CS 2704 Announcements - Spring 2001

[Final Grades]

[May 10]

• The final course grades have been posted on the Grades page.  The password to open the PDF file is "Stroustrup".  All in all, it was a fun semester, at least from our perspective.  Have a great summer!  McQ

CS 2704 Common-Time Final Exam

Saturday, May 5 2001        7:00 – 9:00 PM

Any requests to reschedule final exams must be made (to your instructor).  Given the schedule, we anticipate many students will want to take the exam at a different time.  Given the logistics of offering many alternate times, we will generally consider rescheduling the exam only if you have a total of three or more exams within 24 hours.  Note that officially that means you have at least two other exams between 9:00 PM on Friday evening and 7:00 PM on Saturday evening.  We will confirm such claims.

[Week 15 Announcements]

[May 1]

• I've posted an exam topics list (courtesy of Mr. Barnette).  The link's on the Koofers page.  McQ

[Week 14 Announcements]

[April 25]

• I've reposted the spreadsheet with the updates and corrections that have been confirmed so far.  I'm still waiting for a TA response on a couple of changes.  McQ

[April 24]

• FYI, I've posted the Project 2 test data and checksheet on the Projects page.  McQ

[April 23]

• FYI, I've posted the Project 3 checksheet on the Projects page.  McQ

[April 22]

• Project 3 demos will begin tomorrow morning.  The GTA PID assignments are posted in an earlier message below.  McQ
• The last of the test data and log files have been posted.  Be sure to test your implementation with all of them unless you enjoy nasty surprises at demo time.  Test 9 contains a particularly nasty scenario.  McQ
• The Curator is accepting Project 3.  Submit your zipped archive under the heading P3Ecosystem.  McQ

[Week 13 Announcements]

[April 20]

• The log file for the aging test has been reposted to match the posted aging test data file.  McQ

[April 19]

• Homework 7 on polymorphism has been posted.  Opscans will be passed out next week in class.  The opscans will be due on Wednesday April 25 or Thursday April 26.  If you are having trouble with polymorphism on the project, working out some of the later questions on this homework may help.  McQ
• The demos for Project 3 will begin on Monday.  We will handle everything as before, with each GTA having a signup sheet in McB 133.  Samal will be out of town on Monday and Tuesday and he has arranged a substitute.  The partitioning for the Project 3 demos is given below.  McQ

• Still working on demo data for the project.  I will have part of it posted this afternoon and the rest tomorrow afternoon.  McQ

[April 17]

• A discussion of the inheritance design for Project 3 has been posted to the Homework page.  The design shown is not the only acceptable approach, although it is certainly one acceptable approach.  The discussion mentions several alternatives.  McQ
• After discussing this, the instructors have decided to reduce two penalties from the Project 2 checksheet.  The penalty for using public data members will be subject to a ceiling of 5 points.  The penalty for not doing a proper ordered insertion will be reduced from 10 points to 5 points.  If these changes affect your score, you must speak to a TA in order to verify the change.  We're adopting the following scheme:  raise the question with your assigned TA when you demo Project 3.  Bring a printed copy of the checksheet to your demo.  McQ
• An updated spreadsheet has been posted.  The password is the same as before.  I'll repost that to the discussion board.  There will be some changes to Project 2 demo scores (see above), but all the other changes that I'm aware of at this time have been entered.  McQ
• The key for Test 2 has been posted on the Koofers page.  McQ

[April 16]

• The Curator is now ready to accept the inheritance design.  Submit as P3Design.  Submissions will not be accepted after 8:15 am tomorrow.  McQ
• I've corrected the location output in the first two sample scripts, and posted a third that covers various eating venues.  McQ

[Week 12 Announcements]

[April 11]

• Courtesy or Mr Barnette, I've added some STL reference links to the Online Resources page.  I haven't looked at all of these (yet), but I know the first two are quite good.  McQ
• I've posted some test data for Project 3.  I'll be adding more over the next couple of days, usually without any particular announcement here.  McQ

[April 10]

