the rest to your own preparation.

Syllabus Strategy

I think one thing that can save you a lot of time during GATE DA preparation is the order in which you study the subjects. A good sequence not only makes the syllabus feel more manageable but also helps you connect concepts across subjects.

Of course, this is just the order that worked for me. Feel free to modify it according to your strengths and preferences.

1. Linear Algebra (3 - 4 Weeks Approx. Time)

           I started with Linear Algebra because it felt like getting the best of both worlds. It has a decent weightage in GATE DA and also forms the foundation of             Machine Learning. Even during higher studies later, having strong fundamentals in Linear Algebra will definitely benefit you.

2. Probability and Statistics (3 - 4 Weeks Approx. Time)

           I moved on to Probability and Statistics next because it is another core subject for Machine Learning and AI. It also carries good weightage in exam.                   In fact, the 2026 paper had some very good questions from this area, so I would recommend giving it proper attention.

3. Python Programming (1 - 2 Weeks Approx. Time)

           This was more of a personal choice. After spending a lot of time studying mathematics-heavy subjects, I didn't want to get too comfortable with only                 theory. Learning Python helped keep things interesting and eased my transition into the computer science side of the syllabus.

4. Data Structures and Algorithms (4 - 5 Weeks Approx. Time)

           After Python, I studied DSA. Since you're already in a problem-solving mindset from programming, understanding concepts like arrays, recursion,                     trees, graphs, and algorithms becomes a bit easier.

5. Artificial Intelligence (2 - 3 Weeks Approx. Time)

           By this point, you've already covered some of the prerequisites needed for AI. Topics like BFS, DFS from DSA and conditional probability from                             Probability come up again in areas such as search algorithms and Bayesian Networks. Because of this overlap, AI becomes easier to grasp and you                   can move through it faster.

6. Machine Learning (3 - 5 Weeks Approx. Time)

           Machine Learning is one of the lengthier subjects in the syllabus and introduces many new concepts. Don't rush through it. Give yourself enough time             to understand the intuition behind the algorithms. Try relating different topics to each other and think about why they work instead of just memorizing               them. I found that this approach made learning much more effective.

7. Calculus and Optimization (1 - 2 Weeks Approx. Time)

           For many students coming from a PCM background, Calculus may already feel familiar. Because of that, I found it relatively quicker to cover. Most of                 my preparation for this subject came through solving questions rather than spending a lot of time on theory.

8. DBMS and Data Warehousing (2 - 3 Weeks Approx. Time)

          This subject feels quite different from the rest of the syllabus. I personally didn't give it as much time as some of the other subjects, but I realized that if             your basics are clear and you've practiced a decent number of questions, you can score well here. Also, considering the importance it had in the GATE             DA 2026 paper, I would recommend not neglecting it.

This sequence and timeline worked well for me, but it's by no means the only way to prepare.

An Alternative Strategy

The sequence above worked well for me, but there is another approach that many people may prefer.

You could study:

Linear Algebra → Probability & Statistics → Machine Learning

in one stretch.

This allows you to complete a major chunk of the mathematics-heavy syllabus together while the concepts remain fresh.

However, if you choose this route, make sure to keep revisiting the mathematical subjects while studying the CS portions of the syllabus. Otherwise, it is easy to become rusty over time.

There is no universally "correct" order.

The best strategy is the one that helps you remain consistent and understand concepts deeply.

Preparation Method

If you're preparing through video lectures, I would suggest watching them at a speed that feels comfortable to you. I usually watched lectures at 1.5x or 2x speed, depending on how familiar I was with the topic. Sometimes, if a concept was completely new or difficult, I would slow it down to normal speed or even revisit the lecture again. That's completely okay. Don't force yourself to stick to a particular speed just because others do it.

After finishing a topic, try solving a few basic questions before moving on. For example, if I had completed the Vector Spaces portion of Linear Algebra through lectures, I would attempt some questions from that topic. These could be from a question bank or a test series. I personally used the TAAi test series and kept attempting topic-wise tests alongside my lectures.

Now, you might notice that I haven't mentioned making notes yet. That's because I didn't make notes immediately after watching lectures.

Once you solve a few questions, you get a much clearer picture of how well you've actually understood the topic. Concepts that seemed straightforward while watching the lectures may suddenly become confusing when you try to apply them. You begin to identify the areas where your understanding is weak or where you tend to make mistakes.

Only after this I prepared my notes, usually using the lecture slides, PPTs as a reference.

This approach helped me a lot. If I had made notes immediately after watching lectures, I would have probably written down everything with equal importance. Practicing first allowed me to customize my notes according to my own weaknesses and understanding. That's why, in my opinion, solving a few questions before making notes is a really good practice.

Another thing I would suggest is to try completing the syllabus as early as you reasonably can. Life rarely goes exactly according to plan. There can be holidays, personal emergencies, sickness, work commitments, or phases where you simply don't feel productive. I myself had gaps during my preparation where I didn't study for almost an entire month.

Keeping these uncertainties in mind, make a realistic timeline rather than an ideal one. I was able to complete my syllabus by the first week of December, but I had already been practicing questions alongside my preparation much before that.

Notes / Study Material

I'm sure you can find plenty of study material, PDFs, Telegram resources, and lecture playlists online. There is definitely no shortage of resources these days. Still, I wanted to share some of the material that I personally used and found helpful during my preparation.

First of all, if you're preparing through books or online lectures, I would again recommend the method I mentioned earlier:

Basic practice → Understand your current level of understanding → Then make notes

I found this approach extremely helpful because it makes sure you don't miss out on important information while also keeping your notes relevant to your own needs.

While making notes, keep one thing in mind: make them in a way that even a third person could understand them. They don't have to be extremely detailed, but they should be concise, correct, and explanatory enough that you can revisit them months later without having to reopen the lectures.

Trust me, while watching lectures you will often feel like certain concepts are too obvious to write down. You'll think, "There's no way I'll forget this." But after a few months of revision, you'll be surprised at how many of those "obvious" things completely disappear from your memory.

That's where good notes save a lot of time. Instead of revisiting an entire lecture, you can quickly refresh the concept from your notes.

Also, don't hesitate to make your notes visually appealing. Use black pens, blue pens, red pens, highlighters, boxes, arrows—whatever helps you understand and revise more efficiently later. Your notes are for you, so make them in a way that works best for you.

I am sharing the drive link to my handwritten notes here, where I have uploaded both my complete notes and the short notes I prepared towards the end of my preparation. Feel free to use them as a reference, but I would still strongly recommend making your own notes because they reflect your own understanding and weaknesses.

My Handwritten Notes and Short Notes : [Drive Link] 

Linear Algebra

For Linear Algebra, you can use the 

1. TAAi marathon videos 

2. GO Classes YouTube lectures

I personally wouldn't recommend directly referring to Professor Gilbert Strang's MIT OCW lectures for GATE preparation. The reason isn't that they're bad—in fact, they're excellent—but some topics are approached differently from a GATE perspective. However, I would strongly recommend watching them after GATE, especially if you're preparing for interviews or planning to pursue higher studies. They are fantastic for building intuition.

Machine Learning

TAAi's Machine Learning Marathon series on YouTube was very helpful for me.

Manoj Sir explains the topics clearly and concisely while also discussing good-quality problems. I genuinely felt that a large portion of the concepts taught in the full course were covered in these marathons as well, just in a much more compact format.

DSA

For DSA, I used some GO Classes Marathon videos on YouTube to strengthen my understanding of topics such as DFS, BFS, Dijkstra's Algorithm, and Graphs.

I really liked the way Sachin Mittal Sir taught these concepts. Sometimes, we end up memorizing facts without understanding the intuition behind them. His explanations helped me appreciate what actually lies underneath them.

DBMS

For DBMS, I honestly didn't use anything apart from Deepak Poonia Sir's DBMS series on YouTube.

The videos are quite long, and due to time constraints I could only watch around three or four lectures. However, the annotated notes linked in the comments of those videos are an absolute goldmine.

If you're short on time, going through those notes carefully and making your own notes alongside them can be more than enough for the subject. They are extremely well prepared.

Logic

For Propositional Logic and First-Order Logic, I found the free Discrete Mathematics resources from GO Classes very useful.

Their annotated notes, in particular, can save you a substantial amount of time and make these topics much easier to revise later.

Practice and PYQs

One thing I used to do throughout my preparation was write down almost every good question discussed during lectures in my notes. Whenever I revisited a topic, I would try solving those questions again without looking at the solutions. It was a great way to check whether I had actually understood the concepts or had just convinced myself that I did while watching the lectures.

If you have access to a question bank or topic-wise tests, practice them alongside your lectures as you complete each topic. Please don't leave all the practice for after you've completed the entire syllabus. I genuinely think that would be a huge mistake.

Personally, I solved PYQs alongside my preparation, and I feel they are one of the most important resources for GATE. PYQs give you an idea of how concepts are tested, what kind of patterns appear repeatedly, common traps, and how the examiners frame questions. Sometimes, you even end up learning a completely new concept or a different way of approaching a problem through them.

My suggestion would be to solve the relevant PYQs as you finish each topic instead of saving them all for the end. Then, during revision, go through them again. That second iteration of PYQs really helps strengthen your understanding and makes your concepts much more solid.

You might be surprised by how differently you look at the same PYQ the second time around. Questions that once felt difficult start feeling intuitive, and that's usually a good sign that your preparation is moving in the right direction.

Revision and Short Notes

No matter how many subjects you have covered or how well you understood them while studying for the first time, revision is what ultimately determines your performance in the exam. You may have understood a concept perfectly a few months ago, but if you can't recall it and apply it to solve a question during those three hours of the exam, that understanding doesn't help much.

The revision strategy that worked for me had different phases.

