How can I clear Gate cse exam, how to study, what to stdy, and from where to study and how much to stdy?

How to go for GATE. 1: First of all check your GATE syllabus and make a rough idea about the course and how much time it takes to cover all these things first time. See although there are many subjects but you have done with all of them in your engineering 2: Practice more questions, reading theory again and again will not help you. 3: Don't leave any topic thinking that it is not important because if question comes from that topic and if you don't know anything you are not able to solve very simple questions. 4:Don't read only those subjects which you find interesting,you need to work hard in all areas 5: If you like learning from videos try NP TEL,Courser a etc. They all are good and teaches you in a different way. 6: Always start preparation by collecting books and other material which you need.Don't run for collecting everything. List of Books & Important Topics Programming , Data Structures and Algorithms This is the most important subject according to GATE point of you. Approximately 25% Questions in Gate come from above topics and all are related with each other. Problems on Stack, Queue, Link List.Properties of Heap,deletion and insertion of items in the heap. Tree problems like no of leaf nodes, non leaf nodes, total nodes, height of the tree, no of full nodes, mirror image, etc. AVL tree and balancing them on insertion and Deletion. Binary tree, Binary Search Tree, Inorder, Preorder, Post order traversal. Spanning Trees, Minimum Spanning Tree problems. Finding Complexity : Very Important Topic.You need to practice more and with every problem you solved.  Searching and Sorting Problems. Difference between Different Techniques and how to apply them on different real life problems. Questions on approach of dynamic programming, Divide and Conquer, Greedy and Brute Force. Practice basic problems like quick sort, merge sort, knapsack problem, matrix chain multiplication, Job sequencing, Compressing Mechanism. It will help you to solve other tricky problems,Basic Theory of P-NP class Books and Study Material : 1: Programming With C by Byron Gottfried ( Schaum's Series ) : Best book for C language. 2: Data Structures by Seymour Lipschutz ( Schaum's Series ) : Very Good book for beginners. Does not contains large number of questions but still very good for understanding the concept. It covers all the basics of data structures. Introduction to Algorithm by Cormen : Contains all the topics with deep theory. each chapter contains tricky problems and helps in solving gate problems. 3: Data Structure and algorithms made easy by Narasimha Karumanchi : Very Impressive book. This book is specially designed for gate. It also helps you in interview. It contains problems, there solution and equivalent C program with complexity. So you can practice this subject completely from this book. 4: NP TEL Videos Data Structures And Algorithms : very good videos. Teaches us how to solve tricky problems and there complexity. NP TEL Videos C Programming NP TEL Videos Design and Analysis of Algorithms   Operating Systems Important Points : Scheduling : Numerical Questions have more chances. Practice more in finding turn around time and waiting time of different scheduling policies. Deadlock : Bankers Algorithm, Given Sequence is safe or not. Chances of common data or linked questions. Synchronization : High Probability Of Questions in exam. Practice some question related to semaphores and classical problems of synchronization (this will help you to solve other questions) Memory Management : Questions generally comes from page table size, number of pages, logical address, physical address, page size, inverted page table, virtual memory, TLB etc. Books and study material : 1: Operating system concepts by Abraham Silberschatz and Peter Galvin 2 :Operating System (Pearson Publication ) by Harvey M. Deitel , Paul J. Dietel and David R. Choffnes : 3: Pdf available on NP TEL :Operating System Video Lectures available on NP TEL : High Performance Computing Theory Of Computation Important Points : Finite Automata: covers approximately 50% questions from TOC. So give it more time then others. Do questions related to finding minimum number of states, NFA to DFA conversion, Closure Properties of finite automata, Finding Regular Expressions,mealy moore machine etc. Context free grammar: practice more on simplification of CFG, push down automata, closure properties etc, problems on finding category of any language or grammar.Concepts related to expressive power of different languages. Basic problems related to NP-Completeness. Properties of Recursive and Recursive Enumerable Languages. Turing Machine making and expressive power of different type of Turing machine. Books and Study Material : 1:Introduction to Automata theory. Languages and Computation by Ullman 2:Introduction to Formal Languages, Automata theory and Computation by Kamala Krithivasan and Rama R : Written by IIT madras authors. Contains some gate problems and solutions. 