CS 111: Test 1 info

You are permitted one 8.5 x 11 handwritten notes sheet (both sides) for use as a reference during the exam.

Lots of research has shown that just reading over material isn't enough to prepare for exams. That's a fine way to help familiarize yourself with what's there, but to be able to do well on a test you then need to additionally practice what you will do on the test. Reading about how to swing a baseball bat or how to cross-country ski will give you some good ideas on how to get better the next time you try it, but you then need to get out there and swing a bat or ski in the Arb to actually get better.

How can you practice? One thing you can do is try the exercises at the end of each chapter, for which the solutions are available online. Practice these under test conditions and see how you do.

Make sure to do all of your practicing on paper, not at a keyboard, so as to simulate the exam conditions.

Listed below is the material that I have in mind that you should know for the exam. It's what's in my head when creating it. That said, this isn't a contract. I may have inadvertently left something off this list that ends up on an exam question. I make no guarantees that the exam will be 100% limited to items listed below. Moreover, I will not be able to test all of this material given the time limitations of the exam. I will have to pick and choose some subset of it.

Ultimately, the content that I will be drawing from for the exam is material that we have talked about in class, and material that you have used on assignments. The textbook does have a variety of things mentioned in passing that are worth knowing, but if we haven't discussed it in class and/or if it hasn't been part of an assignment, I won't test on it.

Students should be able to…

• Demonstrate that they understand what an algorithm is.
• Demonstrate that they understand the distinction between compiling, interpreting, and running a program, and what happens in each case.
• Write and evaluate simple expressions in Python, using the kinds of Python code that appear in the textbook readings assigned Monday, April 3.
• Write Python code to appropriately take input from the user and do something with it.
• Define and distinguish among classes, objects, methods, variables, and parameters.
• Write code to render graphics (shapes) based on user input and calculations. In other words, demonstrate the sorts of skills necessary to succeed on the graphics and cloud assignments. My goal is not to test detailed memorization of the graphics library, but rather the ability to use it to do interesting things. Students should already know how to make a graphics window appear, but I will provide copies of the appropriate portions of the graphics.py documentation (currently linked on Moodle) that are relevant.