• Homework 6 has been posted.  This is just an inheritance hierarchy for Project 3, so you've probably already started it.  It will be due 8:00 am next Tuesday.  McQ

[Week 11 Announcements]

[April 5]

• A revised version of the Project 3 spec is now available.  This should answer all the questions posted earlier about it.  The revision also includes an expanded discussion of the design, and a section on development strategy.  McQ

[April 4]

• The key for the inheritance homework is now posted on the Homework page.  McQ

[April 2]

• A draft version of the Project 3 spec has been posted.  There won't be major changes (i.e., the focus will remain the same and the implied classes won't change much).  McQ
• The Project 2 demos should begin today.  I've partitioned you by PID, using the same breakdown as for the Project 2 design homework assignment:

Demos must be completed no later than Friday April 12.  Projects that are not demoed will receive a score of zero.  Signup sheets will be available in McB 133; until then you can just meet the GTA during his office hours.

[Week 10 Announcements]

[March 29]

• A second set of test data has been posted.  This one is moderately thorough --- be sure you try it.  McQ

[March 28]

• Homework 5, on the basics of inheritance, will be posted no later than Friday morning.  Opscans will be passed out in class, and will be due at class on Tuesday April 3 or Wednesday April 4, depending on which section you are in.  McQ
• Test 2 will be given on Thursday April 5 or Friday April 6, depending on which section you are in.  We'll announce the precise coverage later, but it will probably cover everything through the end of this week.  McQ
• Project 2 Deadline Extension:  Project 2 will be due 23:59:59 on Sunday, April 1.  (No, this is not an April Fool's joke.  Unless, of course, that statement also is and April Fool's joke.  The truth is out there, most likely at class.)  McQ
• I've posted a summary of the dB project design.  I didn't draw a class diagram or make class forms, but the description addresses the significant issues for the design and is the same one I gave the GTAs for their grading.  McQ
• The Curator will be set up to accept submissions for Project 2 (the dB project) tomorrow morning.  The project will be listed as P2dB.  Be sure you submit a zipped file with the specified contents.  McQ

[Week 9 Announcements]

[March 20]

• The Curator is now accepting submissions for Homework 4 (the dB project design).  The assignment is listed as HW4dBdesign.  Be sure you submit an unzipped file in the specified format.  McQ

[Week 8 Announcements]

[March 13]

• I've posted Homework 4 on the Homework page.  This is a design for Project 2; the requirements are different from the Tank class design assignment, so read them carefully.  McQ

[March 12]

• I've revised the Project 2 specification to state exactly how the dimension of each dB array is to be set. See the design discussion regarding the array template.  Note that the Book array and the Author array will NOT typically be of the same size.  McQ

[Spring Break Announcements]

[March 11]

• The revised (non-draft) spec for the second project is posted on the Projects page, along with sample input and output.  Consider the posted due data tentative.  McQ

[March 7]

• The notes on operator overloading have been updated.  On slide 6, there's a clarification of the requirement for a binary operator to be a class member.  A discussion of overloading operator [ ] has also been added.  McQ
• The key for Test 1 has been added to the Koofers page.  McQ

[Week 7 Announcements]

[Feb 28]

• A somewhat incomplete, draft version of the specification for the second project has been posted. The basic idea of the project will NOT change, but some details of the input files may change.  The section on design is also subject to substantial change, although it's unlikely any of the stated requirements will be dropped.

We may also post a mandatory or suggested interface for the array template.  McQ

[Feb 25]

• Demo signups for the RoboTank project will start on Monday morning.  The students are partitioned among the GTAs as shown below.  Demos will continue until the middle of the week after Spring Break.  Projects that are not demonstrated for a GTA will be assigned a score of zero.  The maximum late penalty is 50% but we will not accept any more submissions after Friday March 2.  The test data and grading checksheet will be posted on the Projects page tomorrow.  McQ

[Week 6 Announcements]

[Feb 23]

• Demo signups will start on Monday morning.  I'll post which GTA you should demo with later today. For the most part, the GTAs will use their regular office hours for demos, so if your GTA has office hours on Monday you can probably just walk in without an appointment if you want to do it right away.  McQ

