Foundations of Computer Science
Spring 2006
Department of Computer Science
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Foundations of Computer Science Spring 2006 Department of Computer Science | |
Prerequisites:
Required Textbook:
Place and Times: All class meetings are in Wagar 232.
Description:
In this class you will learn how to study the foundation of computation, not in terms of microprocessors and chips, but in terms of abstract models of computation. The investigation of what these models of computation can and cannot do leads us to a theoretical understanding of the fundamentals of computation. The tools we will use include regular expressions, context-free grammars, finite state automata, pushdown automata, turing machines, and methods for measuring the complexity of algorithms.
Class meetings will be a combination of lectures by the instructor, discussions of students' questions, and some student presentations in class.
Students' Responsibilities:
A lot of material will be covered in this course. Students are expected to speak up in class with questions and observations they have about the material. Do not expect to be able to complete all assignments working on your own and not asking any questions. If you find yourself wondering what the next step is in finishing an assignment, please feel free to call or e-mail the teaching assistant or the instructor. You may also discuss assignments with other students, but your answers and code must be written by you. You are expected to be familiar with the CS Department policy on cheating.
See the Grading page for a breakdown of your semester grade among homework exercises, programming assignments, quizzes, and exams.
For homework exercises, you will have two chances to get the correct answers. We will use the following policy. You must turn in your assignment by the due date and time. You will receive your graded assignment within one week. You will then have one additional week to fix your errors. After one week, you must turn in your corrected version and the original, graded version. You will only get credit for the exercises which you attempt to answer on your original version. For example, if you answer only the first half of the exercises for a particular assignment, and provide answers for all exercises in your second attempt, you will only get credit for the first half of the exercises. So, it is very important that you attempt to answer all questions the first time.