Dealing with a rich and deceptive world is a basic human skill that should not be denied to humans working as programmers.--- Mark Weiser, Source Code
IEEE Computer, November 1987
The prerequisites for this class are CS 502, Theoretical Foundations of Computer Science and CS 503, Advanced Programming I. You must be a programmer with a working knowledge of C++.
The course is divided into five (almost) three-week sections. See the syllabus for details.
The class meets in Edison 152 on Tuesdays and Thrusdays from 6:00 p.m. to 7:50 p.m. There are no classes on Tuesday, 9 March, and Thursday, 11 March, due to Spring Break. The last day to withdraw from class with a W on your transcript is Monday, 29 March.
Each programming assignment will be made available on the syllabus at the start of the associated section. Programming assignments are due two weeks from the day the assignment is issued. My version of the programming assignment will be made available on the syllabus after all the assgnments have been received.
The final grade is a weighted average of test scores and programming assignment grades; the programming assignments grades make up 85% of the final grade and the test grades make up the remaining 15%.
The usual grade ranges are in effect:
All grades are kept with one digit of precision to the right of the decimal point and 0.05 rounded up. No grades are adjusted to a curve; that means, for example, that 89.9 is always a B+, never an A-.
95 <= A 90 <= A- < 95 86.6 <= B+ < 90 83.3 <= B < 86.6 80 <= B- < 83.3 76.6 <= C+ < 80 73.3 <= C < 76.6 70 <= C- < 73.3 F < 70
The final grades.
The optional but highly recommended textbook is
In addition, you should also have a C++ book handy so you can learn new C++ features and resolve some of the finer points for C++ features about which you already know. I will be using C++ How to Program by Deitel and Deitel - the textbook for 500 and 503 - but any reasonably complete C++ book would do as well.
I've also put together a bibliography of C++ and programming books I've found helpful.
Mail relevant to the class will be stored in a hyper-mail archive. If your message is of general interest to the class, I'll store it, suitably stripped of identification and along with my answer, in the archive.
My attendance policy applies only to lecture attendance; it does not apply to other kinds of attendance which may be required for the course. Repeated failures to meet the attendance expectations set for tests, meetings, projects, labs or other forms of course work will have a bad influence on your grade.
First, the only complaint that matters is that something got marked wrong when it was actually right. When you come to complain, be prepared to present, in explicit detail, what it is you did and why you think it's right.
Second, complaints about a particular test or assignment are only valid until the next test or assignment is due; after that point the book is permanently closed on all previous test or assignment grades.
A late assignment is penalized five points a day for each day it's late. I use a 24-hour clock running from midnight to midnight to measure days; note this means that an assignment handed in the day after it's due is penalized ten points: five for the day it was due and five for the next day.
A make-up test must be scheduled to be taken by the date of the test following the missed test (or the final exam if you miss the last test). If a missed test is not made up by the time of the next test, you get a zero for the missed test.
There will be only one make up given per missed test. If more than one person misses the same test, those people will have to coordinate among themselves to pick a mutually agreeable date for the make up.
The previous time I taught this course.
A description of SaferSTL (last modified on 21 January 2004), which I'll be using when I test your assignments.
The ISO working group responsible for creating standard C++.
The SGI Standard Template Library (STL) reference, and the Dinkum C++ library reference (requires registration).
The Boost libraries is a collection of libraries for C++. There is some amazing C++ programming here, particularly template programming.
The Association of C & C++ Users (not a 12-step group, unfortunately).
Taligent's Guide to Designing Programs. Taligent was an IBM-Apple partnership formed in the early 90s to develop a next generation, object-oriented operating system (codenamed, at least for a while, "Pink"). The partnership dissolved without, as far as I know, producing anything apart from documentation.
This page last modified on 3 May 2004.
