Info1 WS2013

Info1/WS2012 - Labs and Exercises

Programming is something you can’t learn out of a book – you have try out things yourself and practice! Therefore, this class will have lots of exercises. In the Labs you will have opportunity to work on them, and, most importantly, ask questions if something is unclear to you or you are stuck somewhere. Don’t hesitate to ask me even if I’m the professor; just trust me that I will forget who asked which question anyway by the end of the semester!

Talking to each other and working in pairs is also highly encouraged in the lab. For the first exercises, you will need to hand in individual Lab Reports, whereas you can work on them in small groups later (will be announced in the labs/stated in the exercises).

Starting with Exercise 01, you’ll find a section Pre-Lab for each exercise. These are exercises or preperatory work that you are expected to complete - together with reading through the whole exercise - before coming to lab. If you choose to do that in the lab instead, you’ll typically won’t start working on the actual assignment until half of the lab time is over, significantly minimizing your opportunity to ask questions and getting help if you get stuck on the assignment. Your choice!

Exercises

During the term, there will be 12 graded exercises (Nr. 00 is just a warm-up that won’t be graded). The graded exercises will be written reports on programming experimentation - your Lab Reports (that is, not the source code you produce).

Lecture summaries (10%)

In the Moodle collaboration room you can find a section called “Lecture summaries”. You are expected to write 5-10 complete sentences summarizing each lecture. As both lectures are on the same day this term, you can and should hand in both summaries together - if you happen to write one for just one of the two lectures, clearly state that. It is due at 23.00 the Monday after the lecture for both lectures of the past week. It is either done or not done. I expect you to do 20 out of all (ca. 28) lectures, or 10 double lecture summaries. The first one for 15/Oct does not count. If I find plagiarisms of lecture summaries (especially from the Wikipedia), you will not get any credit for any lecture summary.

Lab reports (50%)

There are 12 exercises to be done. For each week you must write a report. The report must be in English or German, spell-checked and using complete sentences, explaining what you did in the exercise session, that is, the process. Screenshots are welcome. Each report should not be more than 5 pages and in PDF format and must have your name on it. It must include a reflection on what you learned during the session, if anything. They must be submitted to the Moodle area by 23.00 the night before your next lab (that is, Mon or Wed night).

We will be giving “[stars]({{ site.BaseURL }}/studies/grading/guideline)” to let you know how well you are doing on each graded exercise. You will also need to be able to explain your solution to me in person in one of the following labs. No stars does not mean no points - it means you handed in a report on time, but it was nothing to write home about. Late work will not be accepted and will be treated as missing work. Always turn in what you have completed on time rather than delaying in the hope that you will be able to do more.

[Last semesters, I found it necessary to clarify some more things about the reports.]({{ site.BaseURL }}/studies/grading/guideline)