Please read this page carefully and refer to it when in doubt about the course policies.
Lectures
Attendance at all lectures is expected although attendance will not be taken. Assignments and other material will be posted on the website but they are not intended as substitutes for lectures. Some topics discussed in classroom lectures may not be reflected on the website. Students are responsible for all the material covered in class, whether or not it appears on the website. If you missed a lecture, please ask other students, or me (the instructor) about the topics covered in the lecture you missed.
Evaluation
Students will be evaluated based on class participation, a variety of assignments, and a final examination. The breakdown of the total grade is as follows:
- Programming assignments: 45%
- Problem sheets: 10%
- Term paper and presentation: 15%
- Final examination: 30%
- Class participation: in the range [-5%, +5%]
Group Work
Students should work in groups (4 students per group) to complete programming assignments. Only one submission per group is expected. Each assignment should clearly indicate the names and student numbers of the students submitting the assignment.
Assignments
The programming assignments in this course will have a significant emphasis on computer programming with C/C++. The short programming assignments will introduce/reinforce basic concepts of multithreaded programs. The mini-projects (long assignments) will require low-level systems programming. You should start on the assignments early to complete them by the due date. Apart from the programming assignments, some other homework will be assigned to elaborate on theoretical and other aspects of real-time systems.
Examinations
There will be only one exam: a comprehensive final exam worth 30% of the course grade. The exam will not require writing detailed code although pseudocode may be expected. The instructor reserves the right to assign a take-home exam for partial credit towards the final exam.
Academic Honesty
Students are permitted to work in groups. You may teach other students in your group and learn from them. However there must be no collaboration between different groups. Cases of cheating will be dealt with according to UBC’s policies for academic misconduct.
Excuses and Extensions
Under ordinary circumstances late submissions will not be accepted. Please contact me in case of extraordinary situations such as
- Serious illnesses,
- Family emergencies,
- Scheduling conflicts with examinations.
If you have a disability or other special circumstance that may require special accommodations, please talk to me.
Grading Errors
We (the teaching assistants and I) will try to ensure that grading is accurate and timely. On occasion, there may be errors. If you have a question or a complaint about the manner in which an assignment or exam question was graded then contact us to discuss the issue. You must submit regrade requests within 2 weeks of receiving a grade.
Course-related Communication
Website: I will be using the website to post material related to lectures, to publish the homework assignments and solutions, and as a repository for some notes/handouts. Major announcements will also appear on the website.
Piazza: We will use Piazza to host the class’ discussions. All notices to the class will appear Piazza. Please use Piazza for all course-related communication.
Email: We all get a lot of email, and email can be a significant time sink. We will use Piazza for all course-related communication and you must sign up for Piazza as soon as possible. You can post questions related to course content on Piazza. If there are questions that may not apply to the entire class (e.g., missing an important exercise because of illness) then you can mark your question as ‘private’ and your question will be visible to instructors only. You can also ask questions on Piazza anonymously: you will be anonymous to other students. Piazza is an excellent forum for discussion.
