Courses of the first semester for Automation and Robotics

Below is the list of courses of the 1st semester A&R. These description is just a personal meaning, it is not official by the University of Dortmund or any official representative. Please use this only as a hint and try to build your own opinion.

The most important tip for you is to directly repeat content of lecture after it was given. Do not shift it to the next day. No matter how late it is and how tired you are. After you arrived at home repeat the lectures from the day.

Mathematics:

The mathematics lectures were delivered by Mr. Peter Furlan. He really gives you the required basic knowledge of Mathematics. He is used to give assignments in the class, even though it is not mandatory to complete those assignments, they don’t have any weight in final exam, but it will be very helpful for your final preparation if you submit these assignments as he checks those regularly and mark your mistakes. The other cool thing about Mathematics is that you are allowed to take 16 pages A5 size handwritten booklet in the final exam. Start preparing this booklet right from your first lecture, you can start with a rough one and then at the end you can neat that. But be careful, you will have just 120 minutes in the exam so prepare it in a way that it can help you in the exam, for example, if you write too small and everything is mixed up it’s not going to help you.

Computer Systems:

Mr Schwiegelsohn delivered in the WS 06/07 the Computer Systems lectures. No doubt he is among the best professors of the university. He encourages discussions in lectures, try to participate in that, it really will increase your interest in the subject a lot. From last year he had changed the pattern of the exam, before it was open book but now it is closed book exam. So the format of the exam is also a bit different now. Earlier there were more technical questions and very few things which you have to copy paste from the script. But now you really need to memorize the script. Last year exam, which you can find from the web, can give you a nice idea about the exam. In Computer Systems you are allowed to take 1 A4 size paper with you. You may write as small as you wish, print outs are also allowed.

Fundamentals of Robotics:

Mr. Hoffmeier conducted the Fundamentals of Robotics lectures. You have to memorize the whole script in Fundamentals of Robotics, no other tip. If you are good in Denavet Hartenberg conventions, it can help you because you will get a problem from this topic with very high weight, in our time it weighted approximately 25 percent of the whole marks.

Logic Control:

Logic Control is taught by Mr. Sonntag. This is a subject where you can get good marks, and improve your overall grade. Here you should not infer that you will good results even if you don't study, this only means that if you put equal effort in every subject then this could be the subject which gives you higher output. You also have an advantage here that you have to submit a home assignment , which makes 25% of the final marks. The instructions are not to work in groups, otherwise your marks will be divided between you and your partner. They definitely will know if you worked in groups because the questions always have many possible solutions, so the advice is to do as it is said. In tutorials you will be given knowledge of some software’s, sometimes it’s a bit boring, but try to learn those, it will be helpful for the whole subject understanding.

The Welcome Presentation from the Kick-Off Meeting 8. October

Here is the presentation that Kiran held for the Kick-Off Meeting at monday 8.10. It contains a lot useful information for new students of A&R.

View Presentation

PC Pools

As you are already aware, almost for all of your lectures, you will need a personal computer. And not only for scientific issues, but also for all of the information about your lectures, communications with your friends and professors will be processed in internet. Whether you have a PC and your own internet connection, Faculty of Elektro- und Informationstechnik(ET/IT) provides you this service by its PC Pools. Faculty server of ET/IT is called RETINA.

In order to use Retina pools, all you have to do is to fill out a registiration form, which will also be provided by us at the day of kick-off, and submit them. In the map below, you can see the oversight wiev of our campus and the locations of Retina pools.

After your registiration, you will be ablo to use scanners and printers in PC Pools. And each semester Retina enables your account to have 50 pages of print-out for free. If you need more than 50 pages, you can buy print-quote from the Student Union of Faculty (Fachschaft Elektrotechnik, FSET).

Our faculty is also a member of the programme "Microsoft Developer Network Academic Alliance" (MSDNAA). So all the students, including A&R Students, can have many Microsoft softwares for free during their studies.

A brief list of available softwares

• All Desktop Operating Systems

• SQL Server, Exchange Server, ....