3:Introduction to Languages and theory of computation by John C Martin : This book contains lot of problems. Try to solve them with your group. Not preferable for theory. 4:NP TEL IIT madras lecture Theory of Automata, Formal Languages and Computation : NP TEL IIT Kanpur lecture Theory of Computation NP TEL web resources Theory of Automata and Formal Languages Compiler Design Important Points : Parsing : Finding first and follow, LL(1)-LR(1)-SLR,LALR,CLR. Precedence and Associativity of operators. Finding value from expression tree. Ambiguous grammar. Books and Study Material : 1:Principles of Compiler Design by Aho Ullman 2:Lecture slides from Standford : Compiler 3: Courser a course for compilers : Compiler     NP TEL Video Lecture Compiler Design     NP TEL web resources Compiler Design Database Management System Important Points : 1: Normalization: This is very easy once you understand and can solve questions quickly. Questions are like Finding normal form ( comes 70% times in gate paper ), finding candidate keys, decomposition of relation, loss less join and dependency preservation have more probability to come. 2: SQL Queries also asked in the paper. Practice select clause properly with properties of having,group by, any ,all, exits. Question may come with relational algebra in common data section.Practice joins because there is more probability of tricky questions from them.     Books and Study Material :     1:Database system concepts by Silberschatz , Korth , Sudarshan :(solutions available on net) 2: Database Management systems by Raghu RamaKrishnan : 3: Fundamentals Of Database system by Elmasri Navathe 4: NP TEL lectures Database Design 5: Courser a Lectures :Databases Digital Logic Important Points : K-Map,Multiplexer, De-multiplexer, Encoder, Decoder questions,concept of flip flop. Practice questions related to Floating Point representation, integer representation,range and precision.  Books and Study Material : 1:Digital Fundamentals by Thomas L. Floyd : Best book for Digital Logic. Its a complete package for gate. Contains very good level of theory and lots of multiple choice questions for practice. 2: Digital Circuit and Design by Salivahanan and Arivazhagan : Good for start. Language is very easy. 3: NP TEL Lectures from IIT Madras.:Digital Circuits and Systems : Very interesting course. Teacher is too good. Recommended by me. Computer Organization and Architecture 1:Addressing Modes : Theory and questions 2: Numerical related to program counter after some instruction, no of one address-two address instructions, Values after shift and rotate instructions, horizontal and vertical programming related questions. 3: Numerical Problems on Speed up of pipeline, time taken to complete instruction in pipeline and non-pipeline architectures, Hazards in pipeline, hazards removal, branch penalty etc. 4: Numerical Problems on cache memory organization, mapping technique, multilevel caches, write through and write back technique     Books and Study Material : 1: Computer System Architecture by M. Morris Mano : (very good book for theory. Solutions available on net so you can practice all questions easily.) 2: Structured Computer Organization by Andrew S. Tanenbaum 3: Computer Organization and architecture by William Stallings 4: NP TEL Web Resources pdf Computer Organization     NP TEL Web Resources Computer Organization     Computer Networks Important Points : 1: Addressing related questions :Subnet address, supernet address, brodcast address, range of network, no of host, classless addressing, non continuous addresses, first host and last host finding etc. 2: Properties Of Circuit Switching and packet switching, Routing Protocols and Numerical Problems on them.Flow Control and Error Control Policies,Numerical Problems on Window Size, No Of Sequence bits, frame size, bandwidth, round trip time, utilization, Hamming Distance, CRC. Congestion Control policies like slow start, congestion avoidence and Congestion Detection. IP Header,TCP and UDP header format, theory related to Ethernet and token ring. 3: Basics Of Different Type of protocols like : FTP, HTTP, DHCP, ARP, RARP, SMTP, ICMP,POP 4:Basic Concepts of Cryptography and firewalls. Books and Study Material : 1: Computer Network by Andrew S. Tanenbaum : Best book. Very good for theory. Language is easy and solutions available on net. 2: Introduction to Data Communication and Networking by Forouzan 3: Data and Computer Communication by William Stallings 4:NP TEL notes Computer Networks IITM    NP TEL notes Computer Networks IIT KGP    NP TEL Lectures Computer Networks Video Series Information System and Software Engineering 1: Numerical Problem may come from COCOMO model, cyclomatic complexity etc. 2:  Study Different Models and there properties along with difference between them. Data flow Diagrams are also important. Books and Study Material : 1: Software Engineering by Pressman 2: Software Engineering by Sommerville. 