For your final project, you will write one of the programs described below. You will work alone for this project. This does not mean that you shouldn't talk with each other and lab assistants about your project. It does mean that the bulk of your code should be your own, and that any assistance you receive from others should be acknowledged in the comments and documentation accompanying your code.

If you have a project idea that does not fit the following categories, feel free to talk to me about it.

I: A Game

Good games to implement include Bagels (see a previous final project description for details), Boggle, 3D Tic-Tac-Toe, Blackjack, Cribbage, Dots and Boxes, Battleship,....

Let me know ifyou have questions about the rules or suitability of a particular game.

You may use graphics to display your game, but that is not necessary.

II: Moveable Movies

There's a catch, though. Your code must be organized so that the movie can be shown in a frame of any size or location. In particular, your code should include a function described as follows:

	//
	//	DrawFrame
	//
	//	Draws the Nth frame of the movie inside the rectangle
	//	the coordinates of whose top, bottom, and sides are
	//	given by the parameters top, right, bottom, and left.
	//	Note that no drawing is done outside this rectangle,
	//	and that no assumptions are made about the width, height,
	//	or ratio of width to height of the rectangle.
	//	
	
	void DrawFrame( int window, int N, int left, int top, int right, int bottom );

There are lots of cute tricks you can play with your movie if you organize the code in this way. For example, you could show the movie in two locations on the screen simultaneously by doing something like this:

	for( int i=0; i < nFrames; i++ )
	{
		DrawFrame( window, i, 0, 0, 200, 200 );
		DrawFrame( window, i, 300, 300, 500, 500 );
	}

Or you might show all the frames simultaneously in one window, lined up in a grid so you could compare all the frames at the same time. Or you could draw a fancy border, and show the movie inside it.

You need not do any of these things with your code, but you should definitely test it in rectangles of various shapes and positions.

NOTE: DrawFrame should not call g2_open_X11(). In fact, your main program should call g2_open_X11() once, after which g2_open_X11() should never be called again.

III: Monte Carlo Integration

Suppose you want to approximate the area under the graph of a function. You may have seen techniques like the trapezoidal rule or Simpson's rule, but there's another technique called "Monte Carlo Integration." Take, for example, the graph of f(x) = x^2 between x=0 and x=2. The graph fits inside the rectangle R = [0,2]x[0,4]. Now suppose you generate a few thousand random points in R. If you compute

# of points under the graph of f
___________________________________

total # of points 

and then multiply this ratio times 8 (the area of R), you'll get an approximation of the area under the graph of f.

For this project, write a program that will compute Monte Carlo approximations of integrals. Your program should present the user with a menu of three or four functions to choose from, and should ask the user to specify the rectangle R (your program does not have to figure out the y interval from a given x interval--that's a hard problem). The user should also be able to choose how many random points your program will generate. Once the user has ordered up an approximation, your program should do two things:

• Open a graphics window, draw the graph of the function, and draw the random points, and
• Print to cout the number of points generated, the number of points falling below the graph, the area of R, and the resulting approximation of the area beneath the graph of the function.

If this project strikes your fancy, then you'll definitely want to use sqrt(4-x^2) as one of your functions.

What to Hand In, When, and How?

• By 5:00 PM, Wednesday, November 15, send me the following via e-mail at jondich@carleton.edu:
  
  
  1. An explanation of which project you plan to do.
  2. Declarations of any major classes your program will use (if any), and prototypes of the major functions in your program. The functional prototypes should include comments explaining what the functions will do.
  3. A pseudo-code version of your main program, with comments.
  4. A brief plan of attack--the order in which you plan to implement your project's features, etc.
  
  
  The more design detail your provide in this e-mail, the better feedback I'll be able to give you. You can send me this e-mail any time before the 15th, and I'll reply by e-mail within 24 hours.
  
  
• By 5:00 PM, Monday, November 20, submit the following via HSP:
  
  
  1. All your source files, both .h and .cpp, as appropriate.
  2. A file named finalReadMe.txt, which should include a list of the source files in your project, a description of what your program does, and a description of the status of your program (what works, what doesn't, lingering bugs, etc.).
  
  
  

Grading Criteria

• Does your program compile? I can't test it (and thus can't grade it) if it doesn't compile. Note that many people add their comments only after they have completed their coding. This is a very bad idea from the software design point of view, but it is also a great way to accidentally introduce syntax errors. Always compile and run your program immediately before submitting it.
• Does it work? Correctness is the most important thing, though by no means the only thing. Your program should work. If it doesn't do exactly what it was intended to do, you should provide a discussion of your program's limitations in your documentation.
• Is your program well organized? Well-designed function interfaces, good use of classes where appropriate, and a main program that reads like an outline of the program as a whole contribute to readable, debuggable, and maintainable programs.
• Is your program well documented? Your code is a piece of writing directed to two audiences--compilers and human readers. You need to make the code readable to both audiences, and clear commenting is an essential part of what you do for your human readers.
• Is your program written with good style? Descriptive variable/function/parameter names, consistent indentation and placement of braces, and appropriate comments are the fundamentals of good coding style.
• Sometimes, efficiency is relevant. For example, a bad search algorithm with a big dictionary can lead to unreasonably long run times for a spell-checker.
• If everything above is done well, an ambitious program may get a better grade than a less ambitious one. For example, a spell-checker that can handle an arbitrarily large dictionary is more impressive than one that can handle only 200-word dictionaries. On the other hand, a 200-word spell-checker that is works correctly and is well organized, designed, and documented is much better than a buggy, messy, poorly commented spell-checker that can use a big dictionary.

That's all

Start early, stay in touch, and have fun.