Recent posts in Preparation Advice

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!!

I am Nitish Gupta and I secured AIR-13 with a score of 950/1000 in GATE CS 2020. I was in the final year of my Graduation at CCET, Chandigarh when I wrote this and therefore it was my first attempt (Update: I joined IISc, CSA for MTech Batch 2020-2022). I’d like to share the key points related to my preparation so that it can help future aspirants.

I joined a classroom course at a GATE Coaching GATEGURUS here in Chandigarh and most of the theory was covered by the classroom coaching. But doesn’t matter if you join a well-known coaching, online coaching or study using standard books, once you collect the theory from these sources, it all comes down to your strategy that decides how well you’re going to perform. I’ll write my experience in the form of answers to questions I’ve been asked.

What sources did you follow for the theory of this particular subject?

I’ve written it all down in this table, but again, it doesn’t matter which source you follow, it all depends on you.

When did you start your GATE preparation? How long did it take to finish your syllabus?

I joined my coaching on 5th of JAN 2019, and I finished my whole syllabus along with one iteration of GATE previous year questions by November end. The reason it took me so long because I was involved in a lot of extra-curricular in college and also the college curriculum had to be managed because I wanted to maintain a good GPA too (seems worthless now). I used to go to 6-hour classes on Saturday-Sundays and review my class notes during college lectures. On Saturday Sunday, after class, I used to solve questions on the topics that have been just finished. I didn’t take out anytime for GATE from the weekdays until the end of September. October onwards, I devoted as much time as possible so that I can finish my syllabus by Nov.

Where did you solve the questions from?

In the beginning, I used to solve question from GO pdf or GeeksforGeeks but later I felt the need to have it in a hard copy. I bought a GATE previous year book and used to solve questions of the topics just finished. The need for a hard copy, I’ll tell in the next answer. Other than that, I sometimes solved assignment sheets of IITs and previous year questions of other CS competitive exams. If I felt need to solve even more questions, I attempted topic-wise tests of test series.

What was your strategy of attempting GATE previous year questions?

I never touched the last 4 papers’ questions because I wanted to use them as a mock test in the end. For the other questions, the first time I solved them right after finishing the topic and always marked the good or tricky questions with 1, 2 or 3 stars based on how important I thought the question was to revise. The idea was to not attempt the questions with no stars while doing the questions again because they were just too easy to revise. And also, I wrote the key points or new concepts that I learnt from it on the top/bottom of that page with a pencil. Also, I wrote down any concept or terms that were new to me and appeared in the questions so I can study them separately. The 2nd time I attempted all the questions divided into topics in November. Each day, I would revise a set of topics and solve the starred pyq of those topics. The 3rd time in December, I did all the starred pyq subject wise each day.

It’s important to understand that PYQ are the most genuine way to test your understanding of concepts. Hence, learn how to approach and what am I doing wrong, rather than the solutions.

What test series did you buy? What was your strategy for attempting the test series?

I only bought MadeEasy test series but I have read a lot of suggestions to attempt at least 2 different test series so that you don’t get fixated at a particular pattern of questions and I agree with that now. 

I only attempted topicwise test till December. From January I started attempting 1 full length test daily at the same time as my GATE exam time slot and a full-subject or multi-subject test (1.5-hour test) at 10:00 p.m. Before the full-length test, I revised the concepts I  had mistaken in the last tests. After the test, I took a short break and then analysed the test which helped a lot in improving because knowing a concept and effectively applying it to solve problems are 2 different things and you need to learn the latter the hard way, i.e. by making mistakes.

What was your strategy to attempt a full-length test? How did you perform in the full-length tests?

I used to attempt the questions in 2 iterations. I used to finish the Aptitude section in the first 20-30 minutes. Then the 1-mark questions in the next 50 minutes and then the 2 markers in the next 50-60 minutes. In this time, any question that I could not figure out how to solve (not actually solve) in a minute, I left it for the 2nd iteration. I usually saved 15-20 minutes in the end for revision (helps a lot)

This was a question I used to search a lot in January so that I can know where I stand actually. So, I tabulated by results in the following sheet.

*the ranks are noted down immediately after attempting the tests so it may vary from the final ranks of those tests.

​

How was GateOverflow helpful in your preparation?

This was the one source I could always count on for all the PYQ solutions and doubts resolutions. No other source has content as trustworthy as GateOverflow. Every other source has some mistakes in the solution that’s why I always search GO for any doubt in a concept or question and could always trust is because I learnt it from GO. That’s a very essential part when you are in the last few months.

How was your GATE exam experience?

My centre was in a really remote area 35kms away from my hostel and for some reasons I reached 4 minutes before the exam started. I feel the level of GATE is easier than the test series but the state of mind you are in inside the exam hall brings it to the difficulty level of the test series. After the exam, I had no idea how did I do. 

I attempted 61/65 question (because I didn’t leave any NAT questions).

Got 54 of them right and scored 80/100 marks.