3 :NP TEL Videos Software Engineering also good. Web Technologies Practice HTML and XML on computer. Understand Basics. Books and Study Material : HTML Complete Reference Sources Available on http://www.w3schools.com/ Engineering Mathematics Engineering Mathematics is very important in GATE.  Important Points 1: Bayes theorem, Normal and poisson distribution, mean and variance of different distributions. 2: Different types of graph and there properties, graph coloring, isomorphism between graphs, Planner Graphs, Euler and Hamiltonian Graphs and some tricky problems which need practice to solve them 3: Eigen values and eigen vectors question. Simple questions related to matrix. Finding Values of variable with some properties of linear equations like infinite no of solutions or unique solution. 4:Newton Rapson Method and its application. Numerical Integration by different methods. 5:Finding Maxima and Minima. Properties of limit, Continuity and differentiability. Finding values by Mean Value Theorem. Integration.     6:Properties of relation, function. Partial and Total Ordering. Haze Diagrams, Group Theory. Sets Related Questions.     7:Tricky Problems on  Permutations and Combinations. Pigeonhole principle.Simple problems on logic. Books and Study Material : 1: Discrete Mathematics by K Rosen : 2: Probability by T.Veerarajan : good book. Contains large no of questions in probability     3:Introduction to Graph Theory By N Deo     4:Higher Engineering Mathematics by B S Grewal : For Linear Algebra     5:Numerical Methods by S.S. Sastry     6:Discrete Mathematics by Tremblay and Manohar 7:Discrete Maths : NP TEL lectures     8:Probability : Good Videos from IIT KGP General Aptitude Important Points : 1: Problems on Antonym, Synonym, Summary from paragraph, same or different pairs, Ordering of words, sentences etc. 2: Problems on time and work, distance, data interpretation  number system, percentages, clocks, coding and decoding, Venn Diagram, cubes, blood relation, Directions, Number odd man out, Boats and pipes etc. Books and Study Material : 1: Quantitative and verbal reasoning –By R.S. Agarwal 2: Quantitative Aptitude Test : By T. S. Jain-Upkar publication

I secured AIR-7. The best way is to start solving exercises at the end of chapter. I watched video lectures for 1-2 hours, read for 2 hours and solved for 2-3 hours https://www.facebook.com/groups/core.cs/ is a community for GATE preparation and many GATE toppers share their experiences. Here is a sample post on Preparation https://kippt.com/coreuniv has the resources 1>>Good technical knowledge 2>>Good understanding of Basic Concepts 3>>Ability to apply the knowledge and concepts on variety of  problems To Develop 1 and 2 you will need to read and understand  reference books, to develop 3 you will need to solve the problems. Now question  is from where to get the problems or the MCQs, the answer is  the problems are given at the back of every chapter in the reference  books, you will need to solve those problems,may be not all of them.  Problems reveal lot of truth and clear our misconception and  false convictions. And GATE has certain property that lot of Questions in  it are based on concepts that are revealed in certain problems in  reference books. So its really really important to have a shot at the  problems. DISCRETE MATHEMATICS I started my preparation with discrete maths, and I would recommend  you also to start with this perticular subject because this is the  subject from where Computer Science spreads out. Understanding of this  subject is very important. I used following books: 1>>"Discrete maths and its applications" By Kenneth Rosen This is an excellent book for GATE preps. Lot of problems are given  at the end of every chapter plus answers are also given to odd numbered  exercises. The explaination in this book is really very good and "easy  to understand". This book is must read for GATE preps. 2>>book by Tremblay and Manohar I recommend you to read this book after you have read Rosen’s book.  