teaching machines

CS 145 Lecture 1 – Hi

September 2, 2015 by Chris Johnson. Filed under cs145, fall 2015, lectures.

Agenda

• bios
• awards
• what is computer science?
  • Made with Code with Miral Kotb
  • grammar
  • ignition
  • computer as calculator
• meta
  • labs
  • TAs
  • communication
• haiku

TODO

• Read the syllabus.
• Install the Java Development Kit, Eclipse, and the EGit plugin.
• Complete a short background survey. Worth a 1/4 sheet.
• Watch What Most Schools Don’t Teach.
• Read chapter 1 through section 1.3.
• Based on your readings and other activities of this class, write on a 1/4 of paper 2 questions and 2 observations to be turned in at the beginning of Friday’s lecture.

Note

When people give a talk, they sometimes say things like, “As I was preparing this talk, I saw the perfect example of…” Or an author might say, “While writing this book, I got a phone call from…” These sort of statements make me weep. Their self-reference shatters the illusion that I am actually being spoken to or written to personally. Instead of the speaker or author stopping by to communicate with me, they’ve just pulled me into their life. These sentences are meta, sentences about the sentences they are actually sharing with me.

I like to avoid meta as much as possible. I will not lecture about lecture. I will not break from my job of sharing the story of computer science by sharing the story of sharing the story of computer science. Except for today. Today is a metalecture.

This course is CS 145, where we learn how to teach machines. But first, because humans are the most important part of computer science, let’s get to know each other a bit. I’ll share a little about myself, and ask you a few things, like:

1. What’s your name?
2. Where are you from?
3. What’s the last unassigned book you read?
4. If not computers, what? (Outlawed answers: reinvent them.)

You folks are a force. There are around 109 of you. We’ll have a look at your majors. And classifications. Many of you are first-year students. Welcome to the university!

Then we’ll get a sample of what computer science actually looks like. We’ll write a program using a tool called Eclipse, which I ask you to download in the TODOs. Whenever we write programs in class, I will share them on these blog posts. (Meta!)

We’ll talk about the class structure: the topical themes, the labs, the homeworks, the TAs. Also, because this class is so large, we need to make sure we establish some protocol about communicating. Otherwise, I will be destroyed and you will be unhappy.

Finally, we’ll close with a haiku. These are sometimes obscure, but I like to write them to stretch my thinking. Sorry in advance.

Code

…

Haiku

Hibbard 100
Waiting to be filled with minds
Waiting to be filled