It’s nearing the end of the semester and there is no lecture left. It has been a really busy term. However, it’s almost done, none of the courses I’m taking is an easy course. Every day of each week I had one of the quizzes, assignments due, midterms or presentation. I really enjoyed learning the material in CSC236. I’m sure it helps me in my future academic life. Completing this course for me, was a broadening experience with regards to my computer science education.
Last Tutorial and Last Quiz!
Yesterday we did the last tutorial. There was the last quiz as well. Like other quizzes, I feel like 10 minutes are never enough for me. I think solving some of problems really need more time. Because even writing the answer straightforward without any prior thinking consumes more than 10 minutes. It would be beneficial to students the quizzes to be granted a little more time. I hope professor Heap will consider this in future.
Ms Word vs LaTeX
For those who are concerned about the latex and Ms Word equation typing, and want to know the advantages of LaTeX over Microsoft Word, as well as the advantages of Microsoft Word over LaTeX, I recommend these two handy tutorial. I hope they help.
Capter 7 of TextBook
During the last few monthes the TextBook of CSC236 was very handy to me. It helped me for better understanding the course materials, particularly when I studid related chapter prior to the lecture. The chapter 7, FINITE STATE AUTOMATA AND REGULAR EXPRESSIONS, was very helpfull to take the consept of DFSA, NFSA and formal language, with very good examples. I think lecture notes accompanied with this text book would be a good collection for those who want to have an idea of theory of computation.
Assignment 3
The semester is almost over! Our last assignment was due on last Friday. The last office hour before A3 due was very helpfull. It took long time for me to type the assignment with drawing the DFSA and inserting many equations. I finished the typing of answers in the last hour, and my computer crushed when I was uploading my A3. It was very stressfull situation. Thankfully I could fix it and upload my assignment at almost last minut.
Finite-state Automaton and DNA-computation
In the recent lectures, Professor Heap has been talking about Finite State Automata and Formal Languages. I was looking for the Real-world applications of computational theory, I came across to an interesting tutorial about Formal Grammars for DNA-computation. Without any discussion I will share the link to this tutorial:
Formal Grammars for DNA-computation and Bioinformatics
Term Test 2
The results of term test 2 is up now. I could not manage the time well at the test. I think I need more practice to solve the problems faster, otherwise the final test wouldn’t be better than the midterms!
Chalenging Year
Last year when I decided to start Bioinformatics and shared my idea with professor Steipe, he said it would be a challenging year, and it was challenging indeed.
After years of not touching mathematics, having a Math and Computer course in a new academic environment with a new culture, in English, which is my second language was indeed a big challenge. I was not familiar with the mathematics and programming terminology and as Paul our csc148 instructor said, people like me are learning two languages simultaneously, programing language and English. Csc136 was optional for my program of choice. Luckily, I took the course in the summer; otherwise CSC236 could have been a more challenging course for me.
It is a new experience to have to walk into an Advance Molecular Biology class right after a Computer Programming class, which are two completely different fields of study. However, it is nice to see all these subjects like math, statistics, computer science, biochemistry, biophysics and biology all come together in the Bioinformatics course.
Anyways, it’s time to start for assignment 2. It seems to me that the questions are easier than the ones in assignment 1.
The Start Of Something New!
We’ve been asked to create a weblog and update it weekly on the CSC236 course in the University of Toronto. This course is an introduction to the theory of computation. I see almost everyone has already started posting but for me, this is a new experience. I haven’t really been into blogging before but I’ve always thought it would be nice to run a blog.
I’ve had three computer science courses by now and they’ve all had some challenging parts to themselves. I’m hoping I can get through the challenges of this course, like I got through the other courses.
The making of this blog and writing this first post has already been an assignment for me since I’m new to blogging, so I’ll finish this post by letting you know that there will be better posts to come and to stay tuned.
bioinfoplanet 