Brainstorm Problem-Solving!

Hi guys! In my last blog I mentioned posting a short brainstorm blog outlining my approach to Q1 in Assignment 2. Here it is! If you don't recall, this is the first part of the question where we are asked to come up with a recursive definition for the number of OMCOFS in a binary string of length n. What follows is the outline of how I derived the recurrence!

Continuing struggles and Term-Test 2!

Hello again! As all of you are probably equally happy knowing that Term-Test Two was last week, and is thankfully over now, I wish to take a step back and share with you a portion of my experience with A2. In my last post I mentioned that I was having trouble unwinding the recursive definition that was found in question one. The week the assignment was due, Professor Heap mentioned some things in lecture regarding question one and the formula that could be found in the course notes containing the closed form for the Fibonacci sequence. I still had no idea whether or not we were suppose to use that,

given the fact that it was not the result of my unwinding, and the whole idea of using some messy looking equation with weird symbols scared me just a little bit. I ended up not using it, and as a result, I may have seriously hampered my grade for this second assignment. However, now that the assignment is due and I had a chance to look at the sample solution. I realized although I stopped a step short of the final answer, and will more than likely suffer a hefty grade penalty, I felt that I approached the question in the right way,  and as a result I think I'll be happy with whatever mark I get. I plan on writing up a short brainstorm blog explaining how I approached Q1 in my next post.

I hope everyone found the second Term-Test fair, and that everyone gets a grade they were hoping for. I noticed there was some controversial issues being discussed in Piazza regarding the morning and evening section mid-terms, the morning section writing theirs a couple days before the evening students and getting significantly less study time. I don't wish to comment on what I feel is fair or unfair, because I know that every student has different circumstances they're working under and are all trying to manage their time the best way they know how. What I will mention is, although issues concerning the course should be brought to the Professor's attention, anyone with concerns needs to realize he can only do so much to cater to every student's needs. And more importantly, to realize every student has different needs. 

With that being said, I hope everyone enjoys the short break, and wish everyone good luck on the upcoming A3. (...I hope I didn't fail T2......)

A2 Progress

Hello everyone! I hope assignment 2 is going well for everybody. I, myself am not quite there yet.

I am making progress on the second question, but I'm running into a couple of problems trying to tackle that pesky question one. I may, or may not be tragically stuck. I spent quite a lot of time in the beginning trying to grasp what the heck an OMCOF is, and I spent even more time trying to come up with a recursive definition for H(n). I succeeding in doing so, but now, I'm having an extremely difficult time unwinding my definition trying to find it's closed-form. This difficulty has lead me to believing that my recursive definition may perhaps be incorrect. However, I'm having an even more difficult time trying to accept this fact, which, unfortunately has lead me to wasting quite a bit of time stubbornly trying to prove my instincts wrong. And even more unfortunately so,
I believe I am wrong in believing in that my instincts were wrong. You know when you're wrong, but you don't want to be wrong because you're too lazy to find out why you were wrong? So, you sit there and argue long enough to convince yourself you're right? 

........I might fail this assignment. ..*Note to self: Visit office hours this week.*

The course right now is starting to get really tricky! It also doesn't help now that we are more than halfway through the semester and homework seems to keep piling on and on. Working with recurrences, divide and conquer algorithms, and doing proofs using the Master Theorem right now is a little daunting to the say the least. I'm also finding that the lectures are getting a little bit harder to follow with some of this new material being introduced. I will have to make time to put some extra effort in, like reading the chapters before classes to prepare for lectures as well as doing many more practice questions, and getting extra help where needed. Hopefully, I will get question one sorted out before Friday. Let's just try our best, and then hope for the best! Good luck everybody.

Perfect Timing Time Complexity!

Hey guys. We just started on time complexity in CSC236, and I remember it was one of the last topics we briefly got introduced to in CSC165. I also remember not understanding it very well. Last week we started complexity of recursive functions and unfortunately, the one hour lecture was right after the Term-test and so I found it extremely difficult to stay focused. The result of that was not very pleasant, as I struggled with the quiz question on the day of the tutorial. Being swamped with other courses, I failed to prepare as well I wanted.

This week we're continuing with complexity and the material seems to be getting more and more dense,

as scary algorithm's and Big-O notation start creeping there way into the course. 

We haven't even gotten A1 marks back yet, I can't believe A2 is already out! I wish we had more time.

A2 IS ONLY 2 QUESTIONS THOUGH! YESS! OK I CAN DO IT.  HAHaHahaaha... *Ahem*

I hope they don't end up being extremely difficult.

I'm going to go read the questions over and start brainstorming, get a handle on things so I can figure out how to proceed. I feel like proofs are very peculiar. By taking your time and handling things one step at a time, and being careful along the way, the answer often comes naturally!

(If it doesn't come naturally, I often get stuck.)
Good luck on assignment 2 everybody.

First Post

Before I begin posting, I'd like to say hello and welcome to Professor Heap, the TA's, and any fellow students that may or may not read this blog.

*Ahem* Sup everyone.

A little introduction:

I took CSC165H1 last year and I found it to be a really satisfying course. The material was completely new to me, and at first, I found the nature of the course a little abstract and difficult to follow. Thankfully, I had an amazing Lecturer that presented all of the material in a way that I was able to follow. (*Ahem* ...P(failblog)=True.. by contradiction..?) I often like to claim Francois Pitt is one of the primary factors that contributed to my passing of CSC165H1. The way Francois taught that course last year always left an impression on me. I don't know if anyone felt the same way. Thank you, Professor Pitt!

Currently in CSC236H1: Five weeks in - A1, Term-Test1 done! HOO-RAHH~!

Five weeks have gone by in CSC236H1, and so far it's been good! I don't know any of my marks yet, so I don't know how im doing, but I am enjoying the course and the way it's being taught. I feel Professor Heap's tutorial-style lectures are effective, and highly appropriate. The lectures in 165H1 were more dense, and required a little more technicality that we needed to familiarize ourselves with, as we were just learning the formalization of the proof. But now that we have that background, it enables Professor Heap to introduce us to new kinds of proofs and new ideas, in a less formal and rigorous manner, building on the things we learned in 165H1 and allowing us to fill in the gaps. With some time, effort, and dedication, my hope is that I'll be prepared to fill in those gaps when the need arrives. I hope the same for any of my fellow students reading this blog!