• Windows Server

• MSDN Library CDs

• Knowledge Base technical support library

• Visual Studio, inclusive Academic tools

• ...

Both for additional print-quote and MSDNAA opportunities of Retina, you have to visit FSET.

Opening hours:
Tuesday: 14:00-14:30
Thursday: 16:00-17:00

and for more information. (German)

Campus Life

During your studies, your life will not be full of only your classes, there also will be campus life after them. University of Dortmund offers an active campus social life, special events, performances, sports activities, clubs and student organizations. Our campus is equipped with many sport facilities, which are run by AHS (Allgemeiner Hochschulsport der Universität Dortmund).

Whether you're a serious athlete or just trying to stay in shape, want to learn a new sport or practice your skills, AHS has a wide range of Sports program you can enjoy. Sports program provides all students, staff and faculty the opportunity to participate in fun sports and activities. These include a variety of team and individual sports and special events such as basketball, indoor & outdoor soccer, swimming, volleyball, table tennis and dancing. No experience is needed to participate.

For more information:
AHS
Emil-Figge-Str. 50, room 3.442 (Campus Nord)
44221 Dortmund

Opening hours:
During lecture periods
Monday and Thursday: 12 am - 2 pm
Wednesday: 10 am - 3 pm

During vacation periods
Wednesday: 11 am - 3 pm

Telephone: (0231) 755-3796

Mobile Phone (Handy)

There are four GSM companies operating in Germany, which are T-Mobile (D1), Vodafone(D2), O2 and EPLUS. And there are also many other service providers which buy service from these operators and sell them to customers with their own special offers.

You may already have a cell phone with your home country's GSM operator, but because of roaming prices, it will be a expensive choice to use them in Germany. So we assume that, you all want to have a German “handy”.

When you want to buy a service from one of these providers, first thing you have to decide is the type of your contract. You have two possibilities: you may choose to make a contract for two years, which also include cell phone for free or for very cheap prices, or you may have a prepaid contract.

• Mobile Phone with a Contract (Handy mit Vertrag)

These contracts are usually valid for two years. There are lots of opportunities but they are basically formed of starting price (Anschlusspreis), a monthly price (monatlich Preis)which usually includes free minutes, and after spending your free minutes additional minutes are charged depending on your contract tariff.

• Prepaid Contract

As you are probably familiar with the similar services in your own countries. In this type of contracts you pay nothing more than you speak. But there are also many tariff options for prepaid ones too. You can use your own cell phone with a prepaid contract in Germany

All these companies have special tariffs for students, which allow you have free minutes and a cell phone very cheaply. They often make special offers for a limited time. All you have to do is take all these criterias into consideration and decide the most suitable one for your own needs.

Transportation

The tuition fee that you pay in order to enroll at the University in the beginning of each semester, includes a ticket for public transportation in region VRR too (VRR is an abbreviation which stands for Verkehrsverbund Rhein-Ruhr). By this student-ID-ticket you are allowed to travel with almost every integrated public transport vehicle in between Rhein and Ruhr rivers, which include Bus, U-Bahn, H-Bahn, S-Bahn, Regional Bahn(RB), Regional Express(RE) transportation lines.

You can also travel to neighbor cities such as Bochum, Essen, Duisburg, Mönchengladbach and Düsseldorf as well as in Dortmund, of course.

There are also many websites in internet which help you to plan your route to your desired destination.

VRR

DB

Websites offer their services in English too. You just need to fill in your origin and destination addresses to corresponding fields. In a few seconds more than one travel options will appear on your screen. You may choose one of them considering travel time and vehicles.

Bank Account

Having a bank account is very practical and necessary in order to arrange your financial incomes and expenditures, and with a cash/ATM card you can withdraw money from cash machines and free yourself from the bank opening hours . If you already have one, which is also available in Germany (e.g. Citibank or Deutsche Bank) then you may keep working with these accounts.

You can pay the rent, health insurance monthly wages and those regular but varying costs, like the telephone bill by direct debit or a standing order debit. They can be taken care of with a direct debit instruction.

