CSC103 Weekly Schedule Fall 2012

--D. Thiebaut 12:05, 21 August 2012 (EDT)

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Office Hours: Tu-Th: 2:00-4:00 p.m. and by appointment.

Weekly Schedule

Week	Topics	Reading
Week 1 9/6	Thursday Introduction to the class and the 1/2 semester Organization of the class a short movie to get the discussion started... some examples of computers: Antikythera mechanism, oldest computer (start at 1min 47sec) Harvard research: 1.8 zettabytes in 4 grams of DNA Keywords: code: Translating from one system of values to another system. Electricity The Binary System: a system where the only two numbers available are 0 and 1. Every operation that we can do in decimal, with 10 digits, we can also do in binary. The Transistor: A switch controlled by electricity. Two giants for computer science: George Boole (1779-1848): logic expression = boolean expression. Logic: creating formulas where variables are combined by operators. The variables are boolean variables, the operators are logic operators. Any formula can be represented with a combination of just three operators: AND, OR, and NOT.	Reading Primary: Video (Part 2) on George Boole and Boolean Algebra. (5.18 min) Shannon's MIT Thesis, and boolean theory Counting in Binary Secondary:
Week 2 9/11	Tuesday A note on registering for CSC102 (Shameless plug for CS Facebook page) Three different "worlds": World 1 (Logic) World 2 (Technology) World 3 (Math) George Boole (1779-1848) Expressions that can be True or False Operators to combine expressions And, Or, Not Electricity Switches (transistors) ON/OFF The idea of a code Number systems Decimal: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 Binary: 0, 1 Logic: truth tables for AND, OR, and NOT operators Counting in decimal Counting in base 8: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 20, ... 76, 77, 100, 101, ... Interesting published research result: U. Penn designs first optical gate Thursday Counting in base 2 (binary) Adding in decimal Adding in base 2 Homework #1 and Solutions	Reading Primary: Video (Part 2) on George Boole and Boolean Algebra. (5.18 min) Shannon's MIT Thesis, and boolean theory Counting in Binary Secondary:
Week 3 9/18	Tuesday Q&A Review addition in base 2 Claude Shannon (1916-2001): writes a Master's thesis at MIT in 1948, which states that any binary numerical computation can be performed using logic expressions and logic operators. "The whole digital revolution started with [Shannon]" Logic Gates Data sheet for the AND gate. Data sheet for the OR gate. Data sheet for the NOT gate. ( All 3 gates in one pdf) Logic Design Logic-Gate Simulator Thursday HAPPY MOUNTAIN DAY!	Reading: Logic Gates on wikipedia: You can skip the Universal Logic Gate section, the De Morgan section, and the remaining sections until the end. A good introduction on the Logic Circuit Simulator which we use in Lab #1 A "HowTo" document for creating simple Wiki pages (to get you started for next week)
Week 4 9/25	Tuesday PC Demolition Lab (Ford Hall Foyer) . Prep Sheet. Photos of the event on Facebook Thursday Schematics from NASA, and a specific sheet showing logic gates. Lab #1 in FH241 Homework 2 and Solution	Reading A good introduction on the Logic Circuit Simulator (from Lab #1)
Week 5 10/2	Tuesday Some comments about the current homework. Creating a Wiki. Demonstration and introduction to the next homework assignment. Quick summary of PC Demolition Lab. What you needed to discover: The processor The Crystal The Random Access Memory (RAM) The power supply The mother board The hard disk The optical disk (DVD/CD player/burner) The Wiring Various Ports How hard disks work: Disassembling a PC: Video about the first personal computer (a bit of history!) Introduction to creating Wiki pages Introduction to Assembly Language: the secret language of the processor! Microprocessor and Assembly Language Let's play a game Thursday Assembly Language Programming. the xComputer Simulator the Instruction Set for our computer A first program A second program Execution of selected instructions (pdf) Lab Homework 3 (officially starts on 10/4, due 10/11)	Reading A good description of the Computer simulator You will find Wikipedia's description of the processor interesting. Concentrate mostly on the sections labeled Microprocessor, Operation, and Clock Rate.
Week 6 10/9	Tuesday: Fall Break Thursday Execution of selected instructions ( solution and template) Homework #4 and solutions	Reading Primary Jon von Neumann, who first defined the architecture of modern computers. We are still building computers according to his original unpublished draft Secondary von Neumann's draft new research in DNA computing: we are trying hard to find new ways to perform computation and leave the von Neumann architecture.
Week 7 10/16	Tuesday Example of a real Assembly Language program von Neumann's bottleneck John von Neumann The von Neumann bottleneck (pdf) Memory vs. processor. What do dimes and football fields have in common? Attempts to circumvent the bottleneck cache memory multicore architectures Introduction to Processing Thursday: Processing lab. Take-home Final Exam. and Solutions	Reading The Von Neumann Architecture
Week 8 10/23	Tuesday: Final Exam Q&A Introduction to Exponential Laws, Moore's Law, and Ray Kurzweil Quiz & Discussion of two papers on the concept of Singularity: Signs of the Singularity by Vernor Vinge. Can Machine Be Conscious?, Christof Koch and Giulio Tononi.	Reading/viewing And if you think the idea of the singularity is interesting and want to see how somebody pushes the idea even farther, watch this TED talk by Susan Blackmore!

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