Phase 1: Revision from Complete Notes

In this phase, I would revise the subject thoroughly using my complete notes. I would go through the concepts properly, redo the examples I had written down, and make sure I understood everything again. Don't rush this phase. Give it the time it needs. For some subjects, a few days may be enough, while others may take a week or more.

Phase 2: Making Short Notes

Once I had revised the complete notes, I would go through them again and prepare short notes.

Try to make these short notes as efficient as possible. They should contain formulas, important concepts, common mistakes, tricky observations, or anything that you personally tend to forget. Depending on the subject, this phase may take a similar amount of time as the first phase or sometimes even less.

Ideally, try to complete these two phases within a month, but adjust according to your own timeline.

One mistake I made was waiting to finish the entire syllabus before starting revision. Looking back, I wouldn't recommend that. Try to do regular, light revisions alongside your preparation. It prevents revision from becoming overwhelming later when time pressure starts building up.

Phase 3: Revision Through Short Notes and Mocks

Once your short notes are ready, start giving topic tests and mock tests regularly.

Revise primarily through your short notes. Over time, you'll realize that the amount of time required to revise a subject starts reducing gradually. Topics that once took several days to revise may eventually take just a few hours.

As you continue giving mocks, you'll naturally identify weak areas. Maybe you've forgotten a formula, maybe a concept isn't clear anymore, or maybe you keep making similar mistakes. In those cases, first refer to your short notes. If the issue still isn't resolved, go back to your complete notes for that specific topic.

After a few cycles of mocks and revision using short notes, I would suggest doing one final revision from your complete notes. For me, a comfortable timeline for this was around mid-January onwards, but you can adjust this according to your preparation schedule.

About Short Notes

I have uploaded my own short notes in the drive link mentioned earlier, and you're welcome to use them for reference. However, I would strongly recommend preparing your own short notes.

Short notes are probably the fastest revision tool you'll have, which means they need to be tailored to your needs. By the time you're making them, you've already revised the subject once. You know which concepts you tend to forget, which formulas confuse you, and which areas need extra emphasis.

Think of short notes like that one scene from your favourite movie that reminds you of the entire story.

Your short notes should do exactly that.

They shouldn't contain everything.

They should contain just enough to trigger your memory.

Test Series

Choosing a good test series is important, but I think people often focus too much on which test series to buy and too little on how to use it. I'll share my experience here, and maybe others who used different test series can share what worked for them as well.

One thing I realized during preparation is that the purpose of a test series is often misunderstood.

It's not about how many tests you give. What really matters is what you take away from those tests.

The first part of your improvement happens through preparation. But once you've studied the concepts, how do you improve further?

The answer lies in analysis.

The better your analysis, the better insights you'll get about your preparation and the easier it becomes to improve.

TAAi Test Series

I attempted these tests alongside my preparation.

As I completed topics through lectures, I would solve the corresponding topic tests. I found that these tests often checked the depth of my conceptual understanding.

Many times, they exposed weaknesses that I didn't even know existed.

There were topics where I thought I understood everything perfectly, only to realize during the tests that my understanding was superficial.

That discomfort was actually very useful.

GO Classes Test Series

During my revision phase, I gradually started attempting the GO Classes topic-wise tests.

I found these particularly helpful because they highlighted areas where:

• I needed more revision,

• I had forgotten concepts,

• or I needed to think about questions from a different perspective.

Many times, I learned entirely new approaches to solving familiar problems.

You can also reattempt some tests during your revision phase to evaluate how much you've improved and identify what still needs work.

Time Management and the "Multipath" Method

Time management becomes extremely important once you start giving full-length mocks.

Initially, I was doing reasonably well, but after some time my time management became completely off. I would spend too much time on certain questions and then panic towards the end of the exam.

Manoj Sir shared a method on YouTube, and I think it's a strategy many aspirants use. It's generally called the multi-pass method, but I jokingly started calling it the multipath method because everyone adapts it differently. I personally used two passes, while some people prefer three.

The idea is simple.

First Pass: Read the question and make a quick decision. If it looks straightforward, formula-based, or something you can solve within a minute or so, solve it immediately and move on.

If you think, "I can solve this, but it'll take some time," mark it for review and continue.

If you don't understand the question or feel that you currently don't know how to approach it, skip it. It will remain marked separately.

Second Pass: Come back to the questions you marked for review and solve those.

Third Pass (if time permits): Attempt the questions you had initially skipped.

This strategy worked really well for me. My time management improved significantly, and the best part was that it felt like following an algorithm. I didn't constantly worry about how many questions I had attempted or how many I had left. You trust the system and focus only on the question in front of you.

It also reduced my tendency to get stuck on one difficult, time-consuming question just because it appeared early in the paper.

At the end of the day, a test series is not just a tool to measure your preparation—it's a tool to improve it. Give tests seriously, but take the analysis even more seriously. That's where most of the learning actually happens.

Analysis and Logging

As I mentioned earlier, I believe analysis is the most important part of any test series. Giving tests without properly analysing them is like collecting data and never using it.

Over time, I developed a simple system for myself, and I'll share it here. Feel free to modify it according to what works best for you.

After you've given a few tests, you'll start noticing that your mistakes usually fall into certain categories. I classified mine into the following types:

1. Silly Mistake

2. Calculation Mistake

3. Read the Question Incorrectly

4. Insufficient Revision

5. New Concept

6. Unable to Think / Approach

I created an Excel sheet and, after every test, I would analyse each mistake and log it under one of these categories.

At first, it felt like extra work. But after a while, it became incredibly useful.

You start noticing patterns.

Maybe most of your mistakes are due to insufficient revision. Maybe you're losing marks because you're reading questions too quickly. Maybe you're making avoidable calculation errors under pressure.

Once you know the pattern, you know what needs fixing.

I've attached my Google Sheet template as well. You can duplicate it and modify it according to your own needs if you find the system helpful.

Another thing that helped me was maintaining a separate notebook for incorrect questions. Whenever I made a mistake in a good question, I would write down both the question and its solution.

If maintaining a spreadsheet feels too tedious, you can do the entire analysis in this notebook itself. Along with the solution, simply write down the reason behind the mistake:

• Was it a silly mistake?

• Did you forget the concept?

• Was it a calculation error?

• Did you not know how to approach the question?

By the end of your preparation, this notebook becomes much more than just an error log. It turns into a collection of high-quality questions, common mistakes, and important lessons that are specific to your preparation.

And honestly, revisiting this notebook before the exam can be far more valuable than solving a completely new set of random questions, because these are the exact mistakes that you have a tendency to make.

The goal of analysis isn't to remind yourself that you got questions wrong. It's to make sure you don't repeat the same mistakes again.

Mindset and Final Advice

If there's one thing I'd want you to take away from this entire article, it's this: “consistency matters more than chasing unrealistic study hours”

Some days you'll study for ten hours. Some days you'll barely manage one or two. That's okay.

GATE preparation is a long journey. Be kind to yourself. Don't compare your schedule with someone else's. Don't blindly copy a topper's routine. Build a system that fits your life and stick with it.

I wasn't a perfect aspirant. I took breaks, made mistakes, and changed strategies midway. But I kept showing up.

If my journey from an unstructured GATE DA 2025 attempt to AIR 102 in GATE DA 2026 can reassure even one person that improvement is possible, then writing this post was worth it.

All the very best. I hope some part of this article helps you in your own journey.

And if you have any doubts or just want to say hi, feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn.

PS: If you're preparing through self-study, you're welcome to use my notes as a reference. I tried to make them comprehensive enough to cover the important concepts required for GATE DA, and I believe they can also be useful later during interview preparation.

I was in the same position in the month of March—seeing my expected rank good enough to get MTech in one of the IITs, but not being sure what I should prepare before going there.

So I thought of creating this blog so that others can get an idea of what they are signing up for.

A little introduction: I completed my MTech from IIT Madras in 2025, so the experience is still quite recent for me.

The overall timeline for MTech in most IITs and NITs is that the first two semesters are mainly for coursework, and the third semester is usually when placements happen—something most of you are probably waiting for.

If you arrive without preparation, the first two semesters can become very hectic. Many of us come from Tier-3 colleges where we are not used to intense academic pressure or relative grading. At IITs/NITs, you will be competing with BTech students, your MTech classmates, and sometimes even MS and PhD students in the same courses. Because of this, maintaining a good CGPA can be quite challenging.

You might often hear people say that “skills matter, CGPA doesn’t.” In my experience, that is not completely true in IITs/NITs. When companies come for campus placements, CGPA is usually the first filtering criterion. Skills are important, but CGPA often acts as the primary screening factor.

So before you arrive on campus, try to utilize the next three months effectively by preparing the following resources. This preparation will help you in coursework, internships, and placements. It will also allow you to add some of these skills to your resume. Later, when you start preparing for placements, you will only need to revise these topics, which saves a lot of time and builds confidence.

1. DSA:- This is one of the most important things for placements. Most of the coding questions asked during campus placements are similar to problems from the Striver Sheet or NeetCode Sheet. Completing these will give you a strong advantage Link .
2. Linear Algebra:- This is very important for coursework as well as for understanding machine learning concepts. Good lecture series are available from Gilbert Strang (MIT) or Prof. Vittal Rao (IISc), both on YouTube. link or vittal_rao .
3. Deep Learning :- I suggest starting with Deep Learning instead of traditional Machine Learning courses because many ML resources are mathematically heavy and difficult to follow initially. A very good and intuitive course is the Deep Learning lecture series by Prof. Mitesh Khapra. His explanations are very clear and also cover important ML concepts with simple diagrams and intuition. You can learn the more theoretical ML parts during your coursework in college. Link .
4. Puzzles:- This is often ignored but very useful. Try solving one puzzle every day from common interview puzzle collections. By the time you reach campus, you may finish the top 100 frequently asked puzzles in interviews. Puzzle

Hi everyone,

I'm currently in my 4th year of engineering and aiming to give GATE 2026 my best shot. I really want to share my journey so far and seek guidance from those who’ve cracked GATE or are in the same boat.

