CSCC73 -- Algorithm design and analysis

Index of this document

• Contact information and meeting times
• Course content
• Course policies
• Course documents
• Course forum

Contact information and meeting times

Office hours:  Mon and Wed 3:30-4:30, or by appointment

Office:  IA 4024 (Scarborough campus);  SF 2304B (St. George campus)

Telephone:  416-287-7256 (Scarborough campus);  416-978-6028 (St. George campus)

Email:  vassos@cs.toronto.edu

Office hours:  Held at the times and locations indicated in the table below.  Vassos's office hours start on Week 1; TAs' office hours start on Week 2.

Course web page:  http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~vassos/teaching/c73/

Course forum page: https://piazza.com/utoronto.ca/fall2026/cscc73h3flec01/home

Lecture times and locations:  LEC01 Mon 11-12 (SW 319) and Wed 9-11am (IA 2150)

Tutorial times and locations:  TUT01 Fri 1-2 (HW 214), TUT02 Fri 2-3 (HW 214).

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Course content

Prerequisites:  CSCB63, STAB52, and enrollment in a computer science subject POSt (or CGPA of 3.5 or higher).

Textbooks: 

• Hadzilacos.  Course Notes for CSCC73.

• Kleinberg and Tardos.  Algorithm Design. Addison Wesley 2006.
• Dasgupta, Papadimitriou, and Vazirani.  Algorithms. McGraw-Hill 2006.
• Erickson.  Algorithms.

Tentative weekly schedule (check regularly as it may change): 

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Course policies

Academic integrity:   Academic integrity is essential to the University of Toronto and so the University treats cases of cheating and plagiarism very seriously.  Academic offences relevant to this course include using someone else's ideas or words without appropriate attribution; obtaining or providing unauthorized assistance on any assignment, test, or exam; misrepresenting your identity; and falsifying or altering documentation.

Accessiblity:   If you have a disability or health condition that may require accommodation, please consult with AccessAbility Services (IA5105, 416-287-7560, ability.utsc@utoronto.ca) as soon as possible.  Enquiries to AccessAbility Services are confidential.  Their staff will help assess needs and, if appropriate, will provide referrals and arrange accommodations.

Evaluation:   There will be up to six equally-weighted homework assignments worth in total 30% of the course mark, a midterm test worth 25% of the course mark, and a final exam worth 45% of the course mark.  A mark of at least 40% on the final exam is required to pass the course.

Homework grading:  For each homework assignment we may grade only a selected (but not pre-announced) proper subset of the questions or parts thereof.  In that event, the homework assignment will be graded out of the total weight of the graded part of the assignment.

Late homework policy:  No late homeworks will be accepted.  If you miss a homework deadline because of a medical or personal exigency, you must fill out, in plain text, and email the course instructor the Special Consideration Form as soon as possible.  If the reason for missing the deadline is acceptable, the weight of the missed homework will be shifted to other components of your grade.

Homework collaboration policy:   In each homework assignment you may collaborate with at most one other student who is currently taking CSCC73.   If you collaborate with another student on an assignment, you and your partner must submit a single of your solution, as a group.  The solution will be graded in the usual way and both partners will receive the same grade.  Collaboration involving more than two students is not allowed.  For help with your homework you may consult only the instructor, TAs, your homework assignment partner (if you have one), the CSCC73 Course Notes, and your personal class notes.  You may not consult any other source, including AI-based tools (see AI policy below).

Regrading policy:   To submit a regrading request for an assignment or the midterm test you must fill out, in plain text, this form and email it to the course instructor no later than one week from the date the graded assignment or test was made available to the class.  (This period may be shorter for the last assignment, to ensure timely delivery of course grades.)  Regrading requests made after the deadline will not be accepted.  As a result of a regrading request your grade in the assignment may increase, remain unchanged, or decrease.

Regrading requests consume a large amount of the instructor's and TAs' time, both of which are in short supply.  Before making  a  regrading request, you must read and understand the provided solutions and think carefully about your own solution.  To discourage frivolous regrading requests we will apply the following rule:  A regrading request that does not result in increasing the grade of the  submitted assignment causes a "demerit'' to each of the student(s) who submitted the assignment in question.  We will not consider regrading requests for an assignment submitted by a student who has accumulated two such demerits.

Missed midterm test policy:    If you miss the midterm test due to a medical or personal exigency, get in touch with your instructor immediately, and fill out the Special Consideration Form.  There will be no make-up test, but if the reason for missing the test is acceptable, the weight of the missed midterm test will be shifted to the final examination.

1. Any aspect of the homework, including (but not limited to): seeking complete or partial solutions; seeking clarifications or hints (use office hours and the course forum for these); seeking confirmation of proposed solutions; and seeking improvements to proposed solutions, including grammar and phrasing.  You may use AI tools to produce drawings that you include in your answer or for advice on text-formatting tools such as latex.
   Keep in mind that there are tools that can help identify violations of this policy.  These range from technology-based mechanisms to old-fashioned ones such as being asked to explain your answers.
2. E-mail and course-forum posts: AI-generated emails and posts sound fake and are an automatic turn-off for the recipient.  Be genuine!

• I do not understand this paragraph in the notes.  Please explain it to me.  (Of course, you can instead ask your instructor or TAs, who might give you a more tailored answer.)
• Here is an example I created to help me understand some point the instructor made in the lecture.  Please check it for me.
• In class we learned algorithm X for problem Y.  Are there other well-known algorithms for this problem?
• Here is my solution for an exercise that is not assigned for homework.  Check it for me and propose improvements.  If my solution is wrong, tell me why but don't give me the correct answer, I want to find it by myself.

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Course documents

• Miscellaneous
  • How to succeed in CSCC73
    
  • Review of time complexity & asymptotic notation
    
  • Advice on presenting algorithms and proofs
    
  
  
• Assignments


• Assignment solutions (restricted access; user name and password given in the initial email to students)


• Past exams (restricted access; user name and password given in the initial email to students)
  
  • Fall 2024 midterm test
  • Fall 2024 final exam

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Course forum

• Take the time to formulate your postings clearly.
• Be courteous in your communications.
  
• Your postings must abide by the academic integrity policy and the homework collaboration policy.  Postings that offer hints on solutions to homework assignments violate these policies, unless they are provided by the instructor or TA. 
  
• Your postings can be made anonymously to other students (at your discretion), but not to the instructor.