[Feb 22]

• Actually I will not be out of town, courtesy of the storm.  I still don't intend to meet class tomorrow, but I'll be in my office after 9:00 tomorrow for some extra office hours.  McQ

[Feb 21]

• The current grades have been posted on the grades page.  A password is needed to open the file; that will be posted to the Discussion Board.  McQ
• I will be out of town Thursday and Friday this week.  McQ
• The two MWF sections of CS 2704 will NOT meet on Friday, Feb 23.  This has NO relevance to the two TTh sections.  McQ
• I've mailed out the graded Tank designs.  If you don't receive one, let me know.  There are a few that haven't been graded, but I believe the relevant GTA has been in touch with you if that's the case for yours.  McQ

[Feb 19]

• I've posted another set of data for the RoboTank project.  Nothing sneaky (until the end), but a good basic test of the functionality.  McQ

[Week 5 Announcements]

[Feb 16]

• Time change for free tutoring from UPE:

         BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND!
         Upsilon Pi Epsilon, the Computer Science Honor Society, is once 
again providing free tutoring for all CS 1000 and 2000 level 
courses.  Whether you have a quick question or need help studying for an 
exam, stop by and we'll help out however we can.

Time: Every Tuesday at 7:00 - 8:00 pm
Place: McBryde 133, next to the first floor elevators

         If you have any questions or comments, drop me an email at 
roadams5@vt.edu.  Hope to see you there!

-- Rob Adams
    Tutoring Coordinator and Webmaster
    Upsilon Pi Epsilon
    roadams5@vt.edu, misteradams@hotmail.com

[Feb 14]

• I've posted a design solution for the Tank and the checksheet the GTAs are using for grading your designs.  This is mainly for your information in considering any changes to your design for the final implementation.  You are certainly allowed to change your initial design in your final version; in fact, we encourage that if your initial design was questionable.  McQ

[Feb 13]

• Test 1 will be on Thursday Feb 15 or Friday Feb 16, depending on your section.  Test 1 will cover everything through Association, but not Aggregation.  McQ
• Beware Anna Kournikova!  If you haven't done so already, make sure that your e-mail client is set to NOT launch attachments automatically.  If you receive an attachment named "AnnaKournikova.jpg.vbs" or "AnnaKournikova.jpg" DO NOT attempt to open it.  If you do not understand these instructions, and you have any of us in your e-mail address book, remove us.  McQ
• I've added a link to the Test 1 koofer and key from Fall 2000.  Be aware that your mileage may vary.  McQ

[Week 4 Announcements]

[Feb 10]

• I've posted links to koofers from Fall 1999 and Spring 2000.  Others may follow.  Be aware that your mileage may vary.  McQ

[Feb 9]

• I've posted my solution to the parsing homework.  McQ

[Feb 8]

• This just in:

         BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND!
         Upsilon Pi Epsilon, the Computer Science Honor Society, is once 
again providing free tutoring for all CS 1000 and 2000 level 
courses.  Whether you have a quick question or need help studying for an 
exam, stop by and we'll help out however we can.

Time: Every Thursday at 7:00 - 8:00 pm
Place: McBryde 133, next to the first floor elevators

         If you have any questions or comments, drop me an email at 
roadams5@vt.edu.  Hope to see you there!

-- Rob Adams
    Tutoring Coordinator and Webmaster
    Upsilon Pi Epsilon
    roadams5@vt.edu, misteradams@hotmail.com

• Test 1 will be on Thursday Feb 15 or Friday Feb 16, depending on your section.  The specific topics to be covered will be announced here later, but we anticipate that Test 1 will cover everything through Association, but not Aggregation.  McQ

[Feb 7]

• The Curator is now accepting submissions for the Tank Design HW (select HW2TankDesign).  McQ

[Week 3 Announcements]

[Feb 1]

• In some cases, your program may (appear to) execute correctly on your machine, but not when you submit it to the Curator.  This issue may also arise when we are testing your projects manually.  To get some understanding of why, and what you can to to try to detect and deal with this problem, you might want to read a short discussion of release and debug builds.  McQ
• If you're using Visual C++, you may find yourself getting a lot of instances of warning number 4786, which complains about excessively long identifier names being truncated.  You will probably see this only when you start using the STL containers.  We will discuss that later in the term.  In the meantime, if you are getting this warning there are a few things you might want to know:

  There's nothing you can do to eliminate the warning.

