educative.io

Poor and ambiguous english make this course unnecessarily difficult to work through

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#1

Is anyone else bogged down by the imprecise english used on this course for explaining highly detailed concepts?

I feel like I’ve been thrown down several rabbit holes working out how something the narrator explained works, only to find out the explanation was ambiguous or confusingly worded causing me to waste time chasing ghosts.

Take for example the solution summary for reversing a linked list in place. I am very familiar with the optimal solution but the english word choice is so imprecise I can’t conceptualize what is being explained.

To recap, the solution to this problem can be divided into the following parts:

  1. Iterate in a linked list using two pointers, the first pointer points to the head, and the second pointer points to the head next.
  2. Move in a list using the second pointer and add the second pointer node before the first pointer.
  3. Each time the new node is added the first pointer will point to the new node.
  4. Repeat until the second pointer does not point NULL.

Step two and three are ambiguous and I think step four is flat out wrong, unless the meaning is miscommunicated.

How have others found this course?

Is Educative aware of how poor the technical copy is?

Course: Grokking Coding Interview Patterns in Python - Learn Interactively
Lesson: Solution: Reverse Linked List - Grokking Coding Interview Patterns in Python

1 Like
#2

I agree 100%…
Especially for poor technical copy of Educative…
Furthermore there is nobody to ask our questions…
I didn’t think Educative would be like this…

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#3

They offer to translate pre-existing books onto their platform (in return for a smaller cut to the author). I compared a book I have to the Educative version. They made a number of edits to the author’s copy, many of which were worse than the original or obscured its meaning. Even worse, they added quite a few graphical figures that were completely incorrect technically. It seemed likely to me that the editor didn’t understand the topics in the book.

#4

Hello Dan,

I am sorry that you had an unpleasant experience. We value our users and their feedback.

Please provide us with the course or lesson link to investigate this issue.

I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Best,
Aqsa Majeed
Customer Experience Lead @educative.io

#5

Hi @jake1 ,
Our team is constantly striving to enhance our content. In the near future, we will be launching an updated version of this course that features clearer explanations and improved English.

#6

the lessons take much longer to finish due to its unclear explanations