Bryn Mawr College
CS 246: Programming Paradigms
Spring 2013 - Section 001

Syllabus and Schedule

General Information

Course Description: Programming in UNIX and C++. Provides an in-depth introduction to C and C++, as well as programming principles such as abstraction, encapsulation and modularization. Another focus of the class is to gain proficiency in the UNIX operating system. Assumes familiarity with conditionals, loops, functions and arrays and will focus on C++-specific topics such as pointer manipulations, dynamic memory allocation and abstract data types. An excellent preparation for classes such as operating systems and software engineering principles and programming techniques to facilitate medium-scaled development projects.

Prerequisite: CS206 and CS231.

Text & Software

Course Policies

Communication

Attendance and active participation are expected in every class. Participation includes asking questions, contributing answers, proposing ideas, and providing constructive comments.

As you will discover, I am a proponent of two-way communication and I welcome feedback during the semester about the course. I am available to answer student questions, listen to concerns, and talk about any course-related topic (or otherwise!). Come to office hours! This helps me get to know you. You are welcome to stop by and chat. There are many more exciting topics to talk about that we won't have time to cover in-class.

Whenever you e-mail me, be sure to use a meaningful subject line and include the phrase "CS246" at the beginning of that line. Your e-mail will catch my attention and I will respond quicker if you do this. I make an effort to respond to e-mails within 24 hours on weekdays and 48 hours on weekends.

Although computer science work can be intense and solitary, please stay in touch with me, particularly if you feel stuck on a topic or project and can't figure out how to proceed. Often a quick e-mail, phone call or face-to-face conference can reveal solutions to problems and generate renewed creative and scholarly energy. It is essential that you begin assignments and projects early, since we will be covering a variety of challenging topics in this course.

Grading

Your grade will be based upon seven programming assignments, and several written assignments.  Assignments must be submitted according to the Assignment Submission instructions.  You should pay careful attention to the Code Formatting Standards and Grading Policy when doing your assignments.  The grading structure for individual assignments is broken down in the Grading Policy.

At the end of the semester, final grades will be calculated as a weighted average of all grades according to the following weights:

Incomplete grades will be given only for verifiable medical illness or other such dire circumstances.

All graded work will receive a percentage grade between 0% and 100%.  Here is how the percentage grades will map to final letter grades:

Submission and Late Policy

Study Groups

I want to encourage you to discuss the material and work together to understand it. Here are my thoughts on collaborating with other students:

• The readings and lecture topics are group work. Please discuss the readings and associated topics with each other. Work together to understand the material. I highly recommend forming a reading group to discuss the material -- we will explore many challenging ideas and it helps to have multiple people working together to understand them.

• It is fine to discuss the topics covered in the homeworks, to discuss approaches to problems, and to sketch out general solutions. However, you MUST write up the homework answers, solutions, and programs individually. You are not permitted to share specific solutions, mathematical results, program code, knowledge representations, experimental results, etc. If you made any notes or worked out something on a white board with another person while you were discussing the homework, you shouldn't use those notes while writing up your answer, however tempted you may be to do so.

• You are fully permitted to (and should!) discuss projects with members of your team. I also encourage you to work outside of your team to understand the other topics in the course.
  

• Under ABSOLUTELY NO circumstances should you share computer code with another student outside of your project team.  Similarly, you are not permitted to use or consult code found on the internet for any of your assignments.

If you have any questions as to what types of collaborations are allowed and which are dishonest, please ask me before you make a mistake.

Electronic Devices

I have no problem with you using computers or tablets to take notes or consult reference materials during class.  Tempting though it may be, please do not check e-mail or visit websites that are not relevant to the course during class.  It is a distraction, both for you and (more importantly) for your fellow classmates.  Please silence your phones and computers when you enter class.

Reference Links

• Unix References
  
• Unix for Beginners
• Basic Unix Tutorial
• Unix FAQ
• Emacs References
• Emacs Tutorial
• Emacs howto
• A Guided Tour of Emacs
• The Emacs Manual