My GATE 2025 Attempt (in 3rd Year)

Last year, I attempted GATE 2025 during my 3rd year. I had joined one of the major coaching institutes and followed their course for a year. Despite investing good effort, I ended up with a rank of around 5000. It was a hard pill to swallow, especially because I had big expectations. On reflection, the problem wasn’t that I didn’t work hard — it was that I didn’t work smart.

Where I Went Wrong

The main issues were:

• Time mismanagement: I didn’t plan my schedule properly, and as a result, I left out some crucial subjects entirely.

• Skipped important subjects: OS, COA, DLD, TOC, EM, and DM were either untouched or rushed. These are core CS subjects — skipping them was a major mistake.

• Passive learning: I watched lectures but didn’t revise or practice enough. Concepts didn’t stick.

Current Preparation (for GATE 2026)

This time, I’ve enrolled in GO Classes and have been studying since March. So far, I’ve completed:

• COA

• Operating Systems

• Engineering Mathematics

It took me 1 month per subject. But here’s the problem:
I’ve already forgotten most of OS and COA because I studied them 2–3 months ago. These GO Classes videos are very detailed and lengthy, which helps conceptually, but they consume a lot of time.

Now I’m stuck in this dilemma:

If I continue watching 1 subject per month, I might end up just like last year — finishing the syllabus too late, with no time for revision, and ultimately scoring even worse.

My Challenges

• I lack strong conceptual understanding in almost every subject.

• If I go slow (1 subject/month), I’ll have no time to revise.

• If I go fast, I fear I won’t understand deeply.

• I forget older topics quickly.

• I don’t know when or how to revise.

• I haven’t been solving enough questions or tests consistently.

What Should Be My Strategy?

I want to make a strong comeback in GATE 2026. Here’s what I think I need — but I’d love advice:

1. How should I structure my study plan from now until the exam (Feb 2026)?

2. How do I balance new subjects and revision of old ones?

3. How do I handle these long lecture playlists without losing too much time?

4. How to build conceptual clarity without wasting months per subject? 

If you've cracked GATE or are preparing seriously — I’d really appreciate your insights. What worked for you? How did you manage time, concepts, and revision together? Any tips on using GO Classes more efficiently?

Please help me plan smarter this time. I really want to do justice to my final attempt in GATE 2026.I want to achieve <10 rank this time .

Thanks for reading.

#GOClasses #Gate2026

Hi everyone, My Name is Chirag Kathpalia... I have secured AIR 215 in GATE(cse) 2025 and unlike most talented who claim to have cracked the exam in just 4-6 month, it actually took me nearly 2 years of dedicated prepration. So I Will share a little bit of my prepration story in short. So, I'm 2023 college passout, I also wrote gate in 2024 and secured AIR 1150 with 57.79 marks, that Time I studied at UA and major way for me to improve my marks was mock tests and alot of practice.... This year I studied whole syllabus again from GO classes and wrote about 45+ Full length Mock tests from various institutes, I started my revision back in September itself for both 2024 as well as 2025 so I was able to revise all subjects 2-3 times ... The crux is that you need to solve a lot of questions to improve mistakes, I also solved doubts of a great peer group which helped me improve alot but I could do all this because I haven't been doing any job since 2023 so what worked for me might be hard for you if you are in college or doing job.


So First I will share some free and paid resources that are helpful for Gate prep for cse and then will answer some common Questions.

Books I used to refer during my prepration (I still refer them now when someone asks some interesting doubts) :

1. Algorithm and DS : Introduction to Algorithms, by CLRS  

2. Discrete Mathematics : Discrete mathematics and its applications by Kenneth H. Rosen

3. Computer Networks : Data Communications and Networking by Behrouz A. Forouzan

5. Digital Logic : Digital Logic and Computer Design by M. Morris Mano

6. Computer Organization : A. Computer Organisation by Carl Hamacher   B. Computer Organization and Design: the Hardware/Software Interface by David A Patterson and John L. Hennessy 

7. C programming : The C Programming Language by Brian Kernighan and Dennis Ritchie 

8. Operating System : Operating Systems by Avi Silberschatz, Greg Gagne, and Peter Baer Galvin

9. Databases :  Fundamentals of Database Systems by Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe

10. EM :  A. First Course in Probability, by Sheldon Ross | B. Linear Algebra for Everyone (The Gilbert Strang Series)


Now I will mention some Video Lectures (Freely Available) :

1. Algorithm and DS : Amit Khurana DSA lecture, 

2. Discrete Mathematics : DP sir Lecture  (Approx you need 400 hours for DM alone from here) | If you have less time Seach DM summary lecture Go classes on Youtube (Still 100 hours required) 

3. Computer Networks : Amit Khurana Lecture

5. Digital Logic : Amit Khurana DLD lecture 

6. Computer Organization : VD Sir Lecture 

7. C programming : Amit Khurana C programming 

8. Operating System : VD sir OS Lecture

9. Databases :  VD sir lecture

10. EM : Sachin Sir EM Lecture

11. Aptitude : Saurabh sir Apti Lecture

I studied from Multiple educators all the subjects, According to be the best ones are mentioned here :
Em : Sachin sir Best, Dm I liked Sanchit sir followed by DP sir summary lectures, OS khaleel sir and VD sir both are best, CN Reddy Sir followed by Sachin Mittal sir for best explanation,  Toc DP Sir or Deva Sir Both are best but if you have to pick one go with DP sir,  DBMS  DP sir is Best, Algo-Ds  Reddy sir is best but sachin sir ka better h (Mtech level stuff),  For C Prog, VD or Reddy sir both are equally Good, you can also study from Sachin mittal sir(if you have alot of patience) and Dld finally DP is best.

Some Commonly asked Questions :
Q1. Can I get Top rank in just 1 year?
Ans. See its possible but not as easy as it looks like, If you can put in 10-12 hours dedicatedly per day for this exam and you have a good memory to retain what you studied/Do proper revisions on time then your chances of top rank are slightly higher (Again I consider any rank less than 1000 as top rank here)
 

Q2. Can I crack exam without Coaching and still get into top IITs?
Ans. yes definately but you will still need to Solve 2-3 test series ( I suggest Gateoverflow+GO classes TS along with MadeEasy, if you are a dropper with under 2500 rank replace Madeeasy with zeal testseries). Also when you prepare from free resources you may find few things here and there mixed up, to save time we usually Buy a course, know that it doesnt guarentee a good rank ultimately its in your hands. Also join a small TG group that will help you compare where you stand among upcoming rankers like you. 

Q3. What is Right Time to Start prepration ?

Ans. Start as early as possible, It may take 2-3 years sometimes and for some people even more (P.S. 6 Month rankers are mostly fake they prepare for years then claim it was overnight success here by rankers I mean under 500)

Q4. What should be right time to finish syllabus ? When to start test series, when to start revision?
Ans. See I always suggest to complete syllabus by Sept. Mid but thats only possible if you are watching 6-8 hours lectures per day (I highly suggest to watch at 1x or at max sometimes at 1.25/1.5 but never go more that that otherwise concepts will fly over your head). So after september mid start Revision(Give one week per subject for 1st rev) and from Oct 1st week Start Full length Tests (give one test per week). If you do that properly by dec Mid your 1st revision will complete with 10+ Full length mocks, from here on start 2nd revision and give 2-4 days for each subject also write atleast 2 mocks per week now.

Q5. Should I leave my job and prepare/ should I sit for placements?

Ans. That depends on a lot of factors like ctc, family condition, your grasp on concepts and most importantly family support. If your ctc >12lpa trust me you do not need to jump in gate competetion for better package, if you want to go to IITs (dream) or PSUs then thats a different story.

Q6. Do I have to study 12-16 hours per day to get top rank?

Ans. Initially its not must, if you are a dropper I suggest put atleast 8 hours or else you are wasting your year...if you are in a job I suggest take your time even if you get a good rank in 2/3 years you are still earning give as much time to gate as possible, if you are still in college (specially tier 3) bunk classes and prepare for gate dont waste time in college.

Q7. If I have less than 4-6 months to prepare how should I make best use of it Or My syllabus is pending at november end?

Ans. Go with crash courses, on youtube you can find Goclasses or gatewallah or Geekforgeek crash courses and simply focus on PYQs (Or you can also watch complete courses of some educators like Rbr, Sanchit jain nearly 400-500 hours full syllabus) Or another way out could be look for most repeated topic from each subject GoClasses Important topics Video

Q8 Any tips/tricks that you followed/suggest?

Ans. There is no hack to good rank some must do things are : 

1. Solve Pyqs atleast 2-3 times

2. Write atleast 10+ Mocks before gate
3. Make your own clean notes, dont be lazy and write in copy "baad mai pdf se dekh lunga". 

4. Try to help others doubts it makes your concepts better
5. Lastly dont take Marks to heart (I got 17 Marks out of 100 in first full length test) we all go through that phase. 

Q9. Should I do Coding/projects along with Gate Prepration?

Ans. Big NO specially if you are a dropper with rank is > 500 OR preparing first time, dont take exam lightly... in 2024 80 marks was Top 25 rank in 2025 80 marks is 215 rank competition is growing at high speed. After gate you will get 4-6 months to master coding.

Q10. Should I prepare for CSE and DA Both?

Ans. Big No again, Master one first otherwise you may not get rank sufficient to get into college in either of exams.

