Main Course Webpage
General information
The
Course
Discussion Board
will be used for all announcements.
During the term,
you can access your grades on the
CDF secure website
for students.
Here are some guidelines for electronic communication
(email and forum postings).
These are meant to allow us
to better cope with the potentially high volume of email we receive,
and to answer all of your queries more efficiently.
-
Please use email for personal matters only;
post all other questions/comments on the course forum,
where everyone can benefit from the answer.
-
Please use a descriptive subject line — be specific
(for email, always include the course number).
-
To help prevent your messages being incorrectly tagged as spam,
please email or post from your CDF account or your UTORmail account
(www.utorid.utoronto.ca)
and
avoid using
HTML or MIME.
-
We will generally answer queries
within two business days
(not counting weekends),
although we may take longer
during particularly busy times
(e.g., around assignment due dates).
For your own sake,
please do not rely on getting same-day answers
(which we do not have the resources to guarantee,
unfortunately).
Giving feedback
Rather than wait until the official course evaluations
at the end of the term,
by which point it's too late to make a difference,
please feel free to get in touch with me at any point during the term
with any suggestion or concern
that you have about any aspect of the course.
In particular, don't hesitate to let me know
if there are aspects of the course that you particularly like,
so that I can keep them that way,
or if there are specific aspects that you dislike,
so that I can make changes
(or discuss with you my reasons for doing things that way).
If you are uncomfortable bringing your concerns directly to me,
you might consider mentionning it to your TA
so that they can pass them on to me.
Failing that,
feel free to use any means that make you more comfortable
to give me feedback:
writing a letter and slipping it under my door,
sending anonymous e-mail, etc.
(But don't abuse that:
it's hard to get a discussion started
when you cannot reply to the other person,
and some of those issues undoubtedly require discussion!)
Note that this does not mean that
I will accept unfounded complaints!
If you have a complaint or criticism
that you are ready to discuss in a reasonable manner, that's great.
If you are merely unhappy about your marks
(or for whatever other reason)
and you have nothing constructive to say
(e.g., "this course is terrible",
with no thought about why or how it is terrible),
then you should wait and think it over
until you come up with something more concrete that we can work with.
Remember that the goal is to help improve the course
— not just to vent.
But please do think about it and let me know!
Contact information
Instructor
Instructor's Office Hours
W 3–4, R 1:30–3:30, F 2:00–3:30
in room BA 4264.
Lectures and Tutorials
Lectures: WF 1 in room BA 1180
Tutorials: M 1
| in room |
for students whose last name starts with |
|---|
| BA 2195 |
A–F and O–Q |
| BA 2165 |
G–Ma and Me–N |
| BA 2155 |
Si–Z and R–Sh |
Grading scheme
| Work |
Weight |
|---|
| 4 Assignments: |
40% (10% each) |
| 1 Midterm Test: |
15% |
| 1 Final Examination: |
45% |
-
Assignments may be completed in pairs (2 students).
(Details of the mechanisms for this can be found
on the Homework page.)
-
The Midterm Test will be closed-book;
you will be allowed one aid sheet for the final exam
(details will be posted on
the Test/Exam page).
-
On tests and exam,
answering "I don't know" (and nothing else)
is worth 20%,
to encourage awareness of (and honesty about)
your level of understanding.
This does not apply to assignments,
where you have time to ask questions and learn.
(See the Test/Exam page for details.)
-
In order to pass the course, you must achieve a mark of at least
33.33% on the final examination.
In other words,
you will automatically fail the course
(your final mark will be lowered below a passing grade)
if your mark on the final exam is below 33.33%,
irrespective of your computed final mark.
-
See below for
the assignment and test dates,
and for the course policies on
special consideration and
remarking requests.
-
Check the Homework page
and the Test/Exam page
for more information and policies specific
to each assignment or term test.
