Assignments need to be updated, but the material is solid!

The course material is ok, but the support and assignment grading is horrible - I spend several hours just battling with grader after having the results ready. Definitely wouldn't recommend this course to anyone. I subscribed for the whole Specialization and completed Course 1 and 2. Unfortunately Course 2 finishes with Peer Graded Assignment - I submitted it with a few weeks to go before my subscription expires but there was no one to grade it so once my subscription ended I didn't get the certificate despite completing the whole second course as well and I lost access to all my submissions and the Course material even though I have already paid for it.

Pros: The content of the course is great. It introduces fundamentals of big data technologies to those who are new to this field, with some hands-on practices.

Cons: The instructions of assignments are not always clear - they are corrected in the discussion forum but why not updating in the assignment page? Usage of Python 2.7 is also somewhat out of date since it's 2019.

Biggest con: The way the lecturer talks is more than annoying. Full of stop words like 'fine', 'ok', with occasionally correcting mistakes on slides or diverging to other topics - there are only a few minutes each video and how much time did the lecturer wasted on talking nonsense? It's fine if he talks like that on some 90-min-long classes but it's on Coursera. Sometimes I just skimmed the slides rather than listen to him.

It's pretty tough in assignments especially when there are mistakes in the given description, but I do learn the basic concepts of relational algorithm and MapReduce from them.

Very wide and fundamentally robust introduction.

Very good course for understanding the underlying logic behind emerging big data technologies

Good information but lectures were poorly produced and unedited and exercise instructions were blatantly incorrect several times.

A very good introduction to skills needed for applying data science ideas on large scale data problems.

Thanks for this course.True Parallel computing example would have made it even more awesome .

The material is good. If you can get past the instructor's mumbling and rapid speaking then you'll be okay.

Quite interesting subjects, but video material is not of high quality and many mistakes are not changed in later sessions but altered via a text in the screen of a note on the next sheet.

Very good class - the assignments were pretty uninteresting, though.

Excellent course. I just sad about the absence of any assignment or even quiz in Week 4..

The course info makes no mention of Python as a prerequisite. Yet the first assignment demands Python knowledge and skills. Without which you can't pass the assignment. Yet the week's lecture is not about Python.

very poor!

The course is good. It definitely gives a broad overview of the topics. It's presented in an interesting manner and I would definitely go in-depth about these topics. Although, it would have been more helpful had there been more graded quizzes and assignments.

If you want to head into Data Science, this is a nice course that will help you.

Excelente curso, contenidos muy completos; sin embargo, deberían actualizar las instrucciones de cada Assignment con las correcciones ya descritas en los foros, para algunos es díficil encontrar estas correcciones fuera del enunciado. Por lo demás, gracias por esta oportunidad, por abrir las puertas de una universidad tan importante a otros estudiantes que jamás podrían asistir a su campus.

There are times where a user without a very fast connection will struggle to set up, the virtual machine is impossible to get for them. Between the internet and the forum the needed information is there but it makes the first assignment take 15+ hours. A little help on the assignment page on how to get going on Windows would save a lot of people some time.

Apart from this ist is quite good. The automatic grading is amazing and the videos quite nice.

The theory and relational algebra is a little heavy for me (I am very much a practitioner). That said, Prof Howe is *excellent* in is presentation. Very clear and easy to follow. Sometimes beats a dead horse (Map Reduce) and as a result, you definitely know what he's getting after!

little touch of everything， it's good intro for non-tech， but way too shallow for a student from tech background

Great intro into wider aspects

Great content. The questions are academic and sometimes hard to understand the desired outcome

Very good introduction to relational algebra and map reduce. Also helped scratch up on some python and SQL.

Comprehensive and clear explanation of theory and interlinks of the up-to-date tools, languages, tendencies. Kudos and thanks to Bill Howe.

Highly recommended.