Lastly If you are planning to purchase a course, Go with GO classes its Best Around in the market but still you may need few more teachers to study some topics that you can do from youtube. Also if you feel you can not purchase the course try for scolarship/ buying in sharing and if nothing works out many rankers get top rank with self study (Telegram/Mega if you know you know XD)

If anyone still needs any help from me feel free to ask your questions in comments or you can join this discord server and ask on Voice chat when I am free.

Thankyou for reading.

Hi Gate Folks, Hope you are doing well with your preparations. As we all know, “Success is not something that happens overnight. It's built one step at a time, brick by brick”. If you are reading this blog, then you came from a very long journey. I know what emotions you are going through right now because I also went through the same emotions once upon a time.

There are certain points that need to be taken care of before wrapping up your preparations.

1. Syllabus completion - To get a good rank, we need to complete the syllabus. However, to get a rank under 200, we don’t need to get 100 marks. That means you may leave some portion of the syllabus. But be careful before leaving the portion of the syllabus.

2. Last Minute Notes - Most of the people are watching videos from online coaching centers or YouTube. That’s fine. But you need to prepare your own notes. Why? because you are not going to listen the complete videos before one week of the exam. You should be handy with your material. So, start preparing your last minute notes. If you found any new points (while reading any book, attempting the questions of test series), kindly copy it to your notes. At the end, you are going to revise your note book only. 

3. Revision is the key to success in the GATE. - As we are humans, we can’t remember everything we read. We need to keep on revising the main points/concepts. Just similar to “CACHE MEMORY” vs. “Main Memory.” You need to keep your concepts/logics in cache memory instead of main memory. Revision strategy is different for different people. My revision strategy is mentioned here: https://gateoverflow.in/blog/6123/my-opinion-on-preparation-strategy-and-testseries

4. Attempting the freely available exam papers - Before going to the main exam, be familiar with the exam interface. You can use the GO Exam interface for practicing. There are freely available tests (Tests by Mentors: Tests by Bikram and GO Classes) in GO. I recommend everyone attempt these exams. The questions in the free tests are also top-notch. I recommend reading the “How to minimize silly mistake?” and “How did I attempt Gate exam?” blogs posted by Abhishek Shaw https://gateoverflow.in/user-blogs/Abhishek%20Shaw 

5. Understand the common mistakes that one may make in the exam.

   • I suggest you read this https://gateoverflow.in/299897/common-careless-mistakes and https://gateoverflow.in/blog/2249/how-to-avoid-committing-mistakes-in-paper. 

   • One more mistake aspirant does that, solving the question without writing on the scribble pad. I mean, if the question is “calculate (2+3*5(4-3)*2/10*32-5),” then we directly try to answer this question without writing the steps. It looks simple, but there are high chances of miscalculating.

   • You should be careful while answering “Programming C” questions. We try to do the dry run in the mind instead of writing on the scribble pad. Please don’t forget to parenthesise as per the priority of operators before evaluating an expression.

   • I suggest you write steps clearly on the scribble pad for each question while solving it. There should be a gap between the questions. This is important and helpful for those questions that you left in between or marked for review. Otherwise, you need to solve it from the beginning. 

   • Respect the tough questions and lengthy questions. In every paper, there are some questions that are tough and easy but lengthy. You need to identify them within one minute and mark them for review; if you have time, come back and then answer them. Don’t take those questions personally. You should cover all the questions at least once. Who knows there are simple questions at the end of the paper waiting for you, and you struck at solving a tough question and lost 10 mins there? Remember that you will be awarded only 2 marks for solving the toughest question of the paper. 

6. Utilise the GO
   • Whenever you see a good question/answer, add it to your list and revise the questions in the list, especially “Wrongly Attempted”.
   • Revise your favourite questions.
   • Practice the previous gate questions.
   • Revise the feature list questions that are available on GO: https://gateoverflow.in/questions?sort=featured
   • Don’t post the answers for the questions that already have good answers/comments to solve the question until and unless you have a new approach to solve it. If you run behind the points, that will eat your precious time. (If you want to really pay back to GO, come after GATE and post your answers and help future aspirants.) -  “You should be helpful to yourself first, then others.”
   • Whatever your doubt may be, post it on GO; there may be someone who can shed some light on that. If no one answered it, fine, it’s the same as you are not posting your doubt. Involve yourself in the discussions with the peers. Be ready to accept the mistakes and learn from them. Don’t ask for answers in the community; you just take help where you were struck. That is the way of learning.
   • You may utilise the “Google search bar” available on the GO site to find the similar questions/same questions posted in the GO.

Most of the people already know these points but ignore them. The motto of this blog is to spread awareness and remind the above points. If anyone has any other points that are worthy of inclusion in this blog, kindly let me know.

Thanks to @Sachin Mittal 1 for driving the discussion for Probability for GATE CS/DA 2025. Please share your feedback and what you would like for upcoming videos. 

You can see the video content at https://youtu.be/Ew-q4PKJ_5w

🚂 My Gate CSE 2023 Journey (March 2022- Feb2023)

Gate score:690 (GATE CSE), Marks:62.67
Date: 04 July 2023
B.tech: Major in Mechanical and Minor in CSE

2017: Second semester of my college, along with my major in mechanical engineering, I took up minor in CSE as my roommate in my college was from CSE, and I learned a lots of things from him, which generated a huge interest for CSE, in me.

2019: I made a plan to join ISRO after btech, instead. Me and my friend from civil engg. started our preparations for GATE(ME) & ISRO. We prepared notes, studied from NPTEL and YouTube channels.

2020: Corona came and all my notes were left in hostel, as we were said, college is off for 7 days, I didn't carry my notes home, my college was more than 1000 kms away from home, and it never opened until we graduated.

2021: Without any preparations went for GATE ME 2021, only solved apti questions, and could not qualify. I joined the company I got from college placements. I didn't like the work there.

2022: My friend, gave me the idea, about try GATE in CSE, and after some research, the lost CS engineer in me, revived back to life.

Early 2022: I made a plan and started to study along with work, I studied from Gate Smashers, Jenny's Lectures and Neso Academy. I talked with my HR, but our company only allowed to do mtech from BITS Pilani, and in mechanical, and preparing with job was not working out at all. Getting exhausted at the end of the day, and then, preparing for a national level exam, with full dedication was not being feasible, so I resigned from my job.

Now some people will say they can manage, I get it, It's definitely possible with job, but I was a bit unsure about the outcome, if I do it that way, for myself.

March 2022: I joined Made Easy, Delhi center and started proper preparations. My timetable there used to be

• 8-2 Class; 2-6 Eat&Sleep; 7-12 make short notes, solve workbook and refer textbook if needed
•  [ GO classes are equally good, also, according to some of my friends, GO classes are indeed better, but I did not take, so I do not want to rank them, both are good, your input matters more ]

I had a plan to study there only upto October, as I know the last few months in preparations need to be in a higher pace. My TOC was incomplete there, and I managed it myself.

Actually, for a good rank, there is more role of the aspirant than the coaching institute. Coaching gives the direction and the aspirant is the magnitude.

I had used a handful of CS Engineer's ideas in my preparations.

I had 3 level hierarchy of notes.

• HDD Level: Class notes & Textbooks & NPTEL & MIT OCW & others

• MM Level: Short notes (I had total of 6 short-notes notebooks with 12 subject's short notes)

• CM Level: I made a single sheet for every subject, having all important stuffs of the entire subject, and I used to stick it in the wall, I called it wall cache

** This wall cache was very helpful, to get a better big picture and interconnect all subjects (specially COA,OS & DBMS, have lots of ideas same) **

[ My Wall cache pdf (for reference): https://drive.google.com/file/d/1NnMfAddS4D92vld9mnXCIb37exM1Ne99/view?usp=sharing ]

** I also made a stack of important stuffs, which needed constant revision, in a 22 page pdf, which I called the stack sheet, start reading it from page 1, and put it at the end, and continue, untill page 1 reappears, this is a cycle, repeat this process, it is better if you print it out and study, it would be easy to mark and highlight on it.

[ My stack sheet (For reference) CAUTION:: Some thing may be wrong, I did some revision on the hard copy of the sheet https://docs.google.com/document/d/1giHzgVHU9JZ8b7RVCH2Km_B8a3pPF-7K/edit ]

Mid-October to Mid-November I solved all PYQ's and made a collection of all good questions in a folder 

[ My good questions collection folder (for reference): https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1Dw7C7VnQchiTK5EcGuMQKoqx0L9Rk28G?usp=sharing ]

• IMPORTANT, PLEASE SOLVE PYQ’s ONLY FROM GATE-OVERFLOW, this is a community curated place, where you’ll hardly ever encounter any error in an answer, hard copy PYQ books, have lots of misprints and wrong answers in them. And some questions are ambiguous, if you encounter such question, chances are high that people got marks for free for those questions, do not waste your time on them. (MTA: Marks to all)
• Do mistake and understand what went wrong, you’ll find people here who did the same mistake like you and found out the weak point, do not directly watch the correct answer, find what went wrong.

Last 3 months, I used pipelining concept, i.e. everyday I need to do a specific amount of all 12 subjects.

I made a folder of 10 subjects, and my timetable was (60 questions per day)

• 30 questions during day (5 subs) [* then *] stack sheet [* then *] 30 during night [* then *] Maths & Apti 

After every two days, I gave a full length test, schedule on those days were,

• wall cache for full revision [* then *] the full length test [* then *]  Analysis [[ Analysis is very important, do analyze every question, wrong or right, this process may take up the entire day, but let it be. Correcting error is more important than ignoring and moving on ]] 

Some tips,

• If tests are hard give them, if they are too easy and you are getting very good marks & rank in it, it is of no use, you need to learn, test series are not to estimate your marks in real exam, it is for you to improve.
• Do not consume heavy food, the last 3 months, keep your health good.
• Make adjustments with your body to be active during your time slot of actual exam. like if your exam is from 9-12, your body should be trained to be most active during that time, and that training starts before 3 months atleast.
• Take very less sleep on the night of D-2 day, (sleep deprive) such that you get a good sleep on the D-1 day and you are atmost active on the D-day.

