Computer Science 217
Introduction to Computer Science for Multidisciplinary Studies I

John Aycock

Winter 2012

Announcements

19 April 2012

The Assignment 5 marks are available in the usual place. While I do have your final exam marks, I'm not allowed to post them, sorry. (Please don't bother complaining to me; I think it's a silly policy myself.) I can, however, tell you that the top mark was 59/60, and so I'll be scaling up everyone's final exam mark up by 1/60. Thanks, everyone, and have a good summer!

10 April 2012

Ryan's got the information for the final PASS review sessions! They'll be in the normal room in the TFDL, 355D, and will both last an hour and a half (with 10 minutes for a survey at the end).
The first session will be from 10:30am until 12:00pm, and the second will be from 1:30pm until 3:00pm. Both are on Sunday April 15th.
Also, the gift card draw won't be happening in the review session, but attendance will give a person another entry to win. After exams are over, the winner will be contacted via email with details regarding the process to obtain the gift card!

9 April 2012

The PASS sessions this week are cancelled. Instead, Ryan will be running two review sessions on Sunday (time and location to be announced).
For Assignment 5, I overlooked one hint: to print a backslash character (which is normally an escape character in strings), you need to escape it, i.e., '\\' is a string containing the backslash character. Also note that gnuplot expects no extra space between the backslash and the end of a line.

6 April 2012

I've added slides on to the Data Representation set for Monday's lecture.

4 April 2012

I've been told that, for Assignment 5, some people have encountered an odd case where last is reporting that a user has been logged in for a negative amount of time. You can either detect this case and skip it (printing a warning to the standard error) or assume that it won't happen, at your option. The former option is the better program design choice, in case you're wondering!

3 April 2012

Here's the code from Monday's class.

30 March 2012

Success: the fifth and final assignment is available.
I'm going to cancel my office hour today in an effort to get the final assignment specification finished before class. You can still email me if you have questions, as usual.

29 March 2012

Once again, to the student whose ID number ends in 8100: your email address isn't working and I have no way to reply to you, sorry. You'll have to email me from a different address so I can reply!

27 March 2012

Here is a sample of output for the ``plays'' field with the list and count commands.

25 March 2012

Something else about Assignment 4: apart from the order of items, your output should look like the sample output given on the assignment specification.

23 March 2012

Sorry, I forgot to make available the text adventure code from two Fridays ago. It's here.

22 March 2012

While I'll be talking about applications tomorrow as usual on Fridays, there is a set of notes you might want to bring along this time.

20 March 2012

Posted on behalf of Ryan and PASS...
Attend PASS sessions and win! Beginning the week of March 19, 2012, when you attend a PASS session for Computer Science 217, you will be entered into a draw for a $20.00 gift card from the University Bookstore. The draw will take place during the last week of PASS sessions (April 9th-April 13th) and the winner will be announced during the last exam preparation PASS session.
A clarification for Assignment 4, since this question has come up a few times: the user of your program may specify any filename they like for a playlist. If your program is checking for a file named itunes-library.txt or /dev/null, this is incorrect. This would mean that you'd need a different program for each playlist you might possibly want to use, like having to have a different copy of Microsoft Word installed each time you want to edit a document with a different name! Instead, try to open the specified filename, and if there's a problem, catch the exception that's raised.

19 March 2012

The USRIs for 217 will be administered this Wednesday, March 21. Please be sure to come and write lots of comments!
The marks for midterm 2 are posted in the usual place, here. A couple people got perfect scores (or above!), so there's no scaling factor being used for this one.
As with any large multiple-choice exam, there were some mangled or missing student ID numbers. If you think you should have a nonzero mark listed, please email me.

10 March 2012

The midterm is now made up, and I'll be talking about it in class Monday, but in case you want to start studying, it is heavily weighted to the material from functions (slightly before the last midterm) until now. The exam will operate as before:
- Ideally, don't bring extra stuff like backpacks.
- No notes, books, calculators, cell phones, or assistance of any kind.
- It is multiple choice. You'll need (several?) pencils and an eraser to fill in the bubble sheets.
- You will need official photo ID, e.g., UCID card, driver's license, passport. It will be checked at the door as you come in.
- You will need to stay for the full 30-minute duration of the test.
Confidential to the student whose ID number ends in 8100: your email address isn't working and I have no way to reply to you, sorry.

9 March 2012

Assignment #4 is available.

7 March 2012

The syntax for creating a tuple with no elements was, alas, even worse than I remembered. Writing
```
		t = ( )
```
makes t a tuple with no elements. Sorry, it's not my design! I've added it into the tuple notes.
I'm teaching some guest lectures in another course this Wednesday and Friday, and I'll be cutting my office hours those days a bit short so I can make it to the classes on time. Sorry for any inconvenience!

