CS 109 Spring 2012

"Current" Events

New material is added here first, and later moved elsewhere or removed entirely as it becomes old or obsolete. Some information is considered sufficiently important to never expire.

• Midterm Exam I - Wednesday 22 February, 6:00 - 8:00 P.M., Location TBD
  • All covered material up to and including File I/O ( Chapter 1-3 & Appendix on library functions. )
• Homework 3 - Generating an Image from Sidescan Sonar Data Files - Due Wednesday February 15 at 8:00 a.m. via Blackboard
  • Sample data file: theMac.txt
• Homework 2 - Tables of Distances in Fresh and Salt Water - Due Thursday February 2 at 8:00 a.m. via Blackboard
  • Note: Square roots are calculated using the sqrt( ) function, which is located in the cmath library.
    • #include <cmath> at the top of your program, with the other #includes
    • X = sqrt( Y ); will calculate the square root of Y and store the result in X, where both X and Y are doubles.
• Course Policies - Includes instructor information and original planned schedule.
  • Updated: Second Midterm moved to Thursday 29 March, 6:00 to 8:00 P.M.
• John Bell's Home page, including office information and links to:
  • John Bell's Spring 2012 schedule.
  • Programming Resources
  • Exam Philosophies and Samples
• TA 's CS 109 Web Page
  • Sean Xie teaches labs Thursday at 8:00, 9:00, and 11:00
  • Guru Devanla teaches labs Thursday at 10:00 and Friday at 10:00
  • Kaiser Asif teaches labs Friday at 8:00 and 9:00
• Labs Start Thursday 12 January
  • Thursday 9:00 meets in 2249F SEL ( Science and Engineering Laboratories )
  • Thursday 10:00 meets in SCE 408 ( Student Center East ) EXCEPT JANUARY 12 AND 19
    • Thursday 10:00 meets the first two weeks in 205B and 205C SES
  • All other labs meet in 2449 SEL
  • Subject to change - Check web site and e-mail
• Instructions for downloading and installing Dev C++ HERE. ( Portable Apps application here. )
• Homework 1 - Speed of Sound and Distance in Fresh Water - Due Wednesday January 18 at 8:00 a.m. via Blackboard
• Samples of Quality Work
  • Assignment
  • Documentation
  • Basic Solution
  • Enhanced Solution
• Note on textbooks: For Spring 2012 we will be using a custom book, consisting of selected chapters from several traditional books. To the best of my knowledge, this book is only available at the University Bookstore.
  • If you want ( or need ) to buy the source books instead of the custom book, the first one we will be using is "Engineering Problem Solving with C++", Second Edition, by Etter and Ingber. The second book is "Introduction to MATLAB", Second Edition, by Delores M. Etter.
• New CS Department Tutoring Service available for CS 109. Click here to view the schedule of available tutors.
• How to Write a Computer Program from Scratch
• CPlusPlus.com has some good extensive documentation on C++, including the IOStream library, the string library ( and string class ), and the C standard library. However, beware that a lot of it is beyond the scope of CS 109.
• Microsoft Software Program:
  • Dale Reed's Microsoft Software Program page
  • MSDNAA Direct Web Site:
    1. Go to https://msdn01.e-academy.com/uic_cs
    2. Your login name is your CS e-mail address ( including the "@cs.uic.edu" ) This may be a temp account if you are enrolled in CS classes but are not a CS major.
    3. Your password should have been mailed to you at the beginning of the semester. ( To your CS account. ) If you need them to e-mail it again, there is a button on the page to do that.
• Study Advice:
  • Take your own notes in class, even though my notes are posted on-line. Studies have shown that the cognitive activity of comprehending a lecture, converting the concepts into your own words, and going through the physical motions of putting those words on paper re-inforces your understanding of the material. In order to not just spend the hour taking dictation, I recommend you print out my notes before class, and then write in your own annotations in the margins. ( Plus I always end up adding some stuff into the lectures that are not on my prepared notes. )
  • Read the book BEFORE coming to class. Many students seem to think that attending the lectures or reading my notes are acceptable substitutes for reading the book, or else they wait to read the book until a couple of days prior to the exam. That is not true, because the book contains material not covered in lecture or notes, and also explains some of the same material in a different manner. You will get much more out of the lectures if you read the book FIRST, before the lecture, and try to learn as much as you can before you get to class. That way when you hear the lecture it will be the second time you have heard the same material, and a lot more of it will soak in. Besides, you will know what parts of the book gave you trouble, so you know what parts of the lecture to pay special attention to and what questions to ask.
• ACM Web Site ( Tutoring )
• Linux Users Group ( LUG ) Web Site

C Plus Course Notes Pages

Matlab Course Notes Pages

Codelab

• The use of Codelab is highly encouraged for all students new to ( C++ ) programming.
• Codelab problems for "Chapters 2 & 3", ( simple programs and control structures ) are due 2 days prior to the first midterm. Codelab problems for "Chapters 5 & 6", ( modular programming and arrays ), are due 2 days prior to the second midterm.
  • ( Note the chapter numbers do not necessarily correspond to our book. )
  • When you start CodeLab you will see chapters listed on the left, with little plus signs.
  • If you click on the pluses it will open a directory tree. Continue until you see individual problem numbers.
  • Clicking on the problem numbers shows you the problems, and gives you a space to enter an answer.
  • Alternatively you may want to change the sorting from "By Topic" to "By Deadline", to see all the problems due the same day.
• CodeLab web site access is http://www.tcgo1.com or http://www.tcgo2.com
• Course ID is ILLI-7230-HVYB-11
• Note: CodeLab does not like ( or allow ) the use of 'system( "pause" )', so leave that out of any programs that you submit to CodeLab.

Updated Schedule

Week	Chapter	Lecture	Lab	Due
1	1 - Intro	Sample	Sample
2	1 - Intro	Variables, Operators, %, /, ++, += ( No Monday )	HW1 Sol'n	HW1, Wed.
3	2 - Control	logic, >, &&, if-else	Quiz 1 - Ch 1
4	2 - Control	Loops, switch, ?:	HW2 Sol'n	HW2, Thurs( * )
5	3 - File I/O	istreams, ostreams	Quiz 2 - Ch 2
6	3 - File I/O	Catchup / review if necessary	HW3 Sol'n	HW3, Wed
7	4 - Functions	Function syntax, examples		Exam Ch 1-3, Wed 6PM
8	4 - Functions	Passing mechanisms, scope	Quiz 3 - Ch 3,4
9	5,6 - Arrays	Declaring and using 1-D & multi-D arrays	HW4 Sol'n	HW4, Wednesday
10	5,6 - Arrays	Passing arrays to and from functions	Quiz 4 - Ch 5,6
		SPRING BREAK
11	Matlab		HW5 Sol'n	HW5, Monday( * ) Exam Ch 1-6 Thurs 6PM
12	Matlab		Quiz 5 - Matlab
13	Matlab		HW6 Sol'n	HW6, Wed.
14	Matlab		Quiz 6 - Matlab
15	Matlab		HW7 Sol'n	HW7, Wed
Finals				Comprehensive Exam

* - No late submissions accepted for this assignment

 

Homework Documents

• Hardcopy printouts are optional. If you hand in hard copy, you should receive more detailed feedback on the causes of your errors and possible solutions.

HW	Topic	Assignment	Due
1	Simple C++	Homework 1 - Speed of Sound and Distance in Fresh Water	Wed Jan 18
2	C++ Control
3	C++ Files
4	C++ Functions
5	C++ Arrays
6	Simple Matlab
7	More Matlab

Old Pages