CSCI 310 Organization of Programming Languages

Section 01

Meeting Time/Place:     MWF 11-11:50pm Fitzelle 218

Prerequisites:               CSCI 203

Instructor:                    Don Allison

Office:                          225 Fitzelle Hall

Phone:                         436-3439

Email:                          allisodl@oneonta.edu

Office Hours:                Wednesday 1:40-4pm

                                    Friday 2:15-5pm

                                    Others by appointment (or just drop by)

 

Text and Software:  The text for this course is Concepts of Programming Languages, by Robert Sebesta, 8th edition, ISBN 0-321-49362-1, published by McGraw-HAddison-Wesley in 2008.  We will also be using several different computer languages for various programming projects.  These will be available in the department lab.  If you want to install them on your personal computer, you can find them at the following sites:

 

GNU Common Lisp: http://clisp.cons.org/

SWI Prolog: http://www.swi-prolog.org/

Python: http://www.python.org/

Python tutorials: http://www.python.org/doc/

 

Course Description (from the catalog):  Analyzes programming languages in terms of their features and limitations based on run-time behavior.  Presents two or three languages for in-depth study.  These may include, for example, SNOBOL, LISP, Prolog, APL, and PL/1.  Students complete applications projects chosen specifically to exhibit the power and limitations of languages presented.

 

Course Description (the inside scoop): The purpose of this course is to examine the features of programming languages, why they were designed the way they were, and how they are implemented.  We will examine three main programming paradigms: functional programming, logic programming, and procedural/object-oriented programming, spending the most time on the latter.  The current programming language landscape will also be placed in historical perspective so that students may appreciate how hardware and programming language capabilities evolved together and how software engineering has driven and been driven by programming language development.

 

Course Goals  By the end of the course students should be conversant with the different programming paradigms, and should have experienced the process of learning a new language on the fly while also using it to complete a project.  Students should have a reasonable grasp of the basic features of programming languages, and how each feature affects the implementation of that language.

 

Tentative Schedule:

 

Date

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

Friday

Jan 12-Jan 16

 

Last day to register

Classes begin

Add/drop begins

Background email assignment due

 

Read Chapter 1 Preliminaries

Jan 19-Jan 23

Martin Luther King Day – admin offices open

Add/drop ends

Last day to sign up for P/F

Inauguration Day

 

Read Chapter 2 Evolution of the Major Programming Languages

Jan 26-Jan 30

Chinese New Year

Last day to add a full semester course

 

Read Chapter 15 Functional Programming Languages

Feb 2-Feb 6

Superbowl was yesterday

Groundhog Day

May graduation application deadline

 

 

Lisp assignment due

Feb 9-Feb 13

 

 

TAP Certification begins

Read Chapter 16 Logic Programming Languages

Feb 16-Feb 20

President’s Day

College closes after last class

MIDTERM EXAM #1

Feb 23-Feb 27

Graduate admissions applications due

Break

Mardi Gras

Break

Ash Wednesday

Break

Break

Break

Mar 2-Mar 6

Classes resume

Summer session registration begins

Dr. Suess birthday

Read Across America Day

 

 

 

Read Chapter 3 Describing Syntax and Semantics

Mar 9-Mar 13

Daylight Savings Time started yesterday morning…did you set your clock ahead?

Purim

Interim grades due from faculty

 

Read Chapter 4 Lexical and Syntax Analysis

Mar 16-Mar 20

Prolog assignment due

St. Patrick’s Day

 

LAST DAY TO DROP A CLASS

First day of spring

Read Chapter 5 Names, Bindings, Type Checking, and Scopes

Mar 23-Mar 27

Read Chapter 6 Data Types

Mar 30-Apr 3

 

April Fools

 

Python assignment due

College closes after last class

Apr 6-Apr 10

Break

Break

Break

Break

Passover

Break

Good Friday

Apr 13-Apr 17

Easter Monday

Last day for students to make up I or P grades from fall 2008

Classes resume

Income Taxes Due

 

Last day for faculty to turn in grades to replace I/P grades

Read Chapter 7 Expressions and Assignment Statements

MIDTERM EXAM #2

SAMPLE TEST

Apr 20-Apr 24

Begin fall pre-enrollment

Earth Day

Administrative Professional’s Day

Last day to withdraw from college

Arbor Day

Read Chapter 8 Statement Level Control Structures

Apr 27-May 1

Language Design project due

 

 

May Day

Read Chapter 9 Subprograms

Read Chapter 10 Implementing Subprograms

May 4-May 8

Presentation of Language Design Projects

Cinco de Mayo

National Teachers’ Day

Last day of class

Final Exams Begin

8-10:30am TR10

11am-1:30pm TR4

2-4:30pm TR12

8-10:30am MWF10

11am-1:30PM MWF2

2-4:30pm MWF12

May 11-May 15

Mother’s Day was yesterday—did you remember??

