Introduction to Computer Programming

Computing continues to play an ever-increasing role in today’s society. Having an understanding of computing is an essential skill for those in the 21^st century; from working in industries more reliant on technology, using computational methods to further scientific understanding, or being an informed citizen in a world with technology all around us.

This course is a third course in computer programming focused on the design and implementation of data structures. It assumes students already have significant experience with programming and understand fundamental computing concepts (such as control structures (loops and conditionals), variables and data, and arrays) as well as basic data structure (lists, sets, stacks, queues, and maps/dictionaries) and the fundamentals of object-oriented programming.

In this course, students will learn:

1. How to implement compound data structures such as lists and trees.
2. The use of recursion to efficiently solve computational problems.
3. How to utilize inheritance to represent relationships among similar classes.

Prerequisite Material

This course is intended for students who already have some programming experience. Students entering CSE 123 should already be familiar with programming constructs for problem decomposition (methods or functions), control structures (loops and conditionals), variables and data types (such as integer data), data structures such as arrays, lists, sets, and maps/dictionaries, and the basics of object-oriented programming.

To better assess if CSE 123 is the right class for you, the Allen School has developed a Self-Guided Placement to help students assess which intro course is the right one for them to enroll in. Please see this website for more information on who to contact if you have questions about which introductory CSE course is the right course for you.

Programming Language

CSE 123 is taught in the Java programming language. Unlike CSE 122, CSE 123 does assume prior experience with the Java programming langauge. If you have not programmed in Java before, or if you would like to get some extra practice or review, please see our Java Tutorial.