Nathan @ the Computer Lab

Supervision Info for 2004-2005

Contents

This page was getting a bit unwieldy so:

General

Summary of supervision arrangements for 2004-2005.

I will be setting a number of exercises to be attempted before each supervision. I would prefer to look over your answers/notes in advance of the supervision so that we can make the most of the supervision time, so please hand in your answers by 5pm the day before. The purpose of these exercises is to show me what parts of the course you are having difficulty with so do not worry if you cannot do them but I will not be impressed if you have not even made an attempt. If you really have no idea how to even start answering a question then don't forget you can always e-mail me for help.

There are a number of ways to hand in work (listed in order of preference):

  1. E-mail (@cl.cam.ac.uk). ASCII, pdf, ps or HTML formats only please. If you are handing in a programming exercise, ASCII e-mail is the only way of submitting your answers as I need to be able to compile and test your program.
  2. Pigeon hole in the William Gates Building.
  3. Pigeon hole in Jesus College.
    Note: Graduate pigeon holes are now located where undergraduates cannot access them so you will have to give it to the Porters. Since there is a race condition between the porters filling my pigeon hole and me checking it, if you hand material to them please also send me an e-mail informing me so that I can hassle the porters if it isn't there.

Supervisions held in Jesus College will be held in Dr. Jean Bacon's room (Library Court V, Room 7). The easiest way to get there if you are not at Jesus is to cycle/walk to the far end of Jesus Lane (towards the Grafton Centre) and enter Jesus through the car entrace. There is a covered cycle rack to your immediate left as you enter the College, and Library Court is the large "peach-coloured" building next to the cycle shed. The steps lead down to the kitchens - you need to go round to the side that faces the old grey buildings; Staircase V is the first one on your left. (map)

Supervisions held in the WGB building will be held in a supervision room — I will let you know which one.

Provisional Timetable

Day1pm-2pm2pm-3pm3pm-4pm4pm-5pm5pm-6pm
Monday
TuesdayN/A
Wednesday (FW05) hbc25
Thursday (Jesus)em349 & rjm84djs203 & tws26pjf33
Friday (FW05)cam84 & mot20N/A

Fri 18th March: jdt31 & pgs31 at 10am (FW05). Work to be submitted by noon on Thursday.

Part 1b - Compiler Construction

Course information. Four supervisions in Lent term.

Supervision 1

Supervision 2

Supervision 3

Supervision 4

Part 1b - Data Structures and Algorithms

Course information. Three supervisions in Michaelmas term.

Lent term special: Four supervisions. Exercises marked with a "*" will be assessed.

Supervision 1

Supervision 2

Supervision 3

Supervision 4

Part 1a - Programming in Java

Course information. Three supervisions in Lent term.

Supervision 1

  1. A better drawing programme (p. 45)

Supervision 2

  1. Exercises 2 & 3 from below (Dutch National Flag and Shapes)

Other Exercises

Work for supervisions 2 and 3 will be drawn from these exercises.

  1. Write a small Java program to test the user's mental arithmetic skills. The program should ask n sets of 10 randomly generated questions, and then graph the number the user got correct. n should be supplied as a command line argument to the program.
  2. Design a set of classes that might be used to represent shapes in a vector graphics program (such as CorelDRAW and xfig). You should outline the methods that can be called on shapes to manipulate them, but do not worry about the implementation details.
    EXTENSION: Use your classes and code from supervision 1 to implement a simple vector graphics drawing program.
  3. Dutch National Flag (p. 67)
  4. Build up a very long list of prime numbers (i.e. millions) in memory, as efficiently as possible! For speed you will have to use the sieve algorithm (page 68 of notes), but amended as the cost of the fixed array will be too much. It should take a number on the command line and find all primes below this number.
  5. (courtesy of Mr A. Cuthbert): Program the game of life. Experiment with simple automata. Find answer to life, the universe, and everything. Show your working.

Supervision 3

  1. Programming: Exercise 4 (Sieving for primes)
  2. Tripos Questions: 2001.1.9, 2001.1.10

Part 1b - Concurrent Systems and Applications

Course information. Four or five supervisions in Michaelmas term.

Supervision 1

Supervision 2

Supervision 3

Supervision 4

Part II - Distributed Systems

Historical interest only - not supervising this course in 2004.

Course information. Two supervisions in Easter term.

Supervision 1

Supervision 2