University 101 - Risks and Technology

An index page for various class resources

last modified 01/10/2003

Syllabus

Readings

•     Oct. 30 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 54-56
•     Oct. 28 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 49-53
•     Oct. 23 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 47-48
•     Oct. 21 - Cuckoos's Egg, Chapters 43-46; also learn how GPAs are computed at St. Bonaventure
•     Oct. 16 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 39-42
•     Oct. 9 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 37-38
•     Oct. 7 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 33-36; also print out and read the ACM Code of Ethics
•     Oct. 2 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 31-32
•     Sept. 30 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 27-30
•     Sept. 25 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 25-26
•     Sept. 23 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 21-24
•     Sept. 18 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 19-20
•     Sept. 16 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 15-18
•     Sept. 11 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 13-14; Newsweek article distributed in class
•     Sept. 9 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 9-12
•     Sept. 4 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 7-8
•     Sept. 2 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 3-6
•     Aug. 28 - Cuckoo's Egg, Chapters 1-2

Homework

•     Public speaking assignment - you will be asked to give a five to ten minute talk on a topic of your choice, using whatever visual aids you wish.  The topic may come from one of your classes, but there is a small catch; the topic may NOT come from CS 131.  The talks will be given on Wednesday, Dec. 4, in class.  If you wish to use PowerPoint and the overhead projector, then you should get your presentation to me before 9 a.m. on Dec. 4.
•     Resume assignment
•     Learn about the Therac-25 prior to class on Wednesday, October 30.
•     Estimation assignment #5 - If you took a piece of normal paper and folded it, it is twice as thick as it used to be.  If you keep repeating this process, it gets thicker.  Assuming that you could actually effect the folds, how many folds would it take to reach from the earth to the sun?  ... Due in class on Wednesday, October 30.
•     Estimation assignment #4 - Same as #2, and #3, but this time you will pack them into a space.  Will they fill a shoebox?  A car?  A moving van?  A house?  A large building?  ...  Due in class on Wednesday, October 23. 
•     Don't forget to look at the scenario handed out in class and "match" it to the canons of the ACM Code of Ethics.
•     Estimation assignment #3 - Same as #2, but imagine that instead of covering the earth like a rug, you stacked them up to the sky.  (Don't worry about the stack falling over; assume it 'magically' stays up.)  Would the stack be as tall as you?  As tall as a house?  The Empire State Building?  A small mountain?  A big one?  Would it go out of the atmosphere?  To the moon?  To the sun?  Out of the solar system?  To another star?  Due in class on Wednesday, October 16.
•     Cornell note taking assignment
•     Estimation assignment #2 - "If you took all of the hamburgers McDonalds has ever sold and spread them out on the ground (as a carpet), how much area would they cover?  Your dorm room?  A football field?  Campus?  The town of Olean? The county?  The state?  The continental U.S?  North America?  The world?  How deep on the world?"  Write up a short answer detailing your assumptions and how you used them to reach your conclusions.  Helpful estimating data.  Whereas McDonalds now claims "Billions and billions served" on their signs, they used to keep a counter that periodically went up.  Alas, the counter had only two digits.  Some time in the 1980's, it switched to saying "Over 99 billion served" before assuming its current form.  Due in class on Wednesday, October 9. 
•     3 Questions assignment
•     Semester Schedule assignment 
•     Weekly Schedule assignment
•     Estimation assignment #1 - "If you had a giant tube of toothpaste and were to squeeze out all of the toothpaste that you would use in a lifetime in one long strand, how long would it be?"  Write up a short answer detailing your assumptions and how you used them to come to your conclusion.  [Incidentally, I looked up the population of Chicago on the web and found a site that puts it at 2.7 million.].  Due in class on Monday, Sept. 23.
•     Obtain a copy of the university catalog and bring it to class on Monday, Sept. 9
•     Prepare your two-minute talk for presentation in class on Sept. 4    
•     Kristen Nygaard and Edsger Dijkstra each died this month.  Who were they, and why should we, as computer scientists, care about their deaths?  Come to class on Wednesday (8/28) prepared to discuss these two people.
•     Send an email to dlevine@cs.sbu.edu from whatever email account is most likely to reach you should I need to contact you in a hurry.

Other stuff

•     At 12:30 on Wednesday, August 28, right after class, there will be a reception/announcement in the front of De La Roche Hall.  It is expected that all class members will be there.

Journal Topics

•     Weeks 7/8 - One of the entries for these two weeks should be, "My goals for the second half of the semester are..."
•     Week 6 - Both entries may be of your own choosing.
•     Week 5 - A time log for the next seven days.  Note that due to the "7-day" nature of this task, only one journal entry is due Friday, and the other will be due (and shouldn't be completed until...!) Monday.
•     Week 4 - Both entries may be of your own choosing.
•     Week 3 - Reaction to the Newsweek article and to the anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks
•     Week 2 - "The biggest surprise of my first ten days in college is..."
•     Week 1 - "My biggest challenge in college will be..."