CSC 400 Graduate Problem Seminar: Assignments

First, internalize the problem...

• The assignments will be posted here after the day's class, along with the due date. Assignments are due at the beginning of class on the due date. In general, no credit will be allowed for for late assignments. Turn what you have in in for partial credit.
  
  
• For any assignment, I expect a well organized report-style writeup that describes in detail what you did, why you did it, and what the results were. This includes negative results. Scratch work and computer code, if requested should be appended to the main writeup with appropriate pointers.
  
  
• Attribute ANY work that is not your own, including software off the web, text cribbed from other sources, etc. You are encouraged to look for resources, but not to the extent that it negates the point of the assignment. This is sometimes a fine line, especially in programming assignments. I will try to be specific as to what I expect you to write as a minimum. If in doubt, ask. In any case, use of UN-attributed material is plagiarism, and a violation of the University's academic honesty policy.
  
  
• You are encouraged to discuss general techniques and specific approaches to general problems with your fellow students, or anyone else. Unless specifically directed in an assignment, however, you are not to share code you have written, or your written solutions to specific problems.
  
  

• Class activity: Meet your professors: Multiple class sessions over the semester.
  [Induction, Independence]
  
  
• Assignment: Create your department web page and put a picture of yourself on it. You are responsible for finding out how to do this. Try asking other students, staff about web pages, vision students about pics).
  [Induction, Independence]
  
  
• Class activity: The game of PLAUSIBILITY
  [Induction, Presentation, Peer Review]
  
  
• Assignment: Estimation problems. (Assigned in class)
  Be prepared to present your solution to the class.
  If you want more fun, consider the following collections.
  More estimation problems.
  And more estimation problems.
  Still more estimation problems.
  And even more estimations problems..
  [Independence, Presentation]
  
  
• Assignment: ITRG Miniproposals
  Class Activity: ITRG panel
  [Independence, Presentation, Peer Review, Public Policy]
  
  
• Assignment: Find (on the web or elsewhere), read, and understand the entire Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA) of 1998 (Final Joint version of House Resolution 2281, also known as Public Law 105-304). This is not a short document, so you should get busy over the weekend.
  Then prepare reports (written and for presentation) as specified in DMCA Issues Research
  [Public policy, Presentation]
  
  
• Class activity: Parallel puzzle processing experiment.
  [Teamwork, Independence, Induction]
  
  
• Assignment: Password cracking competition
  [Independence, Presentation, Public Policy]
  
  
• Assignment: Individual project proposal.
  You should, by now, have identified a potential 400 project and advisor. Write up the proposed project in a sort document; a couple of pages should be sufficient at this point. However, you should put down specific goals that are reasonable to accomplish in the time permitted, and discuss how you will evaluate the outcome of your project. As mentioned in class, survey papers are not acceptable, nor are overly broad areas such as "look at new approaches to resolving P !=? NP" or "software cache coherance in shared memory multiprocessors". We will have project proposal presentations beginning Oct 17, so be prepared.
  [Independence, Induction, Presentation]
  
  
• Assignment: Team projects. Find out which project you are on, but read the description of all of them. Come to class 2 weeks from today prepared to participate in a discussion of the project design: potential issues, modifications, strategies, adequacy of resources, etc. There will be weekly status presentations and strategy discussions, and a final demo and presentation.
  Following are some projects that have been used in previous years. This year's projects may be from the list, or they may be drawn from the ITRG proposals, if there are any that would make a good team project.
  Semantic internet access
  Personalized bus sytem
  Parallel jigsaw puzzle solving
  Kleptomania
  [Independence, Teamwork, Presentation]
  
  

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