getting started

hello

Welcome to the Fall 2020 Intro CS course.

I'll be posting notes here at least weekly to let you know what you should be doing each week, and to point you towards the other resources.

I'll also be making zoom videos of myself explaining some of the things that I would be saying in a face-to-face class, and having zoom sessions where you can ask questions and we can discuss the material.

All assignments and submitted work will be through this website. If for some reason you're having problems accessing it or something isn't working, email me, Jim Mahoney, at jimmahoney@bennington.edu .

topics

• foundation CS (Computer Science) course ... and useful for many other disciplines
• covers the core ideas of programming computers including functions, variables, data structures, loops and conditionals, with lots of examples and practice
• using the python programming language
  • popular & accessible
  • flexible & general purpose
  • runs easily on any operating system, with good support
  • version 3 of the language, the most recent, is what we'll use this term

computing

"Computing" is a big topic - see wikipedia's computing article for an overview of what it encompasses.

One of the central themes is "managing complexity", including documentation (writing down what we're doing) and tests (making sure things work). We'll be working on both of those this term.

Some of the areas are :

• computer science - understanding what computers can do, in theory and practice
• software engineering - using people and money efficiently to write software to solve real-world problems
• information technology - managing people's data : libraries, employment records, medical, books, money,
• information systems - managing big business computing needs ("enterprise")

with roles like

• data scientist - massage big piles of numbers into a meaningful form
• web developer - online content in its various forms
• system administrator - keep the hardware working
• computer programmer - any of the above

All of these overlap but emphasize different skills and topics.

And these days lots of fields from photography to plumbing to dance to horseback riding use computers for various parts of their workflow - they're just a really powerful tool.

The aim of this course is to give you some foundations, theory and practice on how to use this tool.

a sample python program

Our vehicle to get this foundation will mainly be the python programming language.

Here's a bit of python code, just to show you the sort of thing we'll be doing.

• string art

We will of course see lots more examples of programs as we go along this semester.

what you should do to get going

• Check out the syllabus, resources, and links on the left of this page.
• The first assignment is posted and due this Thursday, which outlines what you should be doing this week. In particular, the assignment includes
  • readings from the textbook (chapter 1)
  • a unix command line tutorial (aka "scavenger hunt")
  • questions for me to learn a bit about you
  • explanations for how to get python programs running.

first meetings

I will be holding zoom discussion and question sessions this week at

• Tues 2 - 5pm
• Tues 6 - 9pm (an extra time, just this week I think)
• Wed 6 - 9pm (regular office hours time)
• Thu 2 - 5pm
• Fri 2 - 5pm

It would be great to see you all at some point this Tuesday Sep 1 either in the afternoon or evening ... even though we aren't going to have regular classes where we all meet at once during the term.

We will be using the same zoom "virtual room" all semester; check out the links to the left after you log in (top right) to this site with your Bennington credentials.

My current plan is to hold regular zoom discussion / question-and-answer time from 2:00pm to 5:00pm every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday ,and Friday, and to have office hours 6:00pm to 9:00pm Wednesday nights.

You do not need to come to all of these - the idea is to have enough that you can participate as you see fit to get ask questions and discuss what we're doing.

getting help

• Stacy and Quang are the CS tutors. More info on their schedule will be coming soon.
• You can work with others in the class on homework, just make sure that you say when you submit your work who you worked with and who did what. In other words, quote your sources. See the syllabus for more on this.
• There's a slack channel for this class #fall20-introcs on bennington-cs.slack.com, which is a good place to ask questions. See the links to the left for an invite if you need one.
• Drop me an email at jimmahoney@bennington.edu if in doubt.