Instructor: Neil Immerman, immerman@cs.umass.edu
Most students will have had an undergraduate course in Automata and Formal Languages such as CS 401. For students who don't know this material, it is would be very helpful to read Chapters 1 and 2 of Sipser in advance and do the exercises to make sure you are understanding.
Work: Very important is that by the evening before each class at the latest, you will read the material for the upcoming class and email me with your thoughts, observations, questions and answers about the chapter (15% of grade). I will use your observations and answer your questions in a fairly interactive class where we will consolidate and build on what we've read. I'll send you notices in advance via Piazza of the sections to be read.
There will be approximately biweekly problem sets due Wednesday afternoons before 4:30 pm in the main office (25% of grade), an in-class Midterm (March 14) and a final (each 30% of grade). Please read the problems and think about them as soon as you get them. Please ask questions about the homework and lectures on Piazza, early and often! This will help everyone. Feel free to suggest answers to your classmates' questions. Mark and I will help sort out your questions and replies and add answers and comments of our own.
Cooperation: Students should talk to each other about the subject matter of this class and help each other. It is fine to discuss the problems and ask questions about them. I encourage such questions in class and office hours as well as elsewhere. However, there is a line past which you must not go, e.g., sharing or copying a solution is not okay and could result in failure. If a significant part of one of your solutions is due to someone else, or something you've read then you must acknowledge your source! Failure to do so is a serious academic violation, likely to result in failure of the course or worse. Furthermore, all solutions must be written by yourself, in your own words. You may get an idea from somewhere or someone and acknowledge that, but you must still understand it and explain it yourself. A copied solution, even with the source acknowledged will be considered plagiarism. The exception is if it is in quotation marks and cited specifically. But in this case, don't bother because you won't get credit for quoting someone else's solution.
Furthermore, please do not look up answers to problems, especially not on the web. The only appropriate places to look things up are in the text and your notes, and the notes I post. To do a problem, ask for clarifications until you understand the problem. Try it on small examples, play with it, make sure you understand the problem or ask a simple question about a small instance of the problem. Ask it on Piazza unless you think you might be giving something away in which case ask in office hours or by email.
Late Assignments: It is very important to do the problem sets on time as the problem sets pertain to the current course material. Late homeworks, no more than one week late will have 15 percent deducted.. Homeworks more than one week late will not be considered. Medical emergenicies, complete with doctor's notes are the only exception. Everyone will be allowed one late homework -- i.e., at most one week late -- during the semester without penalty and with no questions asked.
Homework Grading: The homework is corrected and graded by our TA. We will return your corrected homework to you together with model solutions one week after the homework is due. The homework is meant to be a learning experience and you are not expected to get every question right, but please do think about and try every question. Please read the model solutions and make sure that you understand them. This will help your understanding of the material. If you think something was graded incorrectly it is very important to bring it to our attention as soon as possible so that you can find out whether we made a mistake, or you are not understanding something that you thought you did.
Office Hours and Email: I am delighted to answer questions and discuss the course material -- broadly construed -- during and after class or discussion section, and during my office hours. It's also great to ask questions on Piazza where we can all benefit from the questions and their answers.