Spring 2027

Computing Concepts for Applications in Engineering

Overview of computing concepts for engineering modeling/simulation, covering computer architecture, software development, and software-hardware interplay.

offering recorded3 credits
Recorded instructors · Spring 2027 Dan Negrut4.1/5

Summary

1 / 6

Past student reviews · Dan Negrut

Homeworks required a lot of work and extensive self-teaching outside of class, though the core material itself was not overly difficult.

What you’ll be able to do

  • Use Python and C to generate programs that can effectively perform data processing tasks on modern CPU architectures

  • Describe how a central processing unit (CPU) functions

  • Describe the roles of memory hierarchy and virtual memory in computing

  • Identify the role of the operating system in computing

  • Describe the implications of representing and carrying out operations with numbers using a finite number of bits

  • Identify computational bottlenecks associated with suboptimal memory accesses and/or poor instruction pipelining

Source: UW Guide

Grade history

↗
average GPA
letter grades
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All recorded terms · compare terms & instructors

Prerequisites

Course map

COMP SCI 200, 220, 300, 301, 320, or placement into COMP SCI 300, graduate/professional standing, or member of Engineering Guest Students

ME 459 used by

“Used by” includes alternatives; linked courses may have other requirements. This is a best-effort interpretation; check the catalog requirements above.

Prerequisite text tree

Professors

Spring 2027

Dan Negrut

Adjusted rating
RMP difficulty
captured reviews
About this rating

Raw average: 4.69/5 from 16 quality ratings. The adjusted rating blends this with the UW review average (3.66/5), weighted as 20 additional ratings. Smaller samples stay closer to that average. Each captured review is counted once in the prior; this does not correct who chooses to leave a review.

For this course: 4.0/5 raw quality · 2.0/5 difficulty · 1 reviews

RMP profile ↗ · All captured review dates; profile matched by name.

Past student reviews · Dan Negrut

Instructor Dan Negrut taught a course where homeworks required significant self-teaching outside of class. However, the material was not overly difficult, grading was fair, and exams were reasonable and challenging but not impossible.

Recent recorded grades — Fall 2020: 3.80 GPA, 90.0% A/AB (n=40 letter grades); Fall 2021: 3.86 GPA, 100.0% A/AB (n=33 letter grades); Spring 2023: 3.91 GPA, 98.2% A/AB (n=56 letter grades). Includes jointly taught sections.

Historical instructors & teaching patterns

DAN NEGRUT is recorded teaching in Fall 2018, Fall 2019, Fall 2020, Fall 2021, Spring 2023. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Calendar & sections

Spring 2027

Schedule loads here as you scroll.

SectionModeEnrolled / capacityWaitlist
LEC 001Classroom Instruction0 / 580

Times are Central. Select a meeting for details; export includes recorded dates for the selected sections. Enrollment reflects scan time.

Meeting source records
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Student experience

the class

Past student reviews · Dan Negrut

Dan Negrut teaches a course where the material is manageable, but the workload demands significant independent effort from students.

Recent recorded grades — Fall 2020: 3.80 GPA, 90.0% A/AB (n=40 letter grades); Fall 2021: 3.86 GPA, 100.0% A/AB (n=33 letter grades); Spring 2023: 3.91 GPA, 98.2% A/AB (n=56 letter grades).

difficulty & workload

Past student reviews · Dan Negrut

Homeworks required a lot of work and extensive self-teaching outside of class, though the core material itself was not overly difficult.

Past student reviews · Dan Negrut

Students found the grading fair and the exams challenging but reasonable, describing them as tough yet not impossible to pass.

Topics

  • Computing concepts supporting modeling and simulation in engineering.
  • Computer architecture, software development, and software-hardware interplay.
  • Central processing unit (CPU) functions.
  • Memory hierarchy and virtual memory.
  • Operating system role in computing.
  • Finite-bit number representation and operations.
  • Computational bottlenecks, memory access, and instruction pipelining.

Skills

  • Understand computer architecture, software development, and software-hardware interplay.
  • Generate programs in Python and C for data processing on modern CPU architectures.
  • Describe CPU functionality.
  • Describe memory hierarchy and virtual memory roles.
  • Identify the operating system's role in computing.
  • Describe implications of finite-bit number representation and operations.
  • Identify computational bottlenecks from memory access and pipelining issues.

Grades

Latest available · Spring 2023— not enough history to project Spring 2027.

average GPA
A / AB grades
letter grades
Instructor

Grade distribution · % of letter grades

A
AB
B
BC
C
D
F

Grades over time

Through Spring 2023

More grade details Grade mix, volume & source data

Where this course fits relative to

Latest available grades · Spring 2023 · all course levels

GPA

Higher than % of other courses in this group.

Course GPAs · red marks this course’s range

letter grades

More recorded grades than % of other courses in this group.

Typical course in this group: letter grades.

About this comparison

1185 courses over the same term, each with at least 30 recorded letter grades. Cross-listed courses count once. GPA is not a measure of difficulty or teaching quality. The typical course is the median by recorded grade count; tied values are not counted as lower. Grade counts describe course scale, not unique students or typical section size.

Descriptions compare GPA with this group’s average: at least 0.20 higher or lower; otherwise close to average. Section size uses median recorded enrollment: small up to 30, mid-sized 31–99, large 100+. Lectures and discussion/lab sections are described separately.

Sources & history

UW–Madison

Catalog & offerings

Descriptions, prerequisites, and recorded course offerings.

Catalog observation history

Observations at scan time; dates do not imply when a catalog change took effect.

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Selected offering source records
ME 459 · Spring 2027

Computing Concepts for Applications in Engineering

Recorded 2026-10-14
Raw records 
[
  {
    "run_id": "20261014T203208-0851c9a1",
    "semester": "1274",
    "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00",
    "offering_id": "1274:612:025077",
    "course_id": "ME 459",
    "course_uid": "course_16dd91dc41baac6af9c4c95b",
    "term_id": "1274",
    "source_course_id": "025077",
    "source_subject_id": "612",
    "title": "Computing Concepts for Applications in Engineering",
    "credits_min": 3,
    "credits_max": 3,
    "typically_offered": "Fall"
  }
]
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Student reviews

Original comments behind the course and instructor summaries.

Read original reviews
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Madgrades

Grade history

Recorded grade distributions by term, section, and instructor.

Explore recorded grades
Dataset & model

Recorded 2026-10-14

View the dataset on Hugging Face
Model outputs & technical records
Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B
LLM outputs across runs
Download part 1
Full model traces

Recorded model configuration, reasoning, and tool conversations.

Download part 1
Model & dataset provenance 
{
  "model": "Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B",
  "model_revision": "1d4bf0f2ff6012fd82039f2fa52739d0dd7c60c0",
  "task_version": "17",
  "output_id": "ea079b830bf4854fc4022b4da017c0a93377b9ad4ee04c2fe7a56fa7616f33d8",
  "requirements_status": "needs_review",
  "dataset_revision": "fc1811fa52e581ea57a35c0cf3343f8740a8ffbf",
  "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00"
}