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All right! Hopefully we've all successfully completed Problem Set 0 and are ready to tackle Lecture 2. Note that there is a handout associated with this lecture, and having it printed out before starting is a really helpful thing. Not that I had to stop and print it in the middle of lecture or anything...

Also, since our problem set numbers started with 0, I'm going to put up a post for PS1 this Friday. From that point on, problem sets will go up every other week.

( The lecture video is embedded under the cut )

I had one problem with this lecture, and I'm hoping you all can facilitate a light bulb moment. The code example with x, y and z, the fourth one down the page... I can't figure out what the bug was. Is it just because the statements aren't indented, or is there something else?

winterthunder

All right! Looking at my schedule for the coming weeks, I think I'm going to add a readings and problem set post on Fridays, just to keep them separate from the lectures and to give everyone time to digest and discuss the information before we dive into the next lecture. (This will also give me an extra kick in the rear mid-week to get everything done!)

Thusfar, I've read through chapter 1 and chapter 2 of How to Think Like a Computer Scientist, the variables and strings and input and output sections of Python Programming, and the variables tutorial on Pythonista. They're a bit repetitive, but repetition is good for my brain! If you're a visual learner, do the tutorial on Pythonista first, because there's a really nice series of images there.

Out of the readings, the only thing that gave me pause was the minutes since midnight program in Chapter 2. I'm not sure exactly why... I didn't define hours and minutes when I first ran the example, and then after defining them it seemed a bit useless to write a program that only gave the correct answer at that exact moment. (Anyone watch Alice in Wonderland as a kid? That scene where they're cleaning the attic - "This old clock; it tells the right time twice a day. As for the rest? While, maybe not...") Regardless, I ought to go back to that when I'm not tired and trying to do all the readings in one chunk. Did anyone else have trouble with that one, or with anything else in the readings?

And then, PS0! As

smc1225 graciously pointed out, you have to open a new window to write your code and then run it. This link, which she (guessing gender from the list of feeds on your profile,

smc1225; my most humble apologies if I'm wrong) found when the November group went through PS0, is massively helpful.

So, who's finished PS0? I can't create polls, apparently, but let's report in on our successes and mistakes before we plunge onward into lecture 2!

Edit: Oh, wow, someone gave me paid time! Thanks, oh anonymous benefactor!

Edit 2: Ok, it appears I'm not allowed to insert polls into pre-paid time posts. But, in the future, there will be fun with polls! :D

winterthunder

All right! Computer science skillz, here we come!

If you haven't already, take a look over at this page and make sure you have the correct version of Python installed on your computer. Remember, if you install 3.0 the code you write in this course will not be compatible.

Lecture 1 video is here, and covers definitions and other introductory things. In an ideal world, I would have watched it already, but it's currently playing in another window while I multi-task, and I didn't want to wait any longer to put this post up. It seems basic thus far, but I shall edit this post if I come up with any questions. Also, feel free to comment with anything that doesn't make sense to you. We have over 25 people following along and we're all beginners, so we should be helping each other out. :)

Edit 1:

Ok, I've watched the lecture, and aside from not being able to see what he's typing on the computer screen, I'm feeling pretty good. I'm going to take some time over the next few days to dig into the readings and see if I can't get an idea of what was on the screen.

winterthunder

Is anyone out there still interested in starting this in January? I'm happy to lead a group, so to speak, as I'm definitely still interested. I'd like to do one lecture a week, though, as opposed to two...

elz

Link to video and handout

( Floating point numbers, successive refinement, finding roots )

Poll #1798

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 2

View Respondents

Post-Thanksgiving Tickybox

View Answers

Finished lecture 5!
2 (100.0%)

(Got a bit of catching up to do myself after last week!)

elz

Link to video and handout + Problem set 3

( Decomposition and abstraction through functions; introduction to recursion )

Poll #1733

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 6

View Respondents

Revenge of the tickyboxes

View Answers

Finished lecture 4
6 (100.0%)

Finished problem set 3
1 (16.7%)

Also! I was thinking, Google Code has some handy code review and commenting features, and who doesn't love version control, right? *g* So I set up an intro-cs-dw Mercurial project over there. I've never actually used Mercurial before, but I like having excuses to learn new things.

To get set up:

1) Email or pm me or leave me a comment and I'll add you as a project committer.

2) Add a folder with your name on it and put your problem set solutions in there.

That way if you want to collaborate with someone or leave helpful feedback or read other people's code, it should be a little easier than using the DW comments.

elz

I'm planning to post lecture 4 today, but I also thought maybe we could do some brainstorming. How are you doing so far? Finding anything confusing or the pace too fast? Would it be helpful to have some simpler, less MIT-ish problems to warm up with? A weekly chat option to go over things or watch the lectures? Partners to work on the problem sets with?