What are some key points that every GATE aspirant must know?

*You should have someone to talk to: Can be your parents, your friend, siblings or even your lover. It’s important to share things so that you can endure the pressure in the last few months of preparation. Keeping it all to yourself becomes really difficult sometimes especially when the results are not as you expect.

*Every effort counts, every mistake counts: You may not realize it at that point but every extra page you read before sleeping on that exhausting day, every extra question you attempted, all of it eventually pays off.

*GATE doesn’t require you sacrificing everything else in your life: You just need to be consistent. No need to give up your hobbies, friends or fun for a year for GATE.

*I personally used to read 2 poems often during preparation: ’IF’ by Rudyard Kipling and ‘Go All the Way’ by Charles Bukowski.

*Don’t compromise with your sleep and health

That’s it from me. If you have any questions related to preparation that I didn’t answer, do let me know in the comments or mail me at [email protected] 

Admission forms out for IIITD:-

Check out here, this time there is coding test too.

Non gate:- written +coding+interview test

Gate:- coding+interview test

https://www.iiitd.ac.in/admission/mtech/2020/cse-ece-details

Those who want to prepare for coding rounds for various colleges/company interviews, please check out this link.

I find this link really helpful

https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/must-do-coding-questions-for-companies-like-amazon-microsoft-adobe/

I have been asked by many aspirants so many times, that how to prepare for GATE with a full-time job or how to manage the time? I hope the following short video of less than 4 minutes will answer your all the questions

There are a lot of failures in GATE. 100s of people in top 1000 in GATE prepared by self and approximately 3000 CSE students are in the top 2 GATE coaching centers for CSE alone (contributing about 200-400 in top 1000) and about 4000+ in online courses (contributing about 50-100 in top 1000). If we count all those who took coaching this number will be around 15,000-20,000 and out of these more than 97% failed to get to top 1000. Why is this and who is responsible for this? The one man who is primarily responsible for this is Mr. Isaac Newton.

Now if you do not know what he did, this is what he said

Every body continues to be in its state of rest or of uniform motion in a STRAIGHT LINE unless an EXTERNAL UNBALANCED force acts on it

And due to this almost all GATE aspirants continue in their motion in a straight line without checking if it is correct or not. A few of them who are in good path become toppers. Hardly or almost 0 manages to change their wrong line during their preparation. A few of them do this after GATE when the GATE result acts as the EXTERNAL force. In stead if they use the available previous year papers and other mock tests to evaluate themselves and study from standard text books, some years can be saved. I don’t think this post will act as an external force, still I’m posting for my self satisfaction.

What each person must do is specific to him/her and in India where we have 100s of varieties of people coming from different backgrounds there is no universal way of preparation. Still some of the typical mistakes are as follows:

1. Not following Cormen and Rosen. These two books are a must for GATE CSE aspirants. Again, GATE CSE portions are only a small part of these books and you can focus only on those.
2. Mathematical Logic – You must understand first order logic in the proper way and not use some short cut to get to answer. Because this may not work for GATE and this topic is relevant in answering many other topic questions too. 
3. Ignoring Verbal Ability – Like for above Verbal Ability is crucial in answering many of the CSE questions as well. You do not need to be like Shashi Tharoor but must be at least as good as Virat Kohli in Verbal Ability. 
4. Blind following – Unfortunately our current generation is trained to do blind following and always asking for questions like “Please tell me what to do, etc”. Instead you should be strong enough to identify your mistakes and take outside help only when strictly needed. 
5. Solving only those questions which are in your comfort level – this is fine if the comfort level covers >95% of the questions. Otherwise, please switch to some other exam preparation.

GATE 2019 Marks: 63.33 Rank -582

Selected in IIT Kanpur, see here for Interview experience: https://gateoverflow.in/blog/8079/iit-kanpur-ms-interview-experience

I started GATE preparation probably around starting of 3rd  year, I read a lot of blogs on GO, (see here) and they were really helpful for me, I just wanna go in a little detail about how I did everything - You see, I made a lot(trust me, a lot) of mistakes, so the only reason I'm writing this is to make sure you know the reality of things and then decide on your own what you have to do- Don't repeat these mistakes to get experience, read others experience and learn.
Started preparation with these –
Youtube videos of R, GeekforGeeks prep Notes, [Only good thing was I preferred Cormen for some parts in Algorithms, later switched to Narsimha(Also kind of mistake, realized after GATE)]

At that time my schedule was:

wakeup→Read one topic from Cormen.
Travel 30 KM to college via bus(Reading notes/ watching Downloaded videos )
Look for ways to bunk the class and read notes (I remember going to the topmost floor of our college with Astitva sitting near servers making loud noise and heat during summer)
Travel back home (Reading or watching the same videos to clear my understanding of what I read today)
Manage family shop (Here I also did my work from Remote Internship(As a Javascript developer) work).
Around 11-12: Back in my room - Watched NPTEL lectures plus some work from the internship

Got Gateforum material from library started solving questions (Went full berserk – solved them in 2-3 months )  – It also had material for reading- completed that too. We also found class notes of Ace/RBR/ME: completed them too. – see DON’T DO THIS [I read same things from different notes and in this much time I could’ve read from books which would’ve been much much better]

Now, this went for the whole 3rd   year, yeah whole 1 year kinda just went like that.