The contents in this book is hard to comprehend. You need to have your  basics cleared before you attempt this book. This book is also a "must   read". I also have the lecture notes on discrete maths from some prof at  McGuire university the advanced counting and recurrence relation part  is good. ALGORITHMS I recommend to you to read this subject along with Discrete maths or  after you have completed discrete maths. I used only one book for this subject and found that to be more than enough for GATE. 1>>"Introduction to Algorithms" By T.H.Cormen et al. This is "THE" book for Algorithms. The Book is simply brilliant, it  makes you understand every details of Algorithms. So this book is a must  read. Although I did not read the entire thing. Here is the list of  chapters that I had read. If you are interested of course you can read  the entire book. Chapter 1,2,3,4[excluding 4.4],6,7[excluding 7.3],8,10,11[excluding  11.5],12[excluding 12.4],18,22,23,24[excluding 24.4 and 24.5] for  NP-Completeness you can read 34 also. In addition to this book I  strongly recommend you to see the video lectures from MIT. The lectures  are given by Lieserson[who BTW is also one of the authors of CLRS] and Erik demaine. The lectures are absolutely brilliant. You may download them from http://ocw.mit.edu/  DATASTRUCTURES I did not read this subject exclusively. I mostly participated in  discussions in Algorithms and datastructures communities on orkut . That  is i think more than enough. • THEORETICAL COMPUTER SCIENCE I initially tried to decipher Ullman’s book but I found the content  too much for my brain to comprehend. So I switched to "Introduction  toComputer Theory" By Daniel Cohen. The contents in this book are lucid. Also solving or atleast attempting the problems in the exercises is a must. But its really great if you could read Ullman. • DATABASE MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS I used Korth and Navathe for this. Initially I read korth because it  is lucid and then only for normalization i read Navathe. The database  design part in korth is difficult so read this part with utmost  concentration and you may require several readings before you begin to  understand things. OPERATING SYSTEMS Read this from following books: 1>>Operating System Concepts By Galvin et al. 2>>Stallings Attempt problems in Stallings they are very important especially  problems on memory management and virtual memory. In Galvin the theory  on memory management is excellent. • Digital Design Read "Digital Design" By morris mano [period].• COMPUTER ARCHITECTURE Read this from following books 1>>"Computer Architecture" By Morris mano 2>>"Computer Organization" By Zacky,hamacher 3>>"Computer Organization Hardware/Software Interface" By Hennessey and Patterson Read book 1 almost completely then read memory system from book 2 then you can read book 3, I had read only the performance measurement chapter from book 3 as it is not given in any other book and also solve numericals fromexercises they are very very important. I recommend you to read this subject after "Digital Design". • COMPUTER NETWORKS I had read this subject only from forouzan and had read some chapters  from Comer’s book. Attempt the exercises from forouzan they are important. • C programming You read this from "the C programming language" by kernighan and  Ritchie that is more than enough plus spend some time in actually programming in C that is the best way you can learn C. • C++ I dont know C++ much and I did not read anything for C++. Dont be spoiled, you can read C++ complete reference if you wish to. Compiler Design  "People" say Ullman’s book is  excellent so you can read it from Ullman if you believe "People". In the  final phase of your preps "try" to solve GATE papers. The answers for  the GATE papers are not present anywhere but still you should attempt  them anyway. This will give youconfidence that you can actually solve  GATE. You can read all the subjects given here you can skip one or two  if you dont have much time But more important thing is to  "MASTER"atleast 2 or 3 subjects. Also actively participate in  discussions at GATE CS or GATE CS/IT 2009 and Algorithms and  Datastructures community in http://orkut.com/ that helps alot in patching few  loopholes in our concepts and enhancing your problem solving skills. Thats it guys,this much is I think enough to crack GATE. You can ofcourse Device your own methodsand set of books. Just be confident you can do it!  These are few URLs Which I think "might" be helpful 1>>Opencourseware at MIT>>>>OCW

GATE is all about building concepts and going through syllabus and revising important subjects. Recently, I came across nice web-app which could be of great help for exams like GATE.  Visit  http://doubtpoint.com/ Here you can post doubts about your streams with rich editor. Ask Experts. Learn interactively. Form a study group with your friends and discuss doubts about GATE Q&A. Use doubtpoint like you are using Quora. Hope that helps. My 0.02. Cheers !

first of all get the syllabus of GATE and then according to every subject collect the enough information about every subject and every topic completely don't miss any topic. more focus on basics of every topic and prepare for it.. procedure 1- collect the contents 2- revision 3- previous year questions practise time for study is 3 to 4 hours daily. If u do group study then its much better for u.

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