5 March 2012

I've been getting a number of questions about Bug #11 on Assignment 3. To clarify, the idea is to calculate deltax and deltay (i.e., the change in x and y) so that they have the exact same values, just without using the turtle. In other words, the correct climb rate should still be seen for the player's missile. Some math will almost certainly be required; you are free to employ your favorite search engine, but you must cite the source of any algorithms or code you use that are not yours.

3 March 2012

Sorry if my replies to your email are delayed this weekend; university IT has decided to hobble outbound email without warning.

28 February 2012

Let's try a YouTube version of the Assignment 3 video (thanks to the student who suggested this). Please let me know if you have problems viewing this one.
YouTube update: sorry if you saw an bizarre, possibly offensive comment someone posted; I've disabled comments on the video now.
The long-awaited Assignment 1 award ceremony, along with a montage of the TA-nominated assignments, will be tomorrow. Thanks to all the students who gave permission for their work to be shown!

22 February 2012

Yay! I've finally had time to get the midterms processed and analyze the results. The raw marks are posted in the usual place, here. The top mark was 39/40, which I will interpret as the midterm being one mark too hard, and so I will be scaling everyone's midterm mark by one point. In other words, take your raw score, add one to it, and that's what you got out of 40.
As with any large multiple-choice exam, there were a number of mangled or missing student ID numbers. If you think you should have a nonzero mark listed, please email me.

18 February 2012

I added Assignment #3 design notes. Again, these are not needed to do the assignment. They are only for people curious about the design choices and tradeoffs in the program.

17 February 2012

Have a good reading break!
I'm shutting down microPython; we're long, long past its capabilities, and mostly the web site's just seeing attack probes from the Internet now!
Assignment #3 video has been added; I also added a link to it in the assignment spec.
Assignment #3 is available.

14 February 2012

Happy Valentine's Day! Based on comments some of you made while studying for the midterm, I've tried flagging the deleted bits in the notes to make them easier to spot.

13 February 2012

Continuing with the office-hour theme, Ryan has office hours for the PASS program; see below for details.
My office hour today is cancelled due to illness. Sorry for any inconvenience!

8 February 2012

Khaled (one of the TAs) is doing a midterm review tomorrow at 4pm in MS160.
I've posted the midterm review slides below.
A few reminders about the midterm this Friday in class:
- Ideally, don't bring extra stuff like backpacks.
- No notes, books, calculators, cell phones, or assistance of any kind.
- It is multiple choice. You'll need (several?) pencils and an eraser to fill in the bubble sheets.
- You will need official photo ID, e.g., UCID card, driver's license, passport. It will be checked at the door as you come in.
- You will need to stay for the full 30-minute duration of the test.

4 February 2012

Marks for the first assignment are posted. Please check your mark and let me know asap if there are any problems.

3 February 2012

The code from today's class is available.

1 February 2012

I'm covering one of the 217 tutorials today during my usual office hour, so there won't be an office hour today, sorry. You can still contact me as usual via email.

31 January 2012

If you left a pencil case behind in class Monday, please contact me to get it back.

30 January 2012

NSERC USRA info is here, if you're interested.

29 January 2012

The simulation programs from Friday's lecture. (L02: we didn't have time for the pendulum example.)

27 January 2012

L01: the bug was one we'd seen earlier. The calculation was using radians, the turtle wanted to turn an amount in degrees. Case closed. And we would've gotten away with it if it weren't for that darned chicken.

26 January 2012

Just to clarify: the plots for Assignment #2 must be done using the turtle module.

25 January 2012

Assignment #2 is available.

24 January 2012

I added a few slides to the ``Converting math to Python'' set. They're available separately below.

22 January 2012

Here's the notes and programs from last Friday's class. The seismic data is from the Geological Survey of Canada and was retrieved using the CNDC AutoDRM system. A sample file is here. Recall that the input is redirected by running the program like
```
		python3 wala-L01.py < 20010228.185400.I.WALA.BHZ
```
but again, make sure you use < or else your data file will get erased!
L01
- Notes
- Program
L02
- Notes
- Program

20 January 2012

One question that someone asked in today's class: why did that turtle.goto before the turtle.write not draw a line? That was a side effect of using turtle.tracer to speed up the drawing - it gains speed by only updating the window at intervals. If you run this program:
```
		import turtle

		turtle.tracer(500)
		turtle.goto(100, 100)
		turtle.write('foo')

		input()
```
with and without the turtle.tracer line, you'll see the effect occur.

18 January 2012

PASS program information is below. This is a peer instruction pilot program, or in other words, a free extra source of help!

13 January 2012

Assignment #1 is available.

10 January 2012

I had erroneously listed Assignment 2's due date as February 3, which would've only given a week to do it! The correct due date is February 17.

9 January 2012

A few of you mentioned you were having trouble making the Blackboard links work. If that's still the case, please send me email so I can track down the problem.

22 December 2011

Tutorials start the week of January 16, 2012.
Help me learn your name, if you want!
Some browsers cache previously-viewed copies of web pages. Please make sure that you are viewing the most recent copy of this page.
I will be placing important announcements, clarifications, and information on this web page as the term progresses. It is your responsibility to check this page frequently for updates. I won't be using Blackboard. Or Facebook. Or Twitter. Or smoke signals, semaphores, and interpretive dance. Okay, maybe a little bit of interpretive dance, but that's it.