I also used some apps to have a countdown to real exam and also to monitor my time with phone (screen time).  It is highly advisable to keep phones away, specially get out of social media, use YouTube for motivation and studies only. 

• Last 3 months is the game changer. Make a good plan for it and you will nail it.

• Prepare for a hard test, such that if the test is easy or hard, you’re ready for both

• Make your own execution plan and strategy, a plan is very important to strategically win a war.
• IIT’s are always hard to get into, otherwise you would have IITians in every house and street, but we don’t right, so fight until you get there.

• All the best, give your best shot and make it to the top IIT’s and NIT’s

There is a website created by a member of this community, which displays a random PYQ question (it’s advisable to be in that site in your free time):

Link : https://khushit-shah.github.io/gater-frontend/ 

Some motivational Videos for you guys: 

• https://www.youtube.com/shorts/HcgVOnyRf34
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KL6EBcJoTXQ&ab_channel=IITiansPoint
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxuFHQHj72I&ab_channel=IITiansPoint
• https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL4jOC-YUy3VG9BDzanBGlniwmkMrnEG25
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8iK8oahswQs&ab_channel=SpaceMilk
• https://www.youtube.com/shorts/1_sbBtgl8Fo

"Relax, allow the mind to become empty, and surprise yourself with the great treasure that begins to flow from your soul."

―Paulo Coelho.

Hi everyone, myself Shubhodeep. I want to address a significant topic that goes unnoticed, Mental health.

The famous quote says, "A sound mind lives in a sound body “. This is the truest line you’ll ever hear. How can you achieve your desired goal when you are unwell.

The most common thing to notice amongst aspirants is peer pressure, lakhs of students go to KOTA every year, but only some thousands are able to get the thing for which they went there, and this results with every coaching present in this universe. During the preparation what happens they get DPP’s, assignments, and Test series. In the initial stages, a student's mind is in the peak and he enjoys doing it, without thinking about the results. As time goes on, when he is not able to see the results he faces mental anxiety and emotional breakdown.

Let's hear a story

Keisuke, Itachi and Kiyoshi started preparing for GATE, 3 of them were batchmates from the same college. Now Keisuke and Kiyoshi are a bit average in their studies whereas Itachi is very good in every subject. Now whenever there is a test Itachi tops every subject, but Keisuke and Kiyoshi nearly manage 50-60%. 

Now Kiyoshi is a weak-willed boy now he faces this  

1. Self doubt
2. Lacks confidence
3. Thinks whether he chose the right path
4. Affects physical Health
5. Affects Relationships and Social Connection

Whereas Keisuke is weak-willed too, but he is somewhat smart, what he does is:

Whenever he feels low, he

1. Listens to Music
2. Goes for a walk
3. Takes a nice nap
4. Goes to play Cricket, Football
5. Watches a movie/ web series
6. Watches anime
7. Discusses his mistakes with Itachi after doing 1 of the above-mentioned points

In real life we all are Kiyoshi, but try to be like Keisuke, just like all of you dreamed of becoming IITians in Higher secondary, think this as another opportunity not the last one. Life is like a sea, its full of endless opportunities. don't make gate your destiny, live in the moment, and you’ll automatically arrive at your destination. I was also average student and faced the same problems as Kiyoshi, but I converted myself to Keisuke and I succeeded.

My suggestions

1. Your mistakes are not proof that you are dumb, they are proof that you lack in certain areas. Those are like potholes on a road, everyone ignores them until accident happens. Be happy that you got to know the potholes to cover up before time.

2. Watch anime/web-series/movies only to divert your mind, do not go to procastination stage, that is harmful again.

3. Try to interact with friends regarding your mistakes, you’ll gain vast ways to solve a single problem.

4. Do not overburden with expectations. Like I need to be AIR 1. set small targets like : My target in mocks tests will be 70, if you get even 55. Be happy, you'll do more good as your progress.

5. Do everything you have to do, but not with ego, not with lust, not with envy but with love, compassion, humility, and devotion. – Shree Krishna(Bhagvad gita).

6. Good sleep is very essential to have at least 6-7 hrs sleep always. When your mind is fresh you can achieve infinity

7. Someone maybe beating you 100 times in life, but if you can land that Knockout punch on D-day you win.

8. You are your biggest enemy, no one I repeat no one can affect your dream, it is up to you to catch up.

9. Just give your 100%, Don’t ever regret that you had the opportunity but you did not utilise it properly. When I went inside the exam hall I had this mindset, without expecting any result, and only due to this attitude everything worked out. Just stay calm.

10. "What if I fall?" Oh but my darling, What if you fly?

"IF YOU WANT YOUR LIFE TO BE DIFFERENT YOU HAVE TO START REACTING TO LIFE DIFFERENTLY “

- Kiyotaka Ayanokoji

Hey Everyone, I am ADITYA currently pursuing M.Tech(CSE) from IIITH have done my B.Tech from IET Lucknow(2020).

First and foremost, I'd like to express my gratitude to my parents for allowing me to do anything I wanted and always support me. Our parents work extremely hard to provide a better life for us. Thanks to all the aspirants on GO, especially Arjun Sir for this beautiful Platform.

When I started for Gate?

I have started my Gate preparation in January 2019 in my third year(6^th semester) and followed one man lecture(not hard to guess) which was available free and blindly following him without knowing that his syllabus is out to dated and till may I was able to give some amount of time to gate and from June i started giving more focus to coding as for placement as most of my batch-mates was doing. In placement Gate Subjects do help me to clear the interview and in August i got placed in 2 companies and then I thought of started seriously and started solving PYQ from GO PYQ BOOK(hard copy) and meanwhile started giving test-series of some coaching-center and my marks were improving which started giving me confidence to perform better in GATE 2020 and I was expecting the similar type of Rank in final exam. I was able to do 80% of my syllabus(I finds COA tough and couldn’t practice much discrete) and on the D-Day I was not able to sleep before exam night(Reason: still not known) and on exam I was unable to perform as expected as there was so much question from COA and I do did many silly mistakes due to which I loose many marks and decided that i will give another attempt 

Another Attempt for Gate 2021

In this my most of the syllabus is already completed and i started while doing Job(6^th month intern+fte) from online course which I bought from my First Salary in April and preparation was going good till October and then work getting lot hectic in Company and I can’t left my Job due to some economic-constraint. In whole November able to study little less than expected and in december work is so much hectic that i could not able to study many days(as due to WFH some days I have to work around 12+ hours) so decided to take medical leave in January and talk with many people who have taken and i just take leave from 16^th January till my gate exam 12^th Feb by mentioning Jaundice to my manager and decided not to reply of any mail,call from him(which is very risky) as my company is not known to give such long holiday and in this time i revise everything and my gave mocks of many coaching and my marks were coming around 70-75 which gave me lot of confidence my lowest marks in any full mocks were 53 something of GO-final mock before 2 days of Gate(It was hard and came to later that 53 is good marks in that even with that marks I got AIR-25). I was expecting Under 100 and was also confidence of getting in that but sometimes you can’t do anything with your luck.

But on D-day again I did many silly mistakes( Due to MSQ I loose many marks) and lost the hope of getting into IIT

due to which I decided I will not be giving any more attempt to gate and I never want to do M.Tech from NIT or New IITs so just filled IIITH form with no expectation.

WHY IIITH?

Just filled the form without any expectation to know Have is my concepts stronger? After having 2021 gate I decided not to attempt Gate as I understand that many times if you didn’t perform on D-Day then whole year preparation is wasted. So to all those who are in same condition IIITH is one best bet for you.

Believe me This line”Congratulations! You have been allotted a seat” still gave me a goosbumps.

What Should be focused for IIITH?

Aptitude- keep preparing as this section will play a major role in your selection. You can go through RS Agarwal book and simultaneously solve questions from Indiabix.

For technical Section just keep revising Gate notes and it will help while in 2021 they also asked 2 coding questions(Basic) because of NO INTERVIEW due to COVID so keep focused on that also(basic questions only) but Only C language will be allowed so make sure you practice in that.

Is IIITH worth if not got the IIT?

Yes, definetly it is among one of the best college for CSE in terms of knowledge as well as placements(similar to IITs or even greater than some old IITs)

This would be one of the best bet for all those who are NOT getting Old IITs (To those who thinking it is expensive? Yes, it is but don’t worry bank will take care easily your whole expenditure) 

Intake is around- 120 with NO reservation so competition is gonna tough.

NOTE: DREAMS DO COME TRUE SO KEEP PRACTITING.

If anyone have any query about IIITH you can ping me https://www.linkedin.com/in/aditya-sharma-71015a160

BARC CSE 25 september online test

1. Evaluate postfix expression.
2. one question on binary tree traversal. Postorder and inorder given, we have to find number of left nodes and right nodes.
3. calculate histogram when pixel and color is given.
4. CAP in software engineering
5. numerical on star,mesh and ring topology.
6. Multicast address of ipv4
7. one question on PCA
8. hexadecimal to ip conversion.
9. calculation of machine epsilon.
10. one question on conflict serializability.
11. arrangement of array after one pass of quick sort.
12. one numerical question on aloha.
13. sql based question on inner join.
14. programming based questions on c and c++
15. compiler design question- subset of lalr,lr.

Hi guys, I am Arathi Nair M. This is my second attempt in GATE (CSIT)- 2021. In GATE (CSIT) 2020, I got AIR 11966 with 30 marks and in GATE (CSIT) 2021, I got AIR 306 with 60.6 marks. This might not be much, but I hope it is good enough to get into a good college.

Feel free to scroll down to resources and advice if you don’t want to go through the whole journey.