Two German banks (Sparkasse Dortmund and Dortmunder Volksbank) run their offices at the campus; however before you open a checking account, you should compare the fees charged by various institutions run out of the campus.

Health Insurance

Students in Germany, no matter where they're from, are all insured with public health insurance companies. First find out whether your insurance at home will also cover doctor's and hospital fees during your stay in Germany. If not, or if insurance coverage is not sufficient, you will have to take out an additional insurance.

If you’re privately insured, you cover your medical expenses yourself. Then your insurance company will reimburse you. But the hospitals aren’t cheap. Under German law, there is an additional charge, aside from treatment, of € 10 per day for In-patients. However, this is limited to 28 days a year. If the decision is up to you whether or not to go into the hospital, you should first talk with your insurance company. Due to the expense and other formalities, it might be easier to visit a hospital in your home country.

In case of emergencies, dialing 110 or 112 on your phone will put you in touch with an emergency physician. You can dial these numbers free of charge from any telephone booth.

You need a health insurance to enrol at the University. You'll find the following offices located directly at the campus, however there are also several more available in the web and throughout Germany.

Techniker Krankenkasse

The TK bureau at the campus agreed to offer a special service especially for Automation and Robotics. The local office will provide special consultations and brochures in English.

TK Dortmund-Campus

Vogelpothsweg 85

44227 Dortmund

For more information, feel free to contact

AOK

The local bureau of AOK at the campus:

AOK Studenten-Service Dortmund
Vogelpothsweg 78 44227 Dortmund
(Very close to the University Train Station)

They also have a webportal especially for students in this area of the Germany, where you can find information about their services in English and in seven other languages.

Authorities/Registiration

After finding yourself a residence, your first stop should be the Resident Registration Bureau, which is a local authority for the registration of residents in a municipal district. This is where all people have to register (Anmeldung) within one week of moving into a new apartment or home in Germany and remove their registration (Abmeldung) before living the district.

You'll need a copy of the rental agreement or other documented proof of where you're living.

Your next stop The Foreigners' Affairs Office (Ausländerbehörde), which is a govermental authority responsible for issuing residence permits. Students form non-EU countries must apply for a residence permit before the visa (usually granted for three months) expires.

Following documents are needed for Approval:

- Valid visa (for non-EU students)
- Completed application form (available at the univisersity's Office for International Affairs)
- Valid passport
- Proof of health insurance
- Copy of rental agreement
- Three (3) passport-size photos

Accommodation

In order to register yourself to authorities like Resident Registeration Bureau and Office for foreigners' Affairs, you need an official address of correspondence. So first and also one of the most important thing you have to do is to find yourself a residence.

Depending on your personal precedences, demands and needs. There are lots of different opportunities for accommodation. But taking costs and comfort into consideration, dormitories of the University look like the best choice. Although you have to register for that and wait in a queue because of the admission procedure.

University residences are administrated by Studentenwerk Dortmund.

For finding your own place to stay, there are also many other private dormitories, residences, communities and companies.

• Private Dormitories in Dortmund

  Student Dormitory Roncalli-Haus
  Von-der-Recke-Str. 40 44137 Dortmund
  Tel: 0231 / 128013

Student Dormitory Poppelsdorfer Straße 162
Poppelsdorferstr. 162 44137 Dortmund
0231 / 12 60 24 0231 / 18 48 288

Thomas-Morus-Kolleg
Amalienstraße 21a 44137 Dortmund
0231 / 16 06 11

Private Student Dormitory Barop
Herr Schlitze
0231 / 71 98 86

Private Student Dormitory Eichlinghofen
Herr Bucks
0172 / 29 138 58
info@bucks-immobilien.de

• Residences run by Religious Institutions

  ESG http://www.esg-dortmund.de/

  KHG http://www.khg.uni-dortmund.de/

• Flats run by Companies

  Dogewo http://www.dogewo.de/

• Communities (WGs)

  For those who arrive in Germany alone, flat sharing in so-called “Wohngemeinschaften”, is a good way to get to meet people.