Fire away with any ideas and suggestions!

elz

Post and discuss your answers in the comments! (And yay for everybody who posted problem set 1 answers!)

elz

Link to video and handout + Problem set 2

( Common code patterns: iterative programs )

Poll #1725

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 9

View Respondents

How's it going?

View Answers

Finished lecture 3
9 (100.0%)

Finished problem set 2
3 (33.3%)

elz

First:

Poll #1689

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 25

View Respondents

Tickyboxes!

View Answers

Finished lecture 2
24 (96.0%)

Finished problem set 1
15 (60.0%)

Also, it occurs to me that it might be handy to have a place to post/discuss solutions to the problem sets, to see what we can learn from each other in the absence of TAs. If you actually go to MIT and the problem sets are still the same, don't read these. ;)

Fire away!

elz

( Operators and operands; statements; branching, conditionals, and iteration )

Problem set 1: Computing prime numbers, product of primes

This one's a little trickier, so feel free to comment if you run into any problems or want to brainstorm with other people!

(eta: having issues with poll, alas)

elz

Summary: "Goals of the course; what is computation; introduction to data types, operators, and variables"

( Embedded video - you can also get it from iTunes )

( Problem Set 0 )

And a link back to the rest of the readings for the first three lectures.

And since being able to check off tickyboxes gives me a sense of accomplishment:

Poll #1651

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 40

View Respondents

Lecture 1

View Answers

Finished it!
38 (100.0%)

Problem Set 0

View Answers

Finished it!
38 (100.0%)

elz

Welcome, everybody! On request, we're going to start with Lecture 1 next Monday, 11/9. However, there's quite a bit of reading associated with the first three lectures - here's what it says at the site:

Lectures 1-3

Introduction: Chapter 1 of How to Think Like a Computer Scientist

Variables and statements: Chapter 2 of How to Think Like a Computer Scientist

Strings: Variables and strings section of Python Programming (also, the
strings section)

Python variables are names: Other languages have "variables", from Code Like A Pythonista: Idiomatic Python

For PS0: Input/output section of Python Programming

Conditionals: Chapter 4 of How to Think Like a Computer Scientist (through section 4.8), and the conditional statements section of Python Programming

Iteration: Loops section of Python Programming

Tuples: Tuples section from Dive Into Python and the tuples and sequences section of the Python Tutorial

More on traversing and slicing strings: Chapter 7 of How to Think Like a Computer Scientist

You may want to wait until you've got more context, but if you want to start in on any reading or material this week, here's a place to talk about it!

elz

Before you can write code in Python, you'll want to make sure it's installed on your computer. There's a PDF on the assignments page about getting started with Python and IDLE. It also says:

Warning: On the Python homepage, the latest version available for download is actually 3.0. Do not install this! This version is not backwards compatible with the code that you'll be writing in this course (for example, you have to type print("test") instead of print test.)

Here's a direct link to the Python download page - it looks like we'll want to use 2.6.4.

(My notes so far: installing on Windows is a snap. Shall investigate further on OS X and Ubuntu - I know Python is installed, but I'm not sure IDLE is.)

Comment if you run into any problems or have any advice!

elz

Taking advantage of DW's new community sticky feature:

This is a community for people following along with MIT 6.00: Introduction to Computer Science and Programming, which is part of their OpenCourseWare project; the lectures, reading assignments and problem sets are all free and available online. The goal is to do a first run-through from November 2009 - February 2010, although obviously you can go at your own pace, and it would be great to muster up enough people to support each other on different timeframes (one lecture a week or starting after the new year).

Feel free to join in at any point! No programming experience necessary.

ETA: If you don't have a dreamwidth account but would like one, check out

dw_codesharing or drop me a line.

elz

Okay, so, picking a schedule!

There are 24 lecture videos for the class, so what I'd like to aim to do is start with lecture #1 next week (11/2), do two a week on Mondays and Wednesdays, take a break around Christmas and New Year's and finish up the first week in February.

I'm thinking that if there are enough people who have different scheduling needs, we could try to split it up something like this:

a) Twice a week, start in November - finish early February
b) Once a week, start in November - finish end of April
c) Twice a week, start in January - finish March/April

Then also if you had to jump in and out at any point, you could pick back up with whichever pace fit best.

The tricky part about learning on your own, at least for me, is the lack of dates to have to stick to and the lack of anything prodding me to put down the novel, turn off the CSI rerun, etc. and do some serious reading or lecture-watching. So you want enough flexibility that you don't get overwhelmed, but not so much that you get... underwhelmed.

Thoughts?

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Introduction to Computer Science

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