If I can, anyone can!!!

A Little About Me

I am a B.Tech (Hons.) graduate in Electronics & Communication Engineering(ECE) (2016-2020) from College of Engineering Trivandrum(CET), a government college in Kerala. In my school days, the subjects I loved the most were CS and Maths and so was planning to do B.Tech in CSE. But since I got admission in ECE in the best government engineering college of my state, I ended up deciding to do my M.Tech in CSE.

GATE 2020

I don’t remember when or from where I heard about GATE exam. Somehow, I came to know about it and realized, I will have to write GATE if I want to do M.Tech. But what I didn’t know then was, I could write GATE CSIT instead of GATE ECE. I thought I could get admission in M.Tech CSE only by writing GATE ECE. So stupid of me… I know… haha.

In short, I started my GATE preparation in ECE. But thankfully, I realized that I can write GATE CSE around the time GATE 2020 application form was out and obviously, I decided to write GATE CSE. But, by that time, it was placement season and I got placed in a product-based company and as expected I relaxed and decided to work for one year and then join M.Tech. So, I took GATE CSE preparation too lightly. Basically, I decided to write GATE 2020 as a confidence booster.  I borrowed books from my friends, and studied the easy subjects including digital logic, DS, Logic and a bit from TOC, CN, DBMS and Algorithm. That was pretty much my whole preparation for GATE CSIT 2020.

GATE 2021

As the first step, I decided to enroll in a coaching and joined ACE Deeplearn. It had recorded classes and I thought I can watch them whenever I feel like and also if I join the company (which I didn’t), I won’t miss any classes. I joined Deeplearn in May 2020, but got a bit busy that I started my preparation only in June (And in between at times I didn’t prepare when I needed long breaks). I started watching lectures and writing notes. Here I would like to mention my first mistake.

“I concentrated more on finish watching the videos and far too less on doing more questions and in all subjects except one or two I didn’t solve questions other than those in lectures at that time.” Mistake 1

I started with subjects that were easy for me. This was a trick to boost my confidence, I guess. And I prepared Engineering Maths and Discrete Maths in between technical subjects. After a point, I realized I remember only a few things I studied until then and I didn’t have a short note to revise from. This was my second mistake in the initial stage of preparation.

“I didn’t make short notes in the initial stage of my preparation.” Mistake 2

The best thing about making short notes is on writing it again, it stays in mind for longer and if proper revision is done, one will remember those concepts for a life time. I started preparing short notes (even though my short notes are long, thankfully not as long as original notes) after finishing around 2-3 technical subjects and also a few topics from maths. Here starts my third mistake.

“I neglected revising many subjects until the last few days before the exam, which ended up in me not being able to revise all subjects before exam and this panicked me and I lose a few marks from well known topics.” Mistake 3

Basically, I listened to lecture, note down everything and made short notes then started another subject and continued this pattern. In case, I feel bored while studying a specific subject, I either took break for a few days or start a new subject which piques my interest. It is really important to feel fresh when one decides to sit and study.

“Started being lazy for some time as I had only around 4 subjects to finish” Mistake 4

This mistake costed me to lose marks from 3 subjects. I ended up not studying half or even more than half the syllabus of three subjects.

After being lazy for some time, I decided to do previous year questions(pyq) and questions from ACE workbook. For this, I prepared a timetable and tried to follow it. But making a time table never worked for me till date and as expected, this time too it didn’t work for me. I like to take days off when I am not in a mood to study and also when making timetable, the habit of pushing me to do far more than what I can take, didn’t help me in following the time table. I consider this as my fifth mistake.

“Not making realistic timetable” Mistake 5

Even after failing to make a realistic timetable, I did a fairly good number of questions mostly pyq except for a few subjects. For the rest of the subjects, questions solved in class were the only practice I had.

The thing I am sure I did right is that while doing questions, even when listening to lectures, I tried really hard to find answers myself and only then checked their solution and learnt it too if they used a different method. I might end up not getting the answer or while checking I end up finding a far easier solution but I never let it discourage me. This is one of the most important habit, which helped me get this rank even when I did so many mistakes.

After this I did one of the four subjects, I didn’t yet cover the syllabus of. By that time (Dec last week or Jan first week) I realized that I forgot to make short notes for 2 to 3 subjects I covered and also that I didn’t yet do test series except for two. In those test series, I got only 49 marks each. I decided to not study anything new anymore. Even though, I had studied a bit of the remaining three subjects, I didn’t finish them. I chose to make short notes while revising over studying new things.

In between making short notes I did a few test series. I attended test series from ACE Academy, free tests conducted by Gradeup, pareeksha series of unacademy and did two or three previous year question papers. But I could find the marks of only two of them and as far as I remember, I got less than the lowest mark I mentioned below in previous year question paper in the third one.

Test Series Marks

ACE Academy:                 Lowest: 49          Highest: 63

Gradeup:                          Lowest: 50          Highest: 56

Pareeksha:                      Lowest: 48          Highest: 62

Previous year paper:      Lowest: 53          Highest: 56

“I didn’t even bother to analyze the questions which went wrong while attending test series.” Mistake 6

I didn’t analyze those questions thinking I don’t have enough time. But I now know that is a stupid excuse. Moreover, what happened was I lost confidence and decided to take no more test series. Stupid move but still a wise move as I was not analyzing where I went wrong and was simply taking tests. I recommend gate aspirants to not lose confidence at any point of time. Working hard is the only solution to success.

Once I stopped giving test series, the only thing I did was revision. I watched YouTube videos of Gradeup. I watched selected playlists of them along with some other videos which I thought I should watch. Along with this I revised my short notes, except for some portion as I said earlier. But the effect of low marks in test series stayed with me, and my confidence level was pretty down.

Exam Day

I was pretty nervous. As I said earlier, I decided not to join the company, and it added to the nervousness. I was afraid if I lose one year for nothing and so on. I wanted to give the best but these thoughts made me so nervous and actually affected my marks.

“Being nervous during the exam hours.” Mistake 7

Being nervous, I did silly mistakes in few questions which could have been easily avoided otherwise and thus, losing the chance to get a rank within 100. But if I be honest, after my exam, mainly due to my nervousness I guess, I thought I did my exam very poorly and is not going to get good marks.

Resources

• ACE Deeplearn Lectures
• Gradeup YouTube videos
• A very few videos from other YouTube channels

Advice for Future Aspirants

• Believe in yourself no matter what. You are the best. Never let anything or anyone take away your confidence. Work hard for what you dream.
• If you are planning to make a time table, make a realistic one which will not tire you. Find out what is best for you.
• Don’t neglect aptitude and maths. They are really scoring areas.
• Solve questions related to the portions you cover. Try solving it yourself before checking the solution. Check the solution even when you get the answer correctly, you might be able to learn a new method.
• Make short notes and revise it regularly. Regular revision is a must and short notes makes it easier. Don’t neglect a subject from revision totally just because you know that subject well enough.
• Never procrastinate. Try finishing the portions as early as possible.
• Do as much test series as possible but never let the marks make you feel underconfident or overconfident.
• Analyze every test series you attend. Dedicate the time after test series to analyze your mistakes. Read the short notes from that portion and if you are making mistakes in that portion repeatedly, read notebook or even standard text books if needed.
• Be calm on the exam day. Take deep breaths. Believe in yourself. Don’t waste too much time on lengthy problems. You can come back to it after the first round of answering questions.
• Don’t just read this article, but do not repeat the mistakes I did during my journey.

All the best!!!

Conclusion

I thank Almighty, my family, friends, teachers from ACE Academy and Gradeup for helping me in achieving this rank.

Hope this article is helpful. I might not have the best rank but still feel free to ask in case you have any doubts regarding preparation.

Thanks for reading

Arathi Nair M

Hi, my self Harsh Shah. I got AIR 965 in GATE (CS) – 2021 with 53.01 marks. This was my second attempt in GATE. It is not that good rank but I am happy with this :) 

A little Bit Of My Background:- 

I was graduated in the year 2020 from Silver Oak College Of Engineering And Technology which comes under Gujarat Technological University, Gujarat. It was Tier – 4 colleges I got admission there because of my JEE performance. Yes I also gave JEE and my rank was in six-digit xD: So I left hope of a good college and pursue my B.Tech in computer science engineering. I always (here I mean whole engineering community xD:) tend to study one night before the exam. Though I was getting decent CPI(thanks to my friends and YouTube :) ). 

My Gate Journey:-

Okay, so it will be a little longer. Enjoy :).

I first heard about GATE from my roommate who was a senior and also preparing for GATE. At that time I was in the 3rd semester. Then after a few days of research and discussion with my friends, I decided to prepare for this exam. I knew that I will learn all CS subjects which are important and it is a national level exam, so I was very excited to learn all these subjects and enjoy the journey. And also I never prepared for any competitive exam so I was very excited.

Then I joined an institute which is located in Ahmedabad itself named “The Gate Academy”. there was only one batch that runs on the weekend only. So I used to attend class on weekends and on weekdays I have to attend college. I joined coaching at the end of my 4th semester. And I was very much focused, so hardly attend my college(Thanks to my friends and Faculty member who put proxy so I could prepare for the exam xD ). I also explained the importance of GATE to my parents and told them I will keep my CGPA above 8 but I could not attend college so if college does not allow me to sit for the exam then please help me xD: They were very supportive and allow me to prepare for GATE. All things were going well my concepts were also building well. I was good at focusing only on GATE as I have no college work to do (Again Thanks Those Good Friends :) ). I was doing good in the test series not that much good but comparatively good. But I left COA as I was not able to learn and understand that subject.

