Schedule

Subject to change with minimal notice.

Week 1: Program structure

• Wednesday, January 4. Lecture 1: Introduction. CS in arts, sciences, engineering. Simple programs and the program counter. Short assignment 1 (printed logo) out.
• Friday, January 6. Lecture 2: Abstraction, functions, graphics, and coding style.

Week 2: Animation

• Monday, January 9. Lecture 3: Variables, memory, data types, expressions, and operators. Short assignment 2 (sketch) out.
• Wednesday, January 11. Lecture 4: Boolean expressions. Flow of control: while-loops and if-statements. Short assignment 3 (how rich am I?) out.
• Friday, January 13. Lecture 5: More on flow of control. Functions: parameters and return values. Built-in functions. Random numbers. Debugging. Short assignment 4 (string art) out.

Week 3: Animation, user input, and lists

• Monday, January 16. No class: MLK Day.
• Wednesday, January 18. Lecture 6: Mouse and keyboard input. Short assignment 5 (chalkboard) out.
• Thursday, January 19 (x-hour). Lecture 7: Lists. For loops.
• Friday, January 20. Lecture 8: List algorithms. Nested loops. Selection sort. Short assignment 6 (moving blocks) out.

Week 4: Classes and objects

• Monday, January 23. Lecture 9: Gravity and springs. Multi-body physics. Lab 1 (pong) Lab 1 out.
• Wednesday, January 25. Lecture 10: Introduction to classes and objects. Lists of objects.
• Thursday, January 26 (x-hour). Optional review session. Exam 1, 6:00 pm to 9:00 pm, Life Sciences Center, Room 100 (Oopik Auditorium).
• Friday, January 27. More on classes and objects.

Week 5: Object-oriented design

• Monday, January 30. Lecture 11: Object-oriented design: the Game of Life. Lab 1 due. Lab 2 (gravity simulator) Lab 2 out. Short assignment 7 out.
• Wednesday, February 1. More on object-oriented design.
• Friday, February 3. Yet more on object-oriented design.

Week 6: Algorithms and recursion

• Monday, February 6. Lecture 12: The call stack. Recursion, the recursion tree. Infinite recursion. Short assignment 8 out. Lab 2 due.
• Wednesday, February 8. Lecture 13: More on recursion. Analysis of algorithm running time. Big-O notation. Binary search vs. linear search.
• Thursday, February 9 (x-hour). Lecture 14: More on analysis of algorithm running time. Merge sort. Short Assignment 9 out.
• Friday, February 10. No class: Carnival holiday.

Week 7: Data structures

• Monday, February 13. Lecture 15: Finish merge sort. Linked lists. Lab 3 (quicksort) out. Short assignment 10 out.
• Wednesday, February 15. Lecture 16: Finish linked lists. Dictionaries. Short assignment 11 out.
• Friday, February 17. Guest lecture from Kate Yee of Career Services.

Week 8: Graphs and cryptography

• Monday, February 20. Lecture 17: Graphs. Breadth-first-search on a graph. Lab 3 due. Lab 4 (Dartmouth pathfinder) out.
• Wednesday, February 22. Lecture 18: Fundamental principles of cryptography.
• Thursday, February 23 (x-hour). Optional review session. Exam 2, 6:00 pm to 9:00 pm, Life Sciences Center, Room 100 (Oopik Auditorium).
• Friday, February 24. More on cryptography.

Week 9: Python features, finite automata, and computer organization

• Monday, February 27. Lecture 19: Abstract data types and other Python goodies. Lab 4 due. Lab 5 out.
• Wednesday, February 29. Lecture 20. Finite automata. (Preview of some material from CS 39.)
• Friday, March 2. Lecture 21. Hard problems: NP-completeness. (More preview of material from CS 39.)

Week 10: Next steps

• Monday, March 5. Lecture 22. More on NP-completeness. Parallel computing.
• Wednesday, March 7. More on parallel computing. Lab 5 due.
• Thursday, March 8. Optional review session, 10:00 am to 12:00 noon, 008 Kemeny.
• Sunday, March 11. Final exam, 11:30 am to 2:30 pm, 008 Kemeny.