Final Post

It's the end of the semester and I'm glad to be writing my last sLog. Although, the sLog is good in idea, it was a bit tedious writing a sLog each week but I do see the wisdom in sLog writing though. I see how much I've come in the semester and how much my understanding has changed. I initially used to dread the idea of proof's but now they aren't as scary. Hands down my favourite subject thus far has been big O and Big Omega because it was math related. I didn't enjoy the venn diagrams in the beginning of the course. The last assignment I felt was the easiest thus far. The last question was a little challenging mainly because I didn't understand it as well as the other sections. All in all I can I say I learned a lot and will take this knowledge with me far into the future. Thanks to the professors and TA's for making this a valuable learning experience.

Assignment is SO HARD

This assignment is taking me forever to do but I feel like it's the most straight forward thus far. It took me an entire day to do but I think I enjoyed the assignment. Hopefully, its good preparation for the final exam.

Test 2 Thoughts

I thought the test went well. It was similar to the assignment. I definitely  thought it was easier than the first test. The assignment was excellent preparation for the test and I'm hoping the third assignment will become good preparation for the final exam.  I had the most trouble with the second question. You had to define the d = _____ ( something) and when I left the exam I remembered what I should have put!

def order(L):
        """ (list of numbers) -> None

Order L from smallest to largest. L is changed in-place. """ i=1
while i < len(L): j=i
while j > 0 and L[j] < L[j-1]:
L[j], L[j-1] = L[j-1], L[j] # swap L[j] and L[j-1] j=j-1
i=i+1


This question was done in tutorial. This took me a while to understand and figure out. I finally truly understood how to do it after the TA Christine did it on the board. The easiest way of thinking about figuring out how many steps there are is to think tally each step on the side of the code.

Penny Problem

 Understand the problem

Left drawer has 64 pennies and the right one has none.

1. First Question

Can you arrange things so that one of the drawers has 48 pennies, using the following two operations:

l: If the left drawer has an even number of pennies, you may transfer half of them to the right drawer. If the left drawer has an odd number of pennies, operation l is disallowed.

r: If the right drawer has an even number of pennies, you may transfer half of them to the left drawer. If the right drawer has an odd number of pennies, operation r is disallowed. 

2. Second Question

What about arranging things so that one of the piles has other numbers in the range [0,64]

3.Third Question

What about starting with a different number of pennies in the left drawer?

Devise a plan

Work Backwards

Carry out the plan

First Question
48 - 16

32  - 32

64  - 0

Second Question/Third Question: You can still be successful.
34 - 30
60 - 4
62 - 2
63 - 1
64 - 0

Look back 

Pretty simple after using the hint of working backwords.

Week 6 Recap

This was a light week. No tutorials and no quiz which was a nice treat seeing as it's now midterm season. We haven't received our tests yet or the assignment marks which is making me still a bit anxious but these things take time, so I'm not too worried. I'm really enjoying this section of the course thus far. We are now proving non boolean functions, proving if a statement is false and we learned about limits.  Non boolean means that it doesn't return true or false. An example would be x>5 or sinx. We used the floor [x] which means function of x to prove or disprove a statement . Some techniques learned to also prove that are (for fun) would be tautology( which is basically saying something is true because it is true), proof by intimdiation( saying " trivial" or "don't be stupid of course its true") and my own personal favourite proof by intuition ( "my gut feeling").

Week 5

This week was evaluation heavy in terms of the midterm and quiz. The midterm I thought was quite fair because they were similar to the past test and assignment but I felt that having a question where you needed to understand code wasn't the greatest idea. The TA seemed a little overwhelmed with all of the questions students were asking. I think this could have been avoided if their was a little explanation of the methods any and all. The quiz again in the same week was interesting studying for two evaluations but I feel like it helped me get caught up fully in the course which is only a positive. I think more practice problems that aren't for marks would actually benefit me more because I feel like I'm not getting enough practice. Perhaps extra problems would help me test my knowledge.

I'm really enjoying the first two weeks of the course. This course has in the two weeks changed the way I rationalize and think about my thoughts. I feel like its making an impact on my day to day life. Which, is actually pretty great because I'm the most indecisive person to ever exist. The material covered in class seems very clear and is going at a good pace. I've taken a previous course with professor Danny Heap and I'm used to his teaching style. The tutorial quiz this week I also thought was quite fair. Although, it took me a while to understand the tutorial questions assignment. I thought the second question didn't explain the premises T very well. It was confusing in my opinion. I was happy to see the quiz reflect the homework and hopefully I do well in it.