Design of Computer Programs
About this Course
Understanding how to approach programming problems and devise a solution is an essential skill for any Python developer. In this course, you’ll learn new concepts, patterns, and methods that will expand your coding abilities from programming expert, Peter Norvig.
Learn how to model problems, and how to optimize performance by using some of the advanced features of Python.
[
Move along the path towards becoming an expert programmer! In this class …
Design of Computer Programs
About this Course
Understanding how to approach programming problems and devise a solution is an essential skill for any Python developer. In this course, you’ll learn new concepts, patterns, and methods that will expand your coding abilities from programming expert, Peter Norvig.
Learn how to model problems, and how to optimize performance by using some of the advanced features of Python.
[
Move along the path towards becoming an expert programmer! In this class you will practice going from a problem description to a solution, using a series of assignments. During office hours segments, Peter will also share his own personal tips and tricks for approaching programming problems - and his techniques may surprise you!
]
lesson 1
Winning Poker Hands
Steps of the design process and developing for clarity and generality.
Arguments for program correctness and experimentation and simulation.
Design tradeoffs; Simplicity and Clarity. Decomposition and composability.
lesson 2
Back of the Envelope
Back of envelope calculations: When to use brute force and when to be clever.
The Zebra puzzle: Generator expressions, Permutations and combinations.
Cryptarithmetic; Recursive and wishful thinking; Longest palindrome substring algorithm.
lesson 3
Regular Expressions, other languages and interpreters
Defining the language of regular expressions and Interpreting the language.
Defining the set of strings matched by a regular expression
Other languages.
lesson 4
Dealing with complexity through search
Search: finding your way with a flashlight or boat.
Analyzing the efficiency of an algorithm.
Recurrence relations and Matching data types with algorithms.
lesson 5
Dealing with uncertainty through probability
Probability: the game of Pig.
Maximizing expected utility to optimize strategy.
lesson 6
Word Games
Managing complexity.
Large sets of words.
Appropriate data structures.
lesson 7
Conclusion
Interviews and practice exam.