  Some links for these communities:

  • http://www.studenten-wg.de/

  • http://www.wg-welt.de/

  • http://www.wg-gesucht.de/

Offers of accommodation are available also on notice boards at the University and in local newspapers.

AStA of University Dortmund offers help for Apartment searching too.

Tuesdays: 16:00 - 18.00 p.m.
Asta, Emil-Figge-Straße 50 (ground floor)

Anne-Christin Lutter
Telefon: 0231 / 755 - 6247
wohnraumvermittlung@gmx.de

And of course feel free to contact to us and your other seniors at the department.

Germany needs foreign specialists

Germany needs foreign workers, the country does not have enough engineers, so it seems wise to hire workers from other countries. Many students like in Automation and Robotics are eager to work in Germany after they finished their Master. To do that very good knowledge of the German language is mandatory, but there is a second obstacle that makes it very difficult to work in Germany for a local company. The immigration law (German) from 2004 makes it difficult for foreigners to work here, because the "Agentur für Arbeit" claims that a employee is only important if he/she earns more than 84,000€. No German company will pay that to a beginner, even with a PhD.
Some people told that it still is possible, but I do not know more about this. Does anybody of you have different or same experiences or know some foreigners who are allowed to work in Germany? Please comment or mail us.

Source: Tagesschau (German)

Welcome post for new students

As you might have received your admission by e-mail up to now, we like to welcome you to the Students Body of Electrical- and Computer Engineering.
We know you have a lot of questions concerning the course and the living in Germany. Thus we like to provide you with some of the most interesting and important issues concerning your oncoming studies. Feel free to have a look at the different folders of our forum and suggested websites for more information. As the next Winter Term gets closer, you should consider the issues also listed under the topic Newbie-Guides.
Source: Gerd Sebastiani

Starting step-by-step

Once you've arrived to Dortmund you have to manage through several steps which are compulsory for your stay. This check list just tries to be a help to guide you in this process. The list is intended to be followed step by step, but maybe you want to skip some steps if you have already made them. Anyway, here is the list:

• Get a flat.- Not the easiest step to begin with, but you need a place to live in eventually.
• Register your address in the Municipality.- You need to do this in order to open a bank account or get a health insurance.
• Get a bank account.- In the campus there are two banks: Volksbank (near the Mensa) and Sparkasse (near Sonnendeck).
• Extend your visa.- This is the nastiest step (the people in the Municipality is not so nice), but also the most important. You can't enroll to the courses and can't stay in Germany without it.
• Get a health insurance.- In Germany every person has a health insurance and foreign students are not the exception. You can't enroll to the courses without it.
• Enroll to the Master courses.- Finally, you have to go to Mr. Burda and enroll yourself to the Master program.
  

Get an Health Insurance

As you need a Health Insurance in order to enroll, you have to fix up something here. You'll find AOK offices located directly at the campus (near the S-Bahn stop), however there are also several more available in the web and throughout germany.

Hint: The local AOK office will provide special english spoken consultations. The AOK-Staff will ask you whether you are interested in joining them. You may still claim, that you don't want to sign now, thus considering other offers as well and comparing prices and services of the individual insurances.

More Assurance providers under the following links:
AOK
BKK
IKK
BEK
TK

Get Your Visa

Hence approx. 90% of the students are not yet residents of Germany, you need a visa to stay here. As we as Student Representatives have no influence on this matter, I kindly ask you to inquire about that at the Office of Foreign Affairs of the University of Dortmund (AAA). You find more information at their web page at: www.uni-dortmund.de/AAA

Hint: However, I must ask you to have a keen eye on the final date for enrolment here. If it is obvious to you, that you won't get your visa in time, then I strongly suggest waiting until next year! If you arrive too late for enrolment you cannot get enrolled at the Summer Term, as the Certificate of Admission are only valid for the corresponding Winter Term. As life is quite expensive in Germany (not considering your travel expenses), you should better use that time to stay at your home college and attend some German Classes.

Find a flat

As you need an official address of correspondence, you should consider finding a residence at first.

