Foundations of Computing, II

CSE 312: Foundations of Computing II, Winter 2013

important announcements

Here is the calendar for the course. Almost all information (such as lecture materials and assignments) is/will be linked from the calendar.
Homework Turnin: Change of plans -- turn your homework in as one stapled set of problems.
To submit daily problems, you'll need to log in to the Catalyst Dropbox. There you will be able to submit your solution to the daily problem. Regular homework should be turned in at the beginning of section (or, if you like, in class the day before it's due).
Quick guide for getting started with latex, a typesetting system that is very useful for typesetting mathematics.

course information

Lectures time and place: MWF 1:30-2:20pm, in MGH 241
Sections time and place: AA: Thursday 12:30 -- 1:20 in EEB 003; AB: Thursday 1:30 -- 2:20 in EEB 031; AC: Thursday 2:30 -- 3:20 in THO 211

Instructor: Anna Karlin, CSE 594, tel. 543 9344
Office hours: Wednesdays 2:30-4pm, CSE 594, and by appointment -- just send email.

Teaching assistants: Dimitrios Gklezakos, Tom Guo, Stephen Jonany, and Kane Swanson
Office hours: Monday 4-5pm, Tuesday 4-5pm, Wednesday 6-7pm, and by appointment. See calendar for locations.

Course evaluation and grading:

Rough breakdown: Daily problems (5-10%), weekly problem sets (altogether 35-45%), midterm (15-20%) and final (30-35%).
Daily problems will be graded as credit/no-credit, with credit received for a credible effort. We will be grading a random subset of the homework problems.
Late homework will be accepted (but penalized 30%) up to Friday evening; not accepted thereafter, barring major emergencies. Late daily problems will not be accepted (but you have a pass on turning them in four times during the quarter).

Textbooks:

Introduction to Probability (2nd edition), Dimitri P. Bertsekas and John N. Tsitsiklis, Athena Scientific, 2008 (Available from U Book Store, Amazon, etc.)
[Optional] Kenneth H. Rosen, Discrete Mathematics and Its Applications, Sixth Edition, McGraw-Hill, 2007. No direct use of this, but if you already own a copy, keep it for reference. Some students have said they like its coverage of counting (Chapter 5 and 7.5, 7.6) and discrete probability (Chapter 6)).

Learning Objectives:

Course goals include an appreciation and introductory understanding of (1) methods of counting and basic combinatorics, (2) the language of probability for expressing and analyzing randomness and uncertainty (3) properties of randomness and their application in designing and analyzing computational systems, (4) some basic methods of statistics and their use in a computer science & engineering context.

Class mailing list:

The mailing list (cse312a_wi13@u.washington.edu) is used to communicate important information that is relevant to all the students. If you are registered for the course, you should automatically be on the mailing list.

Academic Integrity and Collaboration:

Homeworks are all individual, not group, exercises. Discussing them with others is fine, even encouraged, but you must produce your own homework solutions. Follow the "Gilligan's Island Rule": if you discuss the assignment with someone else, don't keep any notes (paper or electronic) from the discussion, then go watch 30+ minutes of TV (Gilligan's Island reruns especially recommended) before you continue work on the homework by yourself. You may not look at other people's written solutions to these problems, not in your friends' notes, not in the dorm files, not on the internet, ever. If in any doubt about whether your activities cross allowable boundaries, tell us before, not after, you turn in your assignment. See also the UW CSE Academic Misconduct Policy, and the links there.

acknowledgements

Thanks to previous instructors of this course (James Lee, Larry Ruzzo and Pedro Domingos) for the use of their slides and other materials. We have also drawn on materials from "Mathematics for Computer Science" at MIT (including the fabulous book by Lehman, Leighton and Meyer), and "Great Theoretical Ideas in Computer Science" at CMU.