  Generally, nothing bad happens if you ignore the warning.

  The warning is due to a silly limitation in Microsoft's implementation.

  You can turn off the warning messages by adding the following directive.  You may need to add this in multiple header files before it will swat all of them.

  #pragma warning(disable: 4786)

    McQ
  

[Jan 31]

• The specification for the first major project has been posted.  You should look it over before your next class meeting.  The project will be due at 23:59:59 on Friday, February 23 and will be graded in demos the following week.
• A student pointed out an oversight (on my part) in the answer to Question 14 on Homework 1.  The correct answer is 4, not 1.  I'll rescore the results and mail out revised info later today.  If you have questions regarding your opscans, address those to your instructor since each of us will have the opscans for our individual sections.  McQ

[Jan 30]

• I've just mailed out the reports for all four sections for Homework 1 (the review assignment).  There were 8 opscans that had ID numbers that did not match anyone on any of the rolls.  Make sure you review the posted key for this assignment!  McQ

[Week 2 Announcements]

[Jan 25]

• I've posted a key for Homework 1.  The link is on the Homework page.   McQ

[Jan 24]

• The Curator is now accepting submissions for the parsing homework.   McQ

[Jan 23]

• I've reposted the Parsing Tutorial to fix typos on slides 2, 39 and 42.  The header file for stringstreams is sstream, not stringstream.  The justification output sample on slide 17 was slightly munged when I pasted it into Powerpoint.   McQ

[Jan 22]

• I've posted some additional sample data files for Homework 2.  Yes, they DO conform to the specification.  McQ
• The CS 2704 Web Discussion Board is now active.  Use the link on the table of contents.  Be sure to read and observe the discussion board policies. Failure to observe the policies can result in unpleasant penalties.  McQ
• The C++ review, Chapter 3 of the notes has been updated to fix some minor issues.  Two new chapters on identifying and designing classes have been posted. McQ

• The Homework 2 specification and sample output have been fixed to correct a spelling error ("Minimun" should have been "Minimum"). McQ

[Week 1 Announcements]

[Jan 18]

• All undergraduates who requested a force-add for the Tues/Thur 12:30 section will be added. Unfortunately I am not able to force-add graduate students to CS 2704. DB

• Ditto for the 8:00 and 10:10 MWF sections.  All undergraduates who requested a force-add will be added. Unfortunately I am not able to force-add graduate students to CS 2704 for credit.  I have a limited number of seats in the 8:00 MWF section for graduate students who wish to audit CS 2704.  Note that students auditing a course will not be allowed to submit work and have it graded, and that you may not take a course for a grade after auditing it.  McQ

[Jan 16]

• I've also posted an update to the Parsing Tutorial (Notes page under Supplements).  You'll probably want to consult that while you're working on the parsing program. 
• I've posted the specification for Homework 2.  This is a short (~250 lines of code) program involving parsing of tab-separated input.  It will be graded using the Curator System; be sure to read over the Student Guide, at least the section explaining how the Curator grades your program.  The program is due by midnight on Monday, January 29, which gives you about a week-and-a-half.  Don't procrastinate.  McQ

[Jan 15]

• I've updated Homework 1 to fix typos in questions 29 and 30.  Question 29 should refer to questions 27 and 28; question 30 should refer to question 29.  McQ

[Jan 14]

• Homework 1 is posted.  Opscans will be passed out in class, and collected at the first meeting of your section during the second week (next Monday or Tuesday, IOW).  McQ
• Course prerequisite and agreement forms will be passed out in class.  Complete and sign both and turn them in as directed by your instructor.  McQ