General Course Information

Please read the course information sheet carefully.

In particular, be aware that the University regulations regarding plagiarism apply to assignment submissions. In other words, using someone else's code in your assignment without proper attribution is plagiarism regardless of where the code came from (e.g., a book, the Internet).

Objectives

According to the Calendar's description:

Introduction to problem solving, analysis and design of small-scale computational systems and implementation using a procedural programming language. For students wishing to combine studies in computer science with studies in other disciplines.

Syllabus

Unix
Data and its representation
Data types
Variables
Expressions
Boolean algebra
Conditional statements
Loops
Procedures and functions
Modularity
Program design
Testing
Debugging
Algorithms

Lectures

Lectures are in A140, MWF 1-1:50pm (L01) and 2-2:50pm (L02).

Tutorials

There are nine tutorial sections, all 50 minutes long, all in MS 160.

T01	MW 2pm	Amani Alali
T02	MW 4pm	Padma Paul
T03	TR 10am	Shermin Bazazian
T04	MW 10am	Khaled Dawoud
T05	TR 3pm	Hessam Zakerzadeh
T06	TR 2pm	Hessam Zakerzadeh
T07	TR noon	Shermin Bazazian
T08	MW 3pm	Padma Paul
T09	MW 1pm	Amani Alali

Late Policy

No late submissions will be accepted. If you get sick, have an accident or family crisis, you should still come see me like you would normally.

Note: TAs can not give extensions. Please do not ask them.

Schedule and Evaluation

Assignment 1	10%	Friday, 27 January 2012
Assignment 2	10%	Friday, 17 February 2012
Assignment 3	10%	Friday, 9 March 2012
Assignment 4	10%	Friday, 30 March 2012
Assignment 5	10%	Friday, 13 April 2012
Midterm Exam 1	10%	Friday, 10 February 2012	In-class
Midterm Exam 2	10%	Friday, 16 March 2012	In-class
Final Exam	30%	Scheduled by the Registrar

As stated on the course information sheet, the average of your midterm and final exams must be over 50% in order for you to receive a C- grade or higher in CPSC 217.

The grade conversion method from percentages to letter grades I will use is below. Rounding will be performed if necessary using the usual method. The square brackets and parentheses are used in their mathematical sense, meaning that square brackets are inclusive and parentheses are exclusive. For example, a grade of 93.75 is an A, not an A-.

Percentage Range	Letter Grade
[93.75, 100]	A
[87.5, 93.75)	A-
[81.25, 87.5)	B+
[75, 81.25)	B
[68.75, 75)	B-
[62.5, 68.75)	C+
[56.25, 62.5)	C
[50, 56.25)	C-
[43.75, 50)	D+
[37.5, 43.75)	D
[0, 37.5)	F

An A+ in the overall course will be awarded at my discretion for outstanding performance in all components of the course.

Lecture Overheads and Material

Please note: the slides may be changed up until class time as I fine-tune them!

Past Exams, Study Aids, and Extra Information

Programming exercises for the terminally keen
- Exercises and solutions
Old exams
(I taught one of three sections of CPSC 217 in W10; some of the questions on those exams are written by the other two instructors.)
Extra stuff
- Common Unix commands
- On the many different species of turtle

Assignments

PASS Program

Ryan Cox is your friendly neighborhood PASS leader. The sessions are at

Tuesday 11:00 am - 11:50 am in 355D TFDL

Wednesday 10:00 am - 10:50 am in 355D TFDL

Wednesday 12:00 pm - 12:50 pm in 403 TFDL

Ryan also has an office hour: it's just after the Tuesday session, from 12:00 pm to 1:00 pm. The location for it is in the student success center on the third floor of the TFDL. There isn't a room number but you can ask at the desk to be shown where Ryan is.

How to Contact Me

My official office hours are MWF 10-11am at the CT Desk in the first floor of the Math Science building, starting January 16. As other times: my office is in ICT 650. Feel free to drop by; I have an open-door policy. If my office door is closed - a rarity - please don't knock. I'm probably frantically trying to get something done.

The best way to reach me outside of office hours is by email: aycock@ucalgary.ca. I read my email very frequently, even on many evenings and weekends; many questions can be answered that way. If you want to arrange a face-to-face meeting outside of my office hours, send me some mail and we can set up a time.

Please include ``CPSC'' or ``217'' in your email subject line so that it stands out from the tons of spam I get sent! My mail reader highlights messages that contain CPSC or 217 in the subject line.

While I can be found on Facebook, I use it only for non-work contacts, so I won't respond to any CPSC 217 messages or friend requests on there, sorry!

John Aycock 2012-04-23

Computer Science 217 Introduction to Computer Science for Multidisciplinary Studies I

Quick Links