8-10:30am MWF9

11am-1:30pm MWF1

2-4:30pm MWF11

Final Exam 2pm

Nurses’ Day

8-10:30am TR8

11am-1:30pm TR2

8-10:30am MWF8

11am-1:30pm MWF3

Final Exams End

 

Commencement, Saturday May 16

Armed Forces Day Saturday May 16

 

 

Attendance Policy:  Attendance is STRONGLY encouraged.  Attendance will be taken at random class meetings.  All college policies regarding attendance will be followed.  You will be responsible for material covered in the as well as the material in the text.  In addition, we will be discussing the exams and programming projects in class, writing sample code for them, and so on, as well as answering questions about the assigned material, so it is in your best interest to attend class as much as possible.

 

Collaboration Policy:  Cheating or other academic dishonesty hurts others as well as yourself and will not be tolerated!  Since one goal of this class is to provide you with experience with larger programming projects similar to those in the real world, like the real world it IS acceptable to collaborate with your classmates, under certain conditions.  All work submitted on the exams should be yours and yours alone.  It IS acceptable to discuss the programming projects among yourselves, AS LONG AS any code you turn in you have written yourself!  You should also be able to answer any questions I have about your code—in other words, you should be able to explain the algorithms and data structures you are using in your program if I ask.  Plagiarism can get you in trouble in the “real world”, and it will get you in trouble in this class.  You should credit any code that you did not write yourself, and you should provide references to algorithms and data structures you use!

 

Programming Style Guidelines:  Since this is an upper division course, it is expected that your programs will follow good programming style conventions for the language you are using.  You should indent your code to reflect its internal structure.  You should use block comments to explain what your code is doing at a high level.  Each function should have a header that gives the function name, the inputs, the output(s), and lists any side effects, as well as providing a two or three sentence summary of what the function does.  In addition, your main program file should have a block header similar to the following:

 

! CSCI 310 Organization of Programming Languages, Spring 2009

! Program #1: Functional Programming

! Author: Don Allison

! Date Due: 6 February 2009

!

! This program illustrates the functional programming paradigm.

 

Your header should include the course name and number, the assignment number, your name, the program due date, and a two or three sentence description of the purpose and function of the program.

 

Program Turn-in Procedure: You should zip up your source files, include files, and any data files needed to run your program.  In addition, you should create a README file that describes the steps I’ll need to take to compile and run your program.  The zip file should be emailed to me, allisodl@oneonta.edu, as an attachment, with a subject line such as (if your name were Don Allison and you were turning in the Procedural Programming program) Procedural Programming program turnin: Don Allison.  Make sure you turn in all the required parts!!!

 

Grading and Other Administrivia:

Exams: There will be a two midterm exams and a final.  Each midterm exam will contribute 15% of your grade, while the final will contribute 20%.

 

Programming Projects: The programming projects are an integral part of the course.  There will be three large projects, each of which will be composed of several smaller programs.  Each of these projects will count 10% towards your final grade.  The projects will be implemented in Lisp, Prolog, and Python.

 

Language Design Project: There will be a semester long language design project.  In this project, you will take a problem and solve it by designing a special purpose language for it, using the concepts we have been studying throughout the semester.  You will present your language and discuss its design the last day of class.  This will count as 15% of your grade.

 

Homework, etc:  The remaining 5% of your grade will be determined by your grades on homework assignments, class participation, etc.