You see, I did work hard, studied a lot(At least that's what I thought at that time), but I was only average at that time, Then I quit the internship, told dad to free me from shop work and kind of locked myself in my room on off days, Because of some work I still had to travel around 10 KM daily via public transport after reaching home from college around 6 PM, I used to revise from NPTEL pdfs in Auto rickshaws, but it was no problem, I was working hard for my target and at that time using whatever method possible was a necessity.

Let me tell you this : If you study the right way - You won't have to study the same things many times as me, yes short notes from sites like geeks / gate-vidyalay are good for going through syllabus - In less than an hour you would finish a whole topic - but doing this is not only a bad way of studying for the first time, but It'll also create a negative impact on you- You will think you know things but you actually won’t plus you won't know what things you don't know[Yeah, I used to say to Astitva, Man I’ve studied the whole syllabus but don’t know why not getting these questions], Another thing which will happen is - you will face difficulties in reading books It'll be something like this: I've been reading for 2 hours and I haven't completed even one topic.

Take your time to understand things- you have to do this just once, you see I spent whole 1 year reading short notes and what did it gave me? - Nothing, When I saw answers by Arjun sir, Bikram sir [and many others here], discussions on Gate questions - It made me think I actually don't know anything, Not just solutions but the discussion in comments did “overflow”, things like “endianness”,”split-cache” seemed like out of world. Now I realized I need to study “Everything” properly- So I started using resources from GO classroom and NPTEL pdf, since I didn’t have much time to read all topics from Books so I read important parts from PDF version of standard books.

Test series:

1)MadeEasy : Total ,waste of my crucial 1 month time – They don’t reply when you post a doubt and their solutions are like such that they are given by those who are “studying” in ME, Don’t explain anything, they’re like for this question we use this formula, don’t ask us why we use it.[I didn’t even complete around 10 tests ]

2)Ace: Long repetitive tests -quality same as ME (I didn’t buy it, Astitva took it and I saw some of the tests)

3)R B R: Questions don’t follow serial order, Aptitude in between technical, repetitive questions, mostly very easy questions which make you feel good[Though some questions were better and explanation was little better than ME/ACE], left more than half of all tests   

4)Success Gateway: This free(Now paid) test series is really the “BEST” – both questions and explanations were great, Let me tell you – many similar questions were asked in GATE including pumping length, Inode, C program questions

5)Virtual gate: Also pretty great, Solutions were not always provided but you can find the solutions with some googling because they mostly take questions from GATE or MIT/Stanford Courses.

6)GATEBOOK free tests: Good quality -similar to Success Gateway

Most important are GATE papers, I did this mistake of taking so many tests from ME and ACE, Thank god I realized my mistake and left remaining tests, In last two months I only took GATE and Success Gateway tests. It was during test series and solving gate questions that I was clearing my misconceptions through GO answers and MIT/Standford notes.

Pro Tip: Use Notes from geeks/Gate-Vidyalaya to revise things not in the first time learning, first read from books and later when you need quick revision then only use these. BOOKS>NPTEL=MIT>other notes

D-DAY[You can see these mistakes and how much I attempted here]

Aptitude was so easy – I thought I’m gonna kill it (AIR-1 is in the bag), [because of my - “We’ll see what happens” kinda nature, I attempted English part and got negative marks(don’t do this)]

Technical part: Did a large number of questions wrong because of getting excited, Actually in test series you had maximum one trick per question, but in actual GATE every word is a game-changer, lost  4 marks only because of ignoring one word – “Independently”, Lost 2 marks on Inode question – I did everything right, Also Challenged on this question and got them to change answer key but I didn’t get any marks on it because I wrote 3.82 instead of 3.8 and it became out of range 3.7-3.8 [Pro Tip: Always answer in specified precision]

Conclusion: Read books → Use Gatecse resources→ see discussions and take part in them
(Most importantly don’t try to find short tricks else you might get long rank)

From my experience, I can surely tell this: You will not be able to clear any interview by reading short notes and fixed pattern based substandard material.

Hello guys !

i have done my B.tech (CSE) from Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University , New Delhi. and from past 2 years i have been working with an IT Company . but now i feel like going for Masters (specially in latest IT technologies i.e ML,DS,AI Thing), i can’t leave this job due to some financial issues but i can devote 4 hours a day for gate preparation ( self preparation + use of GO pdfs and GO Site), can anybody help me, guide me is it possible to crack gate with 9 to 5 job? 

please excuse my any typos !

Thanks in Advance 

Hoping an early and positive reply.