Weekly Course Schedule – Summer 2022

IS430 - OBG/OBU - Foundations of Information Processing

Meets Wednesday Mornings Online

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Week 2 (May 23 – May 29)



Monday, May 23   (4:00 P.M. – 5:00 P.M., Zoom)
Optional Session
Lab Session
On Monday afternoons from 4:00 PM till 5:00 PM, I will be holding an optional Lab Session using Zoom. Please drop by to ask a question, to discuss solutions to previous assignments, to get help with the current assignment, to discuss the final project, or just to say hello. Please use a headset while participating. If you have a schedule conflict that prevents you from attending this session, please contact me regarding attending the lab session for my other class. That lab session meets on Monday evenings.


Tuesday, May 24, @  11:55 P.M.
Weekly Assignments Deadline
Computing Setup
  • Send a Greetings post to the Service Desk for this course
    Description: You can earn 10 participation points by sending a Greetings post to the Service Desk for this course within the first 2 weeks of the semester. Regardless of the points earned, getting started using the Service Desk is a best practice.
  • Choose Your Computer
    Description: I recommend that you use a computer that runs Windows 10 or a recent release of macOS. While the software that we will be using for this course does run on Linux, there will be substantially less technical support available for Linux. If you are considering using a Linux computer, please consult with me beforehand.
  • Install Anaconda
    Description: Anaconda is an open data science platform that provides access to a coordinated set of Python tools. We will be using Anaconda to provide our basic Python tools. This will relieve some of the pressure of downloading many Python tools individually. It will also give us some experience in working with Anaconda, which is a valuable skill in its own right. PLEASE NOTE: The version of Anaconda that you download should be the latest version available. That should be the version that supports Python 3.9.
  • Install PyCharm Professional
    Description: PyCharm Professional is a leading Python Integrated Development Environment (IDE). I will be using PyCharm in my tutorial videos and I will expect you to use PyCharm when completing your assignments. JetBrains, the makers of PyCharm Professional, offer free licenses to this and a number of other products to university students and faculty. You will need to secure one of these free licenses from JetBrains using the link below. Following that, you will need to install PyCharm Professional by following one of the tutorial videos below that will help you through the download and install.


Wednesday, May 25   (9:30 A.M. – 11:30 A.M., Zoom)
Class Session 2
Topics
  • Computers and Programs (Zelle 3e - Chapter 1)
  • Writing Simple Programs (Zelle 3e - Chapter 2)
  • Computing with Numbers (Zelle 3e - Chapter 3)
Required Readings
  • Zelle 3e - Chapter 1 (Computers and Programs)
  • Zelle 3e - Chapter 2 (Writing Simple Programs)
  • Zelle 3e - Chapter 3 (Computing with Numbers)
  • Severance Chapter 5, Sections 5.6 through 5.7 ("Definite Loops Using for" through "Loop Patterns")
  • Jablonski, J. (n.d.). Python 3's f-Strings: An improved string formatting syntax (guide) in Real Python.
  • Best, P. (2021). Formatting numbers for printing in Python in The Teclado Blog
Optional Readings
  • Severance Chapter 1 (Why Should You Learn to Write Programs?). Note that I have marked readings in the Severance text as optional. Zelle and Severance provide complementary approaches to learning Python. So, especially for new programmers, I believe that it is worth the extra effort to do these optional readings in the Severance book.
  • Severance Chapter 2, Sections 2.1 through 2.6 ("Values and Types" through "Expressions")
  • Severance Chapter 5, Sections 5.6 through 5.7 ("Definite Loops Using for" through "Loop Patterns")
Required Recordings
Other Resources