 

Grade Computation:

 

 

Weight

Tentative Date

Midterm Exam #1

15%

February 20

Midterm Exam #2

15%

April 17

Final Exam

20%

May 11, 2pm

Lisp Programs

10%

February 6

Prolog Programs

10%

March 16

Python Programs

10%

April 3

Language Design Project

15%

April 27

Class Participation / Homeworks

5%

 

Total

100%

 

 

 

Make-up Test and Late Assignment Policy:  Late assignments will be assessed a 10% penalty for each day that they are late.  Assignments are considered due by 11:59PM on their due date, and any turned in after that time but before 11:59PM the next day will be assessed a 10% penalty.  After 11:59PM of the next day, the penalty will be increased to 20%, and so on up to a maximum penalty of 100%.  Note that weekends count as a single day, ie Saturday and Sunday together just add a 10% penalty.  All assignments must be turned in by the last day of classes for them to count toward the course grade.  You should plan to be present for all the tests and the final exam.  Any makeups will be allowed only for legitimate, school-approved excuses, and should be arranged with the instructor as soon as possible after you discover you can’t attend the exam (before the exam is given whenever possible).  In any case, all work must be completed by the last class, including any makeup exams.  Exams missed for unexcused absences, or exams not made up by the last day of classes will be recorded as a zero grade.

 

Additional resources:  for students wishing to explore further or to find answers to questions not covered in the text, there are many books and journals available.  The following books are just a sampling of the wide diversity out there (these are some that happen to be in the campus library):

 

A Programming Language, Kenneth Iverson, 1962, QA 76.5 .I9 (covers APL)

The Little LISPer, Daniel Friedman, 1987, QA76.73.L23 F74 1987 (gentle intro to Lisp)

Common LISP, Guy Steele, 1984, QA76.73.L23 S73 1984 (definition of Common Lisp language)

LISP, David Touretzky, 1984, QA76.73.L23 T67 1984 (intro Lisp textbook)

LISP, Patrick Henry Winston, 1984, QA76.73.L23 W56 1984 (intro Lisp textbook)

A Programmer’s Guide to Common LISP, Deborah Tatar, 1987, QA76.73.C28 T38 1987 (slightly more advanced Lisp textbook)

Artificial Intelligence Programming, Eugene Charniak, 1980, Q336 .C48 1980 (using Lisp to develop AI applications)

Programming in Prolog, William F. Clocksin, 1985, QA76.73.P76 C57 1985 (standard Prolog description)

Prolog Programming for Artificial Intelligence, Ivan Bratko, 1986, Q336 .B74 1986 (using Prolog to develop AI applications)

The Art of Prolog, Leon Sterling, 1986, QA76.73.P76 S74 1986 (intro Prolog text)

Structured COBOL, Tyler Welburn, 1981, QA76.73.C25 W44

The SNOBOL 4 Programming Language, Ralph E. Griswold, 1971, QA76.73.S6 G75 1971

Pascal Applications for the Sciences, Richard E. Crandall, 1984, Q183.9 .C73 1984

Software Tools in Pascal, Brian W. Kernighan, 1981, QA76.6 .K493

An Introduction to Programming and Problem Solving with Pascal, Michael G. Schneider, QA76.73.P2 S36 1982

Programming in Modula-2, Niklaus Wirth, 1983, QA76.73.M63 W5713 1983

A Guide to ALGOL Programming, Daniel D. McCracken, 1962, QA76.5 .M186

Ada for Experienced Programmers, A. Nico Habermann, 1983, QA76.73.A35 H3 1983

The Annotated C++ Reference Manual, 1990, Margaret A. Ellis, QA76.73.C153 E35 1990

Comparing and Assessing Programming Languages, Alan R. Feuer, 1984, QA76.73.A35 C66 1984

Principles of Programming Languages, Bruce J. MacLennan, 1987, QA76.7 .M33 1987

Fundamentals of Programming Languages, Ellis Horowitz, 1984, QA76.7 .H67 1984

Programming Languages, Terrence W. Pratt, 1984, QA76.7 .P7 1984

The Definition of Programming Languages, Andrew D. McGettrick, 1980, QA76.7 .M28

 

If you have any particular areas you would be interested in for further reading and study, please ask me and I can recommend a range of books for you to consider.

 

Additional unique aspects of the course:  Unlike more traditional memorize and regurgitate courses, this course has a strong hands-on learning, or learning by doing component, represented by the programming projects.  This enhances retention, reinforces understanding, and ensures that the student masters the material well enough to be able to use it in other projects.  By forcing the student to learn three new programming languages and two or three new programming paradigms, this course will help students get beyond the rut of being a Java or C++ programmer, and move them towards the goal of becoming a computer scientist.