Important dates
| Date(s) |
Event |
|---|
| Monday 5 January |
First day of classes |
| Sunday 18 January |
Deadline to enrol |
| Wednesday 28 January |
Assignment 1 due |
| February 16–20 |
Reading Week |
| Wednesday 25 February |
Assignment 2 due |
| Wednesday 4 March |
Midterm Test |
| Sunday 8 March |
Deadline to drop |
| Wednesday 25 March |
Assignment 3 due |
| Wednesday 8 April |
Assignment 4 due |
| Thursday 9 April |
Last day of classes |
| Friday 10 April |
University Closed (Good Friday) |
| April 20–May 8 |
Final Examination period |
-
Homework assignments are due
by the start of lecture on their due date.
See the Homework page
for submission instructions.
-
Late assignments will be penalized by 20% for each day of lateness,
unless you request special consideration — see below for
how to request special consideration
in case of illness or other unusual circumstances.
Policy on special consideration
If you are unable to complete homework or if you miss a term test
due to major illness or other circumstances
completely outside of your control,
please contact your instructor immediately
in order to receive special consideration.
Note that special consideration
will be considered on an individual basis
and will not be given automatically.
In order to receive special consideration,
you must fill out the following
Request for Special Consideration
form and bring it to your instructor
together with your supporting documentation.
In the case of illness,
medical documentation must be supplied
on the standard University of Toronto
Student
Medical Certificate
(Adobe PDF document).
You can also obtain a paper copy of this certificate
from your college registrar
or in your registration handbook.
(A simple "note" from your doctor is unfortunately not acceptable.)
Policy on remarking requests
-
All remarking requests must be received
within one month of the date
when the assignment or test was returned.
(It is your responsibility
to pick up your assignment or test
from the instructor during office hours,
if you were not in class when it was returned.)
-
Your mark will decrease
if the marker sees something
that was incorrectly awarded too high a mark.
-
If there is a simple addition mistake in your assignment or test,
just show the work to your instructor
(not your TA).
-
For all other remarking requests,
please print
this remarking form,
fill it in completely,
and attach it to your assignment or test.
(Remarking requests will not be considered
if the remarking form is missing or incomplete.)
You must be specific
and clearly demonstrate that the marking scheme
was not followed correctly for your assignment or test.
Note that marks are awarded based on merit,
not on need,
so statements like
"I worked really hard" or
"I really need those marks"
are unfortunately not good reasons.
-
Give the form and your assignment or test
directly to the marker or to your instructor.
Remember to submit your work together with the form.
If you are comparing your work to that of another student,
hand in BOTH assignments or tests
(your request will be ignored otherwise).
-
If you are still not satisfied
after getting back your remarked assignment
(or after having a meeting with the marker),
contact your instructor
to discuss your situation.
Course Textbook
"Concepts in Programming Languages" by John C. Mitchell.
Copyright 2003 Cambridge University Press.
ISBN: 0-521-78098-5.
Note:
The course textbook is available as a
free
online e-book
to all UofT students
(log in using your UTORid or TCard number)!
Additional References
General
-
"Concepts of Programming Languages", 8th ed.
by Robert W. Sebesta.
Copyright 2007 Addison-Wesley.
On context-free grammars and formal languages
-
"Introduction to Languages and the Theory of Computation", 3rd ed.
by John Martin.
Copyright 2003 McGraw-Hill.
(Specifically Parts II and III, Chapters 3–8.)
-
"Introduction to the Theory of Computation", 2nd ed.
by Michael Sipser.
Copyright 2006 Thomson Course Technology.
(Specifically Part 1, Chapters 1 and 2.)
On specific programming languages
-
"Elements of ML Programming", 2nd ed.
by Jeffrey D. Ullman.
Copyright 1997 Prentice Hall.
-
"Prolog: Programming for Artificial Intelligence", 3rd ed.
by Ivan Bratko.
Copyright 2001 Addison-Wesley.
Useful links
|
![[FP]](images/fp.png){kind=small}
