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Does the choice of the thesis for a bachelor paper in computer science have an effect on the author's career?

With that in mind, how should I approach choosing my thesis?

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Please choose something that simply isn't another CRUD application! – Darren Young Nov 27 '11 at 11:43
so this is an absolutely inappropriate question for any stackexchange site? – Sergey Nov 27 '11 at 14:57
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I think it is a perfectly valid question for this site. – Kenneth Nov 27 '11 at 17:16
@Darren: +1 for suggesting to not do yet another CRUD – mort Nov 27 '11 at 17:23
I made a small edit to make the question more general rather than a poll for individual experiences. – Anna Lear♦ Nov 27 '11 at 19:35
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closed as off topic by Oded♦, Thomas Owens♦, Yannis Rizos♦, Robert Harvey, StuperUser Nov 28 '11 at 12:07

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4 Answers

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I picked something according to the following criteria:

  • Looked interesting
  • Realistic difficulty level
  • I knew a first year PhD student who I thought would be willing to supervise, having done a project in the same field

I then submitted a proposal to my director of studies and got his approval.

It has played absolutely zero rôle in my career. Even in interviews for my first job, no-one cared what I'd done for my dissertation.

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You are lucky, I didn't even have to write a thesis for either of my bachelor degrees. – Ramhound Nov 28 '11 at 17:32
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I am working on my Bachelor's thesis at the moment, so I can't tell you about it's impact. My criteria for choosing one was to find an interesting topic in a field that I'll maybe specialize in during my Master's. Doing the thesis in this field gives me the change to find out if my expectations are reasonable and - if so - to get known to people teaching and researching in this field.

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As others have said, choose something that interests you. Moreover, keep in mind that your field is Computer Science, so don't restrict yourself to creating a boring piece of software and writing some notes on it. There are many topics that aren't involved with code writing at all (Unless thats a requirement of your university). I did my Master's Thesis on computational biology (systems biology, mathematical models of DNA interactions, model analysis, etc. etc.) yet still work as a software developer.

For the vast majority of employers, they don't really care what (or how well) you did at university, as long as you finished. And you will finish faster if you enjoy your topic. And the fact is that you won't really learn career specific stuff until you actually start working, as university stuff is (mostly) just preparation.

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As I found out that, for some reason they do care how long you take to graduate, thank goodness I was never offered a position at that company. They wrote web crawlers, and when I say write, I mean use a program that generate them. – Ramhound Nov 28 '11 at 17:34
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I am currently working on mine, and chose something that I would find interesting, and something that was contemporary. I also think it's important to be able to talk passionately about it to potential graduate employers. Most may not ask about it, but some definitely will.

FWIW, i'm using the MS Kinect to create an application.

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