Syllabus for CMSC 421, Spring 2010

Location and time: CSI 1122, Tuesday/Thursday, 3:30pm-4:45pm 

Instructor: Dana S. Nau
Office: Room 3241 AVW
Office hours: after class until about 5:30pm
Telephone: 301-405-2684
Email: nau & cs.umd.edu     to send email, change & to @
Web: http://www.cs.umd.edu/~nau
Teaching Assistant: Ke Zhai
Office: ?
Office hours: ?
Telephone: ?
Email: zhaike & cs.umd.edu    to send email, change & to @
Web: ?

Web page and discussion forum

The home page for the course is at http://www.cs.umd.edu/~nau/cmsc421. That's where I'll post the lecture schedule, lecture slides, etc.

There's a discussion forum that has both a web site and RSS feed. I'd prefer that you post your questions and comments there, rather than emailing them to me.

TextbooksGraham LispAIMA Cover

Required:
S. Russell and P. Norvig. Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach, 2nd edition.

Notice that you'll need the 2nd edition, not the new 3rd edition (which was published too late for us to use it)
Recommended but not required:
Paul Graham, ANSI Common Lisp.

Topics to be covered (AMAI refers to the textbook):

  • intelligent agents (AMAI chapter 2)
  • search and game-playing (AMAI chapters 3–6)
  • logical systems (AMAI chapters 7–9)
  • planning systems (AMAI chapters 11–12)
  • reasoning about uncertainty (AMAI chapters 13–14)
  • learning (AMAI chapter 18 & 20)
  • language (AMAI chapter 22)
  • perception (AMAI chapter 24)
  • Lisp: 2 or 3 programming projects

Homework and projects

There will be about half a dozen written homework assignments, consisting of about 5 homework problems apiece. I will usually give you a week to complete them. Submit your homeworks in class (not in my office, not in my mail box, not by email).

There will be several (two or three) programming projects. They will all be in Common Lisp. Your code will need to run correctly in Allegro Common Lisp on the machines in the OIT Unix cluster, because that's what we will use to test your programs. Get a Glue account at http://www.oit.umd.edu/new if you don't already have one. You'll need it in order to use Lisp on the OIT Unix cluster.

Each homework and project will have a due date and a "late date." You'll get:

  • Full credit for homeworks and projects that you submit by the due date
  • 10% penalty if you submit them by the late date
  • After that time, no credit

The homeworks and projects will be graded by the TA, so if you have a question about how your homework or project were graded, please talk to the TA first.

Exams

The midterm exam will be on Thursday, March 11, the last class before spring break.

The final exam will be cumulative. According to the university schedule, it will be on Wednesday, May 19, 10:30-12:30.

Both exams will be open book, open notes. During the last class session before each exam, I'll review what we've covered, to help you prepare for the exam.

If you miss an exam and you have both a valid reason (e.g., a medical emergency) and convincing evidence, I'll give you credit for the missed exam based on your performance on the other exam.

Semester grades

At the end of the semester, I'll assign letter grades on a curve based on your total numeric score, which will be the sum of

  • your midterm exam score: 100 points possible
  • your final exam score: 130 to 140 points possible
  • 1/2 of your total score on the programming projects: 100 to 150 points possible, depending on how many projects
  • 1/5 of your total score on the homeworks: about 60 points possible

To give you a rough indication of how well you are doing, I can also give you a tentative letter grade after the midterm exam, but I won't use that letter grade to assign your final letter grade for the semester.

Honor pledge. I expect you to adhere to the intent of the student honor pledge (see http://www.shc.umd.edu). I'll require you to sign the pledge on the exams, and I'll require you to include it with your programming projects. I won't require it on the homework assignments.

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