Hint: The best compromise between cost and comfort is provided by the hostels of Studentenwerk. Although you have to register for that and wait in a queue. Contact them to receive more information, they normally can understand English. Thus you normally won't get an apartment from Studentenwerk directly after your arrival at Dortmund! Hence we Student Representatives also cannot fix any contracts for you, we kindly refer for more information to the AAA.
For looking up some places on your own, feel free to contact your seniors at the forum or simply try these links:

For looking up some places on your own, feel free to contact your seniors at the forum or simply try these links, which are unfortunately all in German (use Google to translate it, if you like to):Communities (WG's)

• Studenten-WG


• WG-Welt


• WG gesucht!
  

Rooms

• Room Search Engine
  

Student Hostels

• Studentendorf


• Neue Emil-Figge Strasse
  


• Ostenberg


• Meintnerweg


• Baroperstrasse
  

These hostels are administrated by Studentenwerk.

Hostels run by Religious Institutions

• Protestant (ESG)


• Roman-Catholic (KHG)
  

Flats run by a Company

• Company List
  


• Dortmunder Gemeinnuetzige Wohnungsbaugesellschaft DoGeWo
  

Further Links

• Hostel Preview by UDO - contains further cheaper accomodations!


• Flat Company Preview by UDO
  


• Flat Forum of the University of Applied Sciences (FH)


• AStA Info Page


• Studentenwohnungsmarkt


• Studentenwohnung


• Adlantic

Television, Radio and PC fees in Germany - GEZ

This post is important for every student, because everybody will sooner or later receive a letter of a organisation named GEZ. In this letter, obviously written in German, they ask you, if you have television, radio or computer devices. In Germany you have to pay a monthly fee for having this devices. The fee for Computers is around 5€ per month.

If you do not reply to one of the 3 letters, one day a member of the GEZ will visit you at your home. He will ask you to let him in and pretend that you have to. That is wrong. Do not let this fellow into your home. Say that you do not have television or radio and that he has to leave your home now. He is not allowed to enter your appartment and he will not come back with police to assist him.

Another important fact is that the fees, will also be fined backwards. So if you register and explain, that you live in Germany for 6 months now, with you Labtop, you have to pay for this 6 month also. This can be up to 2 years! And thats a lot of money. So take care what you say and write in this contence.

Having devices that can receive Television, Radio or Internet is not for free in Germany. If you have questions about this please ask us. At arcouncil@gmail.com

Library Card

In order to be able to borrow books from the University's Library, you will have to register. You need your passport and a prove of your current address (the letter that was given to you in the municipality).
You have to go directly to the library with those documents. You can also register yourself online here.

Semester Ticket

The semester ticket is a combination of Student identification and an official photo document identification, which costs 83,86 € and is valid in the Verkehrsverbund Rhein-Ruhr (VRR). The semester ticket is not freely available. The amount for the semester ticket is payed automatically by each student within the semester fee. Thus, it is acquired by all students.

Starting from 19:00, the weekends (Saturdays and Sundays) and legal holidays (thus not your birthday) you can take a person with you with your semester ticket. Dogs may be carried free of charge. A bicycle may be carried starting at 9:00 in all buses and trains in VRR, as far there is place.

Here is marked the area in which the semester ticket is valid. There you can use all the buses and trains. With the Interregio you must pay 1.65 € additionally (here for more info). The use of IC, EC and ICE trains, as well as changing to the first class is not possible with the semester ticket.

In some cities at the edge of the VRR the semester ticket applies only in certain bus and lines. So for example in Lünen, Unna, Schwerte and Kamen you can use all trains, but only certain buses. The problem here is an often unsatisfactory co-operation of the cities and districts, which make meaningful tariff regulations more difficult.
Exact information in VRR website.


Did you lose your semester ticket??
Shame on you!! You have to do request immediately a new document of identification (costs 3.40 €) in the Zentrum für Studienangelegenheiten. However this takes about two weeks. You get anyway a provisional ticket, which is a simple script that you will have to use together with your certificate of immatriculation and a personal identification to travel in the VRR transport.