ANSI C vs Python: Personality Split in GE2

Finally, a breath of fresh air. I just submitted both second Written Assignments (GE2) for PLH10 and PLHPRO, and I feel like I've just stepped out of a time capsule.

To be fair, the Hellenic Open University (HOU) has a unique way of keeping us on our toes (or in a state of permanent panic, depending on how you look at it). This time, however, the experience felt like a sci-fi movie... filmed in 1989, with intermittent shots from 2026.

PLH10: Back to the Future (with ANSI C)

Let's start with the "main course" of pain. It's 2026. Technology is racing, AI is writing poetry, and in PLH10 we have to write in ANSI C (C89).

Yes, you read that correctly. They ask us to write C as if we're in Back to the Future with Marty McFly. Forget declaring a variable inside a for loop. Forbidden. Everything at the top, nice and tidy, just like in '89.

Here is the difference that made our lives difficult:

/* Modern C (How it should be) */
for (int i = 0; i < 10; i++) {
    printf("%d", i);
}
 
/* ANSI C (How HOU wants it) */
int i; /* Must be declared at the top of the block, otherwise error */
 
for (i = 0; i < 10; i++) {
    printf("%d", i);
}

ANSI C vs Python: The Comparison

To understand the culture shock, look at the difference in the same operation:

The Torture of Bead Sort

As if the language wasn't enough, we had the assignments.

1. Cubes vs Squares: Prove if $1^3 + ... + N^3 = (1+...+N)^2$. Easy? Yes. But we had to write it in BOTH Pseudocode AND C, with checks for $N$ between 100 and 300.
2. Bead Sort (Gravity Sort): This is where it got real. We had to simulate beads falling on an abacus. In C. With arrays. Without dynamic memory allocation.

3. Cities Matrix: A distance matrix where we only read the upper right triangle (since distance A->B is the same as B->A). At least this worked without segfaults after "mirroring" the values to the bottom half.

Pseudocode and Bipolar Disorder

Someone needs to explain the logic of writing the exact same exercise twice. Once in C and once in Pseudocode.

The funny thing is you find yourself debugging the pseudocode. "Yes, but is this assignment arrow <- correct, or should I have used a colon?". Details that suck the life out of you, while the C compiler just laughs at you.

PLHPRO: The Salvation (Python)

Fortunately, the second PLHPRO assignment was a balm for the soul. After 48 hours of wrestling with variable declarations and structs at the start of functions, writing Python felt like taking off tight shoes after a 10km walk.

Slicing, Sets, and Libraries

Things were much more civilized here:

• Strings & Sets: We reversed strings with slicing (s[::-1]) and found books belonging to "either one category or the other but not both" with a simple ^ (Symmetric Difference). In C, I'd still be writing loops for this.
• Triangle Inspector: Area calculation using Heron's formula. import math and you're done.
• Library System: The big project. Dictionaries within dictionaries (Library dict, ratings dict).

My favorite part? Handling book returns, where we had to force the user to provide a rating between 1 and 5.

# The beauty of Pythonic input validation
while True:
    rating_str = input("Enter a rating for the book (1-5): ").strip()
    try:
        rating = int(rating_str)
        if 1 <= rating <= 5:
            break
        else:
            print("The rating must be an integer between 1 and 5.")
    except ValueError:
        print("Invalid rating.")

Conclusion

GE2 was a lesson in patience and schizophrenia.

In PLH10, I learned how to think like a 1990 computer and how to manage memory (and my nerves).

In PLHPRO, I learned how to solve problems quickly and elegantly, appreciating modern languages.

The difference in mental health is measurable in coffee cups. If I survived the combination of Bead Sort in C and Library Management in Python in the same week, nothing can stop me.

If you think ANSI C was the only problem in this module, take a look at how plh10.exe broke my VS Code in the previous assignment.

Onward to GE3. With more coffee and fewer Segmentation Faults (hopefully).