Now comes the exam day. I still remember that day very well 8th February 2020. I entered the exam room with a positive mindset although I did not prepare for COA (I thought that in 2019 only 4 marks came from COA so I will manage that in 2020). But when the paper started I was shocked, I had a habit of starting the exam from the first question itself And SURPRISE………. The first 5 to 6 questions were from COA. And that was enough for ruining my whole exam. After that, I could not solve even easy questions and end up getting 29.67 marks with AIR 12320. It was not like that coaching was not good, many of my friends got a decent score and got their dream college. It was because of my fault only.

On the very next day, I regretted it a lot because of one subject I ruined my two years of preparation. On that day I called my parents(I was staying in a hostel)and told them I ruined my GATE exam and literally, I could not stop my tears. They told it is okay it was just an exam. I told them that I want to take one year drop and prepare for GATE one more time. This time they were against me because they thought I am telling it to satisfy my ego. And they told me to find a job. At this time my friend helped me a lot. She knew I can surely do better than this because she Shawn me preparing for this exam and she knew my capacity. So she agreed with me to take one year drop and prepare one more time. So I explained to my parents that don't judge me on the basis of this score I can surely do better than this and I will prove it. My sisters also helped me by letting me take one year drop. At last, my parents convinced but they told me that they will allow only a one-time drop.

Okay, so from here journey started for GATE 2021. As I wanted to start fresh I joined the coaching institute one more time. But this time I joined at “ACE Academy Hyderabad”. But due to COVID, I could not go to Hyderabad, I stayed at my home only. I was very clear that I will do each and every subject again no matter I did that subject earlier or not. So I started preparing it. This time I am very much clear with my not-to-do list. I have an aim to get AIR under 500. what I used to do is suppose today one topic is covered from a particular subject like for example if today IP addressing is covered from CN then after the lecture, I revise class notes then solve questions from ace volume 1 then volume 2 then bits and bytes and at last pyq. At the time of pyq I almost solved tough questions so it will be easy for me to solve them. many times if I could not get ans for pyq I used to visit GO Website for the detailed solution it blew my mind. It has such an in-depth solution. This continuous for every subject.

Then comes Test Series. This time my performance was good in Test Series. On average I got 20 out of 25 on the topic-wise test, 40 out of 50 on the subject-wise test, and 65 – 75 on the full-length test. Test series will play an important role as they manage your time and also tests your knowledge. But never map test series marks to your original exam marks.

The Exam Day:-

I was pretty cool on the day of the exam. I had a morning slot so I reached the center early and was listening to songs. By that time I gave many full-length tests so I prepared my mind to write one more full-length test :). Paper was easy as compared to the afternoon slot but it was surely trickier and lengthy than GATE 2020. I did some silly mistakes(due to that I got 53 marks otherwise I could get around 60 marks). But no regret as I was able to solve hard questions.

The conclusion: –

1. Never compare your marks with your friends 
2. Never compare Test Series marks with Actual Exam.
3. Do not ignore aptitude and maths if possible do it as early as possible.
4. Do not leave any subject.
5. Revision is your girlfriend you have to take care of her. Otherwise, she will ruin your life.
6. Prepare every day. Do not focus on a number of hours.
7. Be prepare for everything. What I mean is don't assume that your paper will be easy or tough.
8. Remember “All late nights and early mornings will pay off”.

Still at the end. I am satisfied with my score. GATE taught me how to manage time, how to handle pressure, and whether you are from tier 1 college or tier 4 college it will not matter. My suggestion is at least one time in your life to prepare for a competitive exam it will teach many things.

I know I have not a good rank to guide anyone but still feel free to ask anything. I will try my best to answer it.

Thanks for reading.

only difference between gate and iitjee is that iit jee may be hard but has only 3 subjects mainly, but gate has its own difficulty parameters, ie, remembering all 12 subjects till the end , which really becomes a major issue.

I had three types of notes:-

1. FULL – SUBJECT COPY
2. FULL – SHORT NOTES(In around 3 to 4 A4-pages)
3. MICRO-short notes(in only one A4 page,with only most important points and formulae which you have difficulty to remember)

HERE ON I WILL TELL WHEN AND HOW TO MAKE THEM AND I WILL BE CALLING THEM AS:-  1)NOTE,2)NOTE,3)NOTE RESPECTIVELY.

Once you complete one subject with all 1)NOTES , and start with next subject,it will be ok but once you het till the third subject the one you read at the start will bw almost out of your mind. Same continues on as you proceed with other subjects. 

Solution = 2)NOTES.   As you finish one subject sompletely, make a short notes copy and after solving all prev year ques of that topic, make 2)NOTES out of that subject, in no more than 3-4 A4 pages, as you only want short notes and not another replica of your old notes.

Revising the 2)NOTES is much easier than 1)NOTES,  MY way was after every subject ends, I used to quickly revise 2)NOTES of previous subjects(is say 4 subjects already done, then 3 subjects via fast revision of 2)NOTES, and any one subject of full revision via 1)NOTES) and continue this routine for all subjects one by one, this will help you keep all subjects info in your mind.

ONCE, YOU ARE OVER WITH THE SYLLABUS, NEXT IMP. POINT IS TO REMEMBER ALL FORMULAE,AS           12 SUBJECTS*(100-200)DIFFICULT FORMULAE = nearly 2000 formulae to be remembered(only talking about difficult one, easy one can be more in number).

Solution is 3)NOTES:-   once you have done all subjects , now you will get to know which subjects which part, and which formulae are you laking, Take one A4 or atmax two A4 and write down only the key points in , and where to keep it is, “””PASTE THOSE IN YOUR ROOM’S WALL”’’’’, so that when you wake up early in the morning you first see those points on the wall and just spend next 30 min-1hr, revising all 3)NOTES on the wall. AND you have to do this standing and not laying on the bed. Once you have read all those 3)NOTES you will also see that the sleepiness one have in while waking in morning is also gone as you were standing all the 30-60 min and now, you have no more sleep left, now you can continue whole day with full energy.  I had done me 3)NOTES with such confidence that even without seeing those notes on my wall , i could even mug those formulae like a poem.

and at last but not the least, if you want to wake up in the morning, PUT AN ALARM, BUT “NO SNOOZE”, SO THAT YOU WON’T BE HAVING CHOICE TO SNOOZE FOR NEXT 5MIN , BUT ONLY TO WAKE UP.

GIVE  Your BEST and You CAN DO IT,

ALL THE BEST.

Truth is one cannot start to study for 13-14 hrs on the very first day. You have to start from a small amount of time for which you are comfortable, Eg→ 5 to 6 hrs daily, day time by time increase your limit. Just remember “21 days RULE” , it always works, ie, any habit can be taken by practising it for atleast 21 days continuously .

I started with 6 hrs daily, which also felt as a burden to me in the start , but after 21 days 6 hrs was seeming too less for me , so in next 21 days i started to study around 9-10 hrs . in about next month it was also not a big issue to study 10 hrs daily . Now, actually 10 hrs is enough for gate . But, as i was in final year, I had less burden from the college and only 2-3 subjects so I thought to increase my limits further,almost upto JEE aspirants, ie , 14 hrs daily , and almost 85hrs+ each week. It was something very difficult to pursue , waking up 6:00 am and going all the way till 12:00 at night. with few breaks in between after every 3 hrs.But again 21 days rule did help me achieve it.

One strategy i followed was work 6 days a week. Reasons:-

1.   14 hrs * 6 = 84 hrs(almost as i wanted)
2.   Leave study completely on sunday , One may think that I am joking, But I myself practised this,Why? Becoz, If you keep working daily your efficiency gradually goes on decreasing, but if you skip one day for rest , your mind would not allow it , and thats waht we want , as just thinking that we are wasting lot of time whole sunday, sleeping and watching TV (only tv an no social media or web series), your mind will release diff harmones for under pressure and by the night you would be so much pumped up for the next day that on monday you would be super ready to start again 14 hrs daily. Just try once the above method, and once without it and then see which prefers you as choose for the best according to your body requirements.
3. But finally, it is better to study 10 hrs with 100% focus than to study 14-15 hrs with  lack of concentration.
4. Lastly , Fix a goal and just say to your mind that you will not accept anything lower. Doing so will atleast fetch you some good things in that range, so just aim big, very big. For my case it was IISC Banglore and ISRO , just seeing their picture also should kept me going. I just wanted to have them in any case, nothing except them were acceptable.I got an injury in my thumb in november and doctor said to stop writting as it may grow even worse , but that was not an option.As said in CHICHHORE Movie “Pain can give you pain If you allow it to do so”.and I had not given it that permission, three months I continued with by injured and painful thumb , least caring about that.
5. Lo and behold, I finally got AIR-152, that day I actually felt the pain in my thumb ;), it was very painful but I was happy as it was the remembrance of my struggle to achieve my goal. I am not sure how long will it take to cure my thumb or would i have to go from some surgery but actually what matters is that I was able to bring a smile and pride in face of parents and family members.

--->>>SO IN THE END, IT DEPENDS ON YOU WHAT YOU WANT TO ANSWER:-

ques1) can i get some iit or not??

ques2) Which IIT should i choose among the top ones and which to leave?

                                       IF YOUR MIND SAYS “ A BIG YES” TO THE QUES (2) , THEN YOU ARE ON THE RIGHT TRACK, AND NOONE CAN STOP YOU .

                                                            ‘’’’’’’’ALL THE BEST TO ALL’’’’’’’’’’.

Hi everyone !!

Congratulations to all, who are shortlisted for BARC CS Interview. Interviews are starting from 1st December, and book your slots for interview as soon as possible. Now, in this short period I would like to share few things which you can pick and revise for interview process. 

