CS/COE 445: Tips for Success

Programming Assignments

If you would like ungraded feedback on a programming assignment, you may send an email to your TA or to the instructor and ask for feedback. If you choose to do this, please send your code as well.
When emailing with a question about a program you are writing (or a problem you are having with it), send enough code so we have some context and can diagnose your problem (it is ok to send all of your code). Asking questions without sending code is like asking a doctor to make a diagnosis without first doing a examination.
You are highly encouraged to save your work frequently and maintain backups of your computer and, especially, any programs you are writing for this class. "My computer crashed" or "I lost my usb drive" are not valid excuses for turning an assignment in late.
You should always have multiple copies of your work. You can have one on your computer or laptop and another on Box, Dropbox, email, or a usb drive.
You will always be able to make unlimited uploads to CourseWeb before an assignment deadline. You can take advantage of this to submit an assignment early. Then, if you later decide to improve your program and upload another, you may do so without penalty (as long as it's before the assignment deadline). The last submission uploaded will be the one graded.
Occasionally, a student will discover they received a lower grade than they were hoping for on a programming assignment. When they investigate why, it turns out that:
- they accidentally uploaded the .class files and not the .java files,
- the .java files they uploaded were not the latest versions of the file (i.e. they didn't save before zipping the source code files)
- they accidentally upload the zip file for another program
- they upload an empty zip file
In each of these cases, after the submission deadline has passed, there is no way to resubmit for more points. It is your responsibility to ensure the file(s) you submit are the ones you intend to submit. To avoid the above problems from happening, do the following:
1. Run your program to ensure it is behaving the way you expect it to behave.
2. Save the source code file(s) and exit the IDE or text editor.
3. Zip your files and make sure the assignment information sheet is included in that zip file.
4. Upload the file to CourseWeb.
5. Download the file from CourseWeb and extract the contents to a different location than where the original source code files were.
6. Does the zip file contain your assignment information sheet? Is that sheet complete?
7. Does the zip file contain all of the .java files? Open those .java files to make sure they aren't blank. Run the source code file(s) in that .zip file. Does your program still behave the way it is supposed to?
Students sometime encounter problems submitting their assignments to CourseWeb by the deadline. Here are some suggestions on avoiding these problems:
- Do not wait until 11:59 pm to submit your program. The submission time is the time the server receives your assignment. The server uses its clock, not your computer's clock. If your clock is slow, then your computer may say it's 11:55 pm when the server says it is 11:59 pm. The server's time will be used to determine whether an assignment is late.
- Assignments must be received before 11:59:01 pm. If it is even one second after 11:59 pm, CourseWeb will mark it late. Give yourself some time to submit the assignment so you don't end up submitting it seconds after the deadline.
- Occasionally, a student encounters problems with connecting to CourseWeb. If this happens, try again a few minutes later (yet another reason to not wait until 11:59 to submit your assignment). If you are still having trouble, email the instructor your assignment. The time he receives your email will be your submission time.

General Course Tips

Emergencies are typically situations involving police or medical doctors (e.g. car accident, mugging, death in the family, or medical emergency). Properly-documented emergencies are emergencies that have a note from an unbiased third party (e.g. police officer or medical doctor) that include:
- Your name
- Date and time of emergency
- Basic/general description of emergency
- Contact information for the unbiased third party (e.g. phone number or email address)
If you are having issues that can affect your grade, it is better to talk to me sooner rather than later.
While talking to me before or after class is a good way to bring something to my attention, it is also easy for me to forget who talked to me or what they talked about. Please also email me so I can have the details and not forget about your request.