Classes

CS642 (Digital Image Processing) Spring 2001

This class was taught by Dr. Heggere Ranganath of the Computer Science Department. The textbook used was Digital Image Processing by Rfael C. Gonzalez and Richard E. Woods.

CS646 (Computer Geometric Modeling) Fall 2000

This class was taught by Dr. Tim Newman of the Computer Science Department. The textbook was Geometric Modeling (Second Edition) by Michael E. Mortenson.

CS545 (Introduction to Computer Graphics) Spring 2000

This class was taught by Dr. Tim Newman of the Computer Science Department. The textbook was Computer Graphics: Principles and Practice by Foley, van Dam, Feiner, and Hughes. Most of the class dealt with the development of 2D graphics primitives. OpenGL was used for the programming assignments.

MA740 (Combinatorial Algorithms) Spring 1999

This class was taught by Dr. Peter Slater of the Mathematics Department. The textbook used was Computers and Intractability: A Guide to the Theory of NP-Completeness by Garey and Johnson (1979). The two main topics for the course were NP-Completeness proofs (mainly for problems in graph theory) and linear algorithms for trees.

MA640 (Graph Theory) Fall 1998

This class was taught by Dr. Peter Slater of the Mathematics Department. The textbook was Fundamentals of Domination in Graphs by Teresa W. Hayes, Stephen T. Hedetniemi, and Peter J. Slater. Yes, my professor co-wrote the book! Dr. Slater is an old pro on this subject. This was a great course, and was the first large dose of graph theory that I'd ever had.

MA540 (Combinatorics) Spring 1998

This class was taught by Dr. Peter Slater of the Mathematics Department and the textbook was Applied Combinatorics, Third Edition by Alan Tucker. It was a wonderful course. Combinatorics is one of my favorite branches of mathematics. It's all about counting things. It covers counting principles, arrangements and selections with and without repetitions, distributions, binomial identities, generating functions (ordinary and exponential), recurrence relations, inclusion-exclusion principle, equivalence and symmetry groups, and Polya'a formula.

CS650 (Software Engineering) Summer 1997

This class was taught by Dr. Wei Li and we used the fourth edition of the text Software Engineering: A Practitioner's Approach.

CS630 (Artificial Intelligence) Spring 1997

This class was "team taught" by Dr. Harry Delugach and Dr. Dan Rochowiak. We met one night a week (Wednesday) from 4:00-6:50, which was a long session, but the way the class was managed, it turned out to be a very enjoyable term. Each student had to present a chapter from a new book by Sowa, which had not been published at the time. Each student's presentation filled the entire long session. Every session included a lot of discussion of topics, and it was very interesting to have Dr. Delugach and Dr. Rochowiak discussing items together, because they would sometimes have different opinions and different ideas of what was important.

CS530 (Introduction to Artificial Intelligence) Fall 1996

Dr. Dan Rochowiak taught this class. He was a very interesting instructor, due to his philosophy background. Philosophy and computer science are two neat areas to mix.

CS537 (Neural Networks) Summer 1996

Dr. Ranganath taught this class. One student described this class as "The class of failed ideas". Neural networks do not seem to be technologically advanced enough, at this point, to reliably solve any problem of significance. The backpropagation networks seem to be the most useful, but figuring out the optimum network size and the optimum learning rate and amount of training time is quite tricky. Neural networks should be used as a last resort, when no known algorithm or function exists to determine the desired output or classification.

CS612 (Compiler Construction) Spring 1996

Dr. Wang was going to be teaching this, but he left. He taught the class "distantly" by email correspondence. He made assignments, which I did and turned in electronically. We used the "dragon" book. I hope this "distantly taught class" situation will not arise again.

CS603 (Formal Language/Automata Theory) Fall 1995

My first class in six years! Dr. Wang taught it. We used the Hopcroft and Ullman textbook (1979).

CS795 (Advanced Database) Summer 1989

Taken independently under Dr. Graves.

CS717 (Advanced Algorithm Design and Analysis) Spring 1989

Taught by Dr. Graves.

CS555 (Theory of Program Devlopment) Spring 1989

This class was taught by Dr. Amin. It involved a theoretical basis of developing a correct program based on preconditions and postconditions. We used the David Gries The Science of Programming text.

CS670 (Computer Networks) Winter 1989

Taught by Dr. Amin, using the Computer Networks text by Andrew Tannenbaum.

CS687 (Database Systems) Winter 1989

Taught by Dr. Graves. We used the C.J. Date text. Our class project was "Build a database management system using a database management system." To this day, I still hear this one discussed. What do you do? Is it even possible?

CS586 (Microprocessor Architecture) Fall 1988

Taught by Dr. Ranganath. Involved hardware, specifically the study of the Motorola 68000 processor. Labs involved programing and interfacing memory to the Motorola 68000 chip, and related things.

CS624 (Programming Languages) Fall 1988

Taught by Dr. Meehan. The last of my core courses for the MS degree. We used the Horowitz book.

CS535 (Symbolic and Logic Programming) Summer 1988

Taught by Marty Smith. Basically, it was a LISP course. We used PC Scheme to do all the programming assignments.

CS613 (Computer Architecture) Summer 1988

This was taught by Dr. Shiva. This is the course in which I had an 89.8 average for the entire course, and he gave me a "B" as the course grade. He was the first professor I ever had that did such a thing with an "89" type grade. I've had extremely mixed feelings about this over the years, mostly negative, of course. Click here for more on this: 1988[3][613]1988.

CS617 (Design and Analysis of Algorithms) Spring 1988

My first quarter here. Dr. Amin taught this course. Back then, we had the Horowitz and Sahni book.

CS690 (Operating Systems) Spring 1988

My first quarter here. Dr. Meehan taught this course. We used the first edition of the Deitel textbook.