CTI 102 (Spring 2024)
What's Logical

General Information | Schedule | Resources | Requirements

General Information

Course description: This course introduces students to well-known interesting problems and logical puzzles. In addition to solving the puzzles and problems, we also discuss their implications and applications. | Prerequisites: Knowledge of basic algebra in middle school and high school is required. No programming experience is required, but could be interesting to use. | Credits: 1.

Course goals: Improve critical thinking by developing evaluative, problem-solving, and expressive skills. Enhance communication skills through discussions, group work, presentations, or debates. Develop intellectual curiosity and better understand the role of a student in an academic community. Learn well-known interesting problems and logical puzzles and how to solve them. Learn implications and applications of the problems and solutions.

Instructor: Annie Liu | Email: liu@cs.stonybrook.edu | Office: New Computer Science 237 | Phone: 631-632-8463 | Office hours: Mon 4:20-5 PM, Tue 11:20 AM-12:00 PM, Thu 11:20-11:40 AM, 2-3 PM, or email for an appointment.

Lectures: Tue 1-2:20 PM, New CS 220.

Textbook: There is no required textbook for this course; relevant materials and additional references will be given as the course proceeds.

Grading: Lecture critiques: 10% | Lecture notes: 10% | In-class exercises: 50% | Assignment: 10% | Project presentation: 20% | Grade cutoffs: 93-100 (A) 90-92 (A-) 87-89 (B+) 83-86 (B) 80-82 (B-) 77-79 (C+) 73-76 (C) 70-72 (C-) 67-69 (D+) 60-66 (D) 0-59 (F)

Course homepage: http://www.cs.stonybrook.edu/~liu/cti102-logical

Schedule

Total 10 weeks

1. Introduction and overview. Questionnaire

2. Objects, real or not. Assignment

3. Relationships.

4. Constraints.

5. Concurrency.

6. Distributed computing. Assignment due end of week (Fri 3/1)

7. Knowledge.

8. Games.

9. Project presentations (Tue 3/26). Presentation materials

10. Summary and conclusion.

Handouts

Questionnaire

Lecture Critiques

Lecture Notes

In-Class Exercises

Assignment

Project

Resources

Google Classroom for this course, for students in the course

Requirements

Follow all information in the Google Classroom for this course.

Attend all lectures and take good notes. This is the most efficient way to learn the course materials, because we will both distill and elaborate written materials and discuss important related materials. We will start promptly on time. We will have every student participate in solving problems and presenting solutions in class.

Do all course work. The readings are to help you preview and review the materials discussed in the lectures. The assignments and project are to provide concrete experiences with the basic concepts and methods covered in the lectures. The exercises and quizzes are to help check that you are keeping up with the lectures and the assignments.

If you have any questions, ask. Ask questions in class, in office hours, and in the Q&A group. Talk with your classmates, and share ideas, but not solutions to assignments.

Your submitted work

Your handins must include the following information at the top: your name, student id, course number, assignment number, and due date, and must be submitted in a neat and organized fashion.

Your programming solutions must be submitted with a README.txt file explaining where things are, what you did and found for the assignment (that is not described in the assignment handout), and how to run and test your program. This file is worth a non-trivial portion of the grade.

Your approach to solving problems is as important as your final solutions; you need to show how you arrived at your solutions and include appropriate explanations. Always include good explanations in your README file and good comments in your code.

Your assignment and project submissions must be your own work. You are not permitted to share, borrow, or even look at another student's work while completing your own assignment. Likewise, copying material from any source other than what is specified by the instructor will constitute cheating. You may discuss ideas with others and look up references, but you must write up your solutions independently and credit all sources that you used. Any evidence that answers have been copied, shared, or transmitted in any way, including the use of answers downloaded from the Internet or written by others previously, will be regarded as evidence of academic dishonesty. Anyone involved will be reported.

Submission issues

Neither extensions nor late submissions will be approved under normal circumstances. If some emergency or other circumstances truly beyond your control prevent you from submitting your assignment on time, supply the instructor with suitable documentation and notification prior to the assignment deadline. The instructor will also refer you to the Dean of Students for follow-up consultation.

Students are urged to plan ahead to avoid problems such as computer failures at the last minute. If your assignment is incomplete before it is due, turn in whatever you have. You are advised to budget your time wisely and to start working on an assignment the day it is posted.

Grading issues

The final grade you receive in this class will reflect, as far as possible, the extent to which you have mastered the concepts and their applications. How much someone needs a grade, or how close they are to the next higher grade, will have no effect on grade. As the instructor, I want everyone to do well in this course, and will make every reasonable effort to help you understand the material taught. However, the grades provided at the end of the semester are final, except for rare situations involving grading errors. They will not be altered for other reasons, so please do not ask me to do so.

If you think you found grading errors, please arrange a re-grading within one week of receiving the graded work; later requests will not be entertained.

To promote consistency of grading, issues about work graded by a TA should be addressed first to the TA and then, if the issues are not resolved, to the instructor.

University Policies (source: https://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/faculty-pathways/pages/syllabus.php)

Academic Integrity

Each student must pursue his or her academic goals honestly and be personally accountable for all submitted work. Representing another person's work as your own is always wrong. Faculty is required to report any suspected instances of academic dishonesty to the Academic Judiciary. For more comprehensive information on academic integrity, including categories of academic dishonesty please refer to the academic judiciary website at http://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/academic_integrity/index.html

Student Accessibility Support Center

If you have a physical, psychological, medical, or learning disability that may impact your course work, please contact the Student Accessibility Support Center, Stony Brook Union Suite 107, (631) 632-6748, or at sasc@stonybrook.edu. They will determine with you what accommodations are necessary and appropriate. All information and documentation is confidential.

Students who require assistance during emergency evacuation are encouraged to discuss their needs with their professors and the Student Accessibility Support Center. For procedures and information go to the following website: https://ehs.stonybrook.edu/programs/fire-safety/emergency-evacuation/evacuation-guide-disabilities and search Fire Safety and Evacuation and Disabilities.

Critical Incident Management

Stony Brook University expects students to respect the rights, privileges, and property of other people. Faculty are required to report to the Office of Student Conduct and Community Standards any disruptive behavior that interrupts their ability to teach, compromises the safety of the learning environment, or inhibits students' ability to learn. Further information about most academic matters can be found in the Undergraduate Bulletin, the Undergraduate Class Schedule, and the Faculty-Employee Handbook.

Final note (thanks Professor Shyam Sharma for sharing this): College is more than the sum of the courses you take, or the numbers on your transcript; here you also build relationships with professors and advisors, academic staff and classmates. If you anticipate requesting me (and this is true with any professor) to write recommendation letters for internship, job application, scholarship/fellowship, or graduate school, then it is wise to demonstrate your best commitment to studies in this course. If I've observed you as the kind of student college professors want to rave about, I will rave about you in my letters. I respect in students a genuine interest in learning and intellectual honesty in engaging with complex ideas, regularity and punctuality in class, hard work and collegiality with peers and instructor, significant progress and resilience during the semester, a willingness to go beyond "requirements", and so on. In a way, it starts with treating a required course like this with curiosity and interest, as a good learning opportunity, taking full advantage of the course and my support. When I don't have much to say---or include clear, strong, and positive details---I ask students to find another recommender who knows their strengths better. I add this note on the syllabus because students in the past have said that they "wish" they'd known about the idea early on.