1. Read previous interview experiences.  My Interview Experience https://gateoverflow.in/blog/9985/barc-cs-interview-experience-2019 . 
2. Revise GATE syllabus thoroughly once, you can use your GATE notes. Now focus will  be on assertion-reason rather solving numerical questions. Why threading when multiprocessing is already there ? How will you design a firewall to stop a set of IP addresses ? What is the need of pipelining ? What other kinds of Databases are available ? Can you list some compiler optimizations and why they are used ? Use mutex to make H2O in synchronization ? which algorithm will you prefer when people are submitting forms on BARC website and we need to sort them based on name ? How priority queues are implemented ? What is CPU clock speed and what factors affect CPU clock speed ? Write a program to find whether two rectangles are overlapping or not ?
3. Pick 4-5 favorite subjects and do extra revision. I used GeeksforGeeks articles during my preparations. They are effective also they are written in a very practical and comparative aspect. Example : https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/mutex-vs-semaphore/
4. Try to retain basic pseudo codes in mind, like bakery algorithm, Peterson solution, congestion control alogrithm, Longest common subsequence etc. 
5. Try to touch those topics also which you have ignored partially or completely during GATE, because they ask question on them also.Like, what is CISC architecture, Symmetric and asymmetric multiprocessing, What are inodes and how free space are managed, etc.

Feel free to reach me for doubts during preparation !!!

https://www.linkedin.com/in/abhilash-bhardwaj-6000b7b4/ or

 https://www.quora.com/profile/Abhilash-Bhardwaj-3

All the best !!

Abhilash Bhardwaj

Scientific Officer(C)/ 2019-Batch BARC

Hi, I am Ankita Dey. I did BTech in ECE from a Tier 3 college and prepared with a full-time job. I secured a rank of 312 in 2020 CS GATE. I am currently pursuing MTech in Computer Science from IIT Kanpur.

NOTE: Since it is pretty detailed, you can skip to any area without reading the others.

Backstory:

I had no plans of doing MTech while in BTech. After getting placed in a Service based company, I thought I would improve my coding skills, learn new technologies, and switch to a Product based company. Within a few months, I realised it is much more difficult than it sounds. Not only was I absolutely terrible in Competitive Programming (though I loved to code), but also the lack of knowledge in CS core subjects was hampering my chances. So I decided to study CS core subjects to get to the same level as my CS grad colleagues. I really enjoyed studying CS subjects (to be honest, much more than ECE subjects). So I thought of preparing for CS GATE.

Preparation Story:

Time Management: Prepared sincerely on Weekends (I studied every weekend as much as I did during Btech semester exams. But, I could never complete the target. So I studied on Weekdays while commuting to office and sometimes after coming back home.

Note-taking: I watched a video as many times as required to understand it at first. Then again watched it to take detailed notes (I took notes in a way such that I would never have to watch the video again). Writing notes really helped strengthen the concept I just learned.

Previous Year Questions: After completing a subject, I tried to solve its previous year's questions. Struggled a lot initially. October onwards, I sincerely started solving them for all subjects numerous times. Gradually, I got used to GATE pattern. Gate Overflow and Geeks for Geeks contribution in this area was immense.

Revision: I revised a subject after completing it. Checked previous day's notes the next day. That's it. I didn't revise as much as I should have as I was rushing to complete the syllabus. This is the biggest mistake I made.

Mocks: Mocks tremendously improved my marks as well as my confidence. I gave sectional mocks of the institute I took coaching from and gave full length mocks of other institutes. It's always better to give mocks of more than one institute so that one doesn't get too used to a specific pattern. Apart from getting my concepts strong, a thorough mock analysis was pretty much the key to improving my score.

Rough Timeline:

Nov 2018 – Jan 2019: Watched YouTube videos to know as much as I could about CS subjects. Stressed on Programming in C, DS, Algo, and Maths.

Feb 2019: Gave 2019 GATE. Got 6855 rank. To be honest, I was pretty happy just to qualify CS GATE!

Mar 2019: By the end of March, exhausted most of the YouTube videos I could find (and liked) on CS subjects.

Apr 2019: Bought online coaching. Stated with DS and C programming. Couldn't qualify PGEE.

May 2019: Prepared Toc and Discrete Maths.

Jun 2019: Prepared leftover part of DS, Algo, and TOC. Started DBMS.

July 2019: Completed DBMS. Started with OS.

Aug 2019: Completed OS. Prepared leftover parts of already prepared subjects.

Sep 2019: Started Digital Electronics (it was my strongest ECE subject) and Compiler Design (less syllabus, so took less time).

Oct 2019: Completed Compiler Design and Digital Electronics both. Started Computer Networks.

Nov 2019: Completed Computer Networks. Started Computer Organisation. Also started giving sectional and subject wise mocks at this time. Did thorough mock analysis.

Dec 2019: Continued giving sectional and subject wise mocks. Stressed on improving weaker areas. Couldn't complete Computer Organisation. So left out a huge part of it (don't recommend it if you have time).

Jan 2020: Didn't study anything new. Gave a mock of Made Easy and Ace every alternate day throughout Jan, except last week when I gave one mock every alternate day because I needed more time for revision. 

Feb 2020: Gave GATE 2020. I wasn't feeling stressed at all after giving so many mocks. In spite of that, I had to rush a bit towards the end due to lack of time, which led to silly mistakes. But I am happy where I am now. So no regrets!

June 2020: Gave PGEE without much revision. Got selected in the first round, thanks to GATE preparation.

Contact:

If you have any queries feel free to send me a message on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/dey-ankita/

I got AIR 202 in GATE 2020.

I was working while preparing. Many of the GATE applicants will find themselves preparing for GATE while working. I have written a post on some points which I feel will be useful for future aspirants, may be specifically working aspirants.

Hello!!

My Gate 2019 Journey

I decided to appear for gate in my 2nd year only and actually started preparing for it January 2018. I joined a coaching which one of my seniors joined and got AIR 2 in Chandigarh. But later came to know that the faculty here changes every year and I got the new faculty which was fine. Few subjects were really amazing and cleared all my concepts but few needed self study. I referred Standard books for all subjects and prepared good notes. One thing I lacked in my preparation was problem solving. I only solved GATE previous year once till August and that too very casually. One more thing that was lacking in coaching was tests. There were not enough tests and a competitive environment to study.

After August campus placements started in my college and I decided to sit for them. Another mistake that I did in my 2019 attempt, to focus on two things together and not making the best out of any. I sat in around 7-8 companies and gave their aptitude tests, programming tests and interviews and devoted my half attention there till 13th September, when I finally made it to Infosys Ltd. I wasted a lot of time here stressing out and my Gate preparation got neglected a lot by then. After being placed only at the package of 3.5 LPA, I somehow got satisfied and started enjoying my last semester in college, chilling with my friends. Gate prep was some where down in my priority now. I also chose to go for 6 Months internship in Infosys Mysore which started on 14th January, 2019. Joining my internship that too in January was my biggest mistake. I could have prepared well and given test series in December after my semester exams and continued my preparation in January. Well I went to Mysore and only 25 days were left for my exam. I got really busy there with the classes and could only score around 41.33 with a rank more than 5000.

I also appeared in IIIT H exam but could not qualify. I realized that I had no other option but to join my job as dropping was not my thing. I cannot focus for long hours and dropping was a bit risky.

My Gate 2020 journey

So I started my preparation again in June,2019. I was motivated this time. I was not happy with my placement as growth opportunities are very less in Infosys. I got my offer letter for training again and went to Mysore on 5th August, 2019. I took my books along and studied there as well. I had to choose my work location and I chose Chandigarh again. I was alone here this time, no friends and took a PG where I knew no one. I had no time to waste. I made no new friends in Chandigarh and only concentrated on my Gate prep. Luckily the project I got initially had little work and I could even study in my office. Infosys has a library also where one can easily study and no one will judge.

I solved all previous year problems by November end once and completed all my subjects. I realized i was weak in Algorithm, DM, LA and Probability. I prepared for them in December along with revising other subjects and solving previous year question again. I also made short notes like 4-5 pages for each subject and 1-2 pages of formula list for most subjects and pasted that on my wall. I used to revise all that daily and solve previous year (selected not all) during revision. I took two test series one from Made easy and other from Ace Academy. This time I gave like 20 tests and always used to analyse them and write down their mistakes in a notebook.

During January I took leave from my job and gave my 100% only to the my GATE preparation. I deactivated all social media accounts and was in contact with only one friend who was preparing for GATE along with his job. Preparing along with your job needs a lot of self motivation because sometimes one can feel that maybe I can switch job and then I will grow or doing 9-5 job was more easy than preparing all the subjects again and again.

Mistakes that I made in my Gate 2020

According to me my mistake was not forming a group with like minded and motivated Gate Aspirants and as I was not in contact with any of my teacher so problem solving was tough sometimes and finding a solution to the tough questions was not easy. I used to disturb Prashant every time I got stuck…Thanks for helping me with my doubts.

I used YouTube channels to study in my 2020 attempt. I had no time to study from standard books but I had my notes from last year for reference. This was also a mistake as I lacked in understanding the core concepts and idea behind those concepts. I only knew that this is the formula that I have to apply to solve these type of questions in some subjects like computer networks. I actually used questions to understand the concepts rather than understanding the concept first and then solving questions for practice.

Another mistake was solving fewer full tests and not preparing a good strategy to solve questions. I always solved questions in sequence and did same during the exam. I was not good in handling the exam pressure and got panicked during the last half an hour. I was not able to revise efficiently and solve the remaining problems at that time. One tip to future aspirants try giving more tests and give atleast one CBT if possible.

That’s my GATE journey from 5462 AIR to 616 AIR and I hope those who get stuck at a less paying job feel motivated after reading this and start preparing for GATE and score good marks. GATE needs consistent efforts of revising all the subjects. Its not that tough like JEE. Do solve previous year questions atleast twice before the exam. Anyone with dedication and determination can perform good in GATE.

ALL THE BEST!!