General information

Instructor: Richard Eisenberg
Email: rae@cs.brynmawr.edu
Office Phone: 610-526-5061
Home Phone (emergencies only): (redacted)
Cell Phone (emergencies only): (redacted) (no texts, please)
Office: Park 249
Office Hours: Tuesdays 10am-12noon, or by appointment
Lecture: MW 1:10pm-2:30pm
Lecture Room: Park 338
Lecture Recordings: at Tegrity
Lab: (register for only one)
M 2:40pm-3:30pm (Richard Eisenberg)
T 2:25pm-3:15pm (Deepak Kumar)
W 2:40pm-3:30pm (Richard Eisenberg)
R 2:25pm-3:15pm (Deepak Kumar)
Lab Room: Park 231
Website: http://cs.brynmawr.edu/cs110-02
TA hours (in Park 231): Monday 6:00pm-8:00pm: Katherine Lee, 7:00pm-9:00pm: Rachel Xu (*), and 8:00pm-10:00pm: Lizzie Siegle
Tuesday 6:00pm-8:00pm: Calla Carter (*)
Wednesday 7:00pm-9:00pm: Rachel Xu (*), and 8:00pm-10:00pm: Lizzie Siegle, and 8:00pm-10:00pm: Katherine Lee in Haverford’s Hilles 110
Thursday 6:00pm-8:00pm: Ziting Shen (*), and 7:00pm-9:00pm: Jiayi Lin, and foo: bar
Friday 7:00pm-9:00pm: Yazhe (Eileen) Feng and Jiayi Lin
Saturday 7:00pm-9:00pm: Yazhe (Eileen) Feng
Sunday 6:00pm-8:00pm: Ziting Shen (*)
Note: (*) indicates TA is primarily there for another class but is willing to assist if needed.

Goals of course

By the end of this course, you will be able to…

During the course, you will…

This course is meant to be an introduction to computer science. No experience is expected. Many assignments are open-ended, allowing both students with prior experience and those without to be challenged and exhibit their knowledge.

Course Philosophy

CS 110 at Bryn Mawr emphasizes creative coding. We recognize that computer programming is an act of creation, and we want you to be able to express yourself through your work. The Processing language (see below) is designed around writing visual sketches, potentially incorporating colors, images, animations, and interactivity. Most of the assignments in this course are very open-ended, allowing you to create a sketch that is meaningful and interesting to you. Along the way, you will practice the fundamental computer science and computer programming skills this course covers, including objects, arrays, inheritance, recursion, functions, and data processing.

Processing is a very close variant of Java, and so graduates of this course will leave with proficiency in that language, as well.

Materials

Processing: Creative Coding & Generative Art in Processing 2 by Ira Greenberg, Dianna Xu, Deepak Kumar, Friends of ed, 2013. Available at the Campus Bookstore. Also at amazon for $44.99. A Kindle eBook is available for those comfortable learning from an eBook (rental for the semester is priced at $14.63). The Bryn Mawr Bookstore price is $47.75.

Processing Software (this software is already installed in the Computer Science Lab). The software is also available for your own computer from the Processing web site. Download the latest stable 2.X version for your own computer. (It’s listed under the Stable Releases section toward the bottom of this page.)

Extra challenges

It can often be fun to test yourself and stretch your programming abilities. Below are several websites with practice problems and challenges that you might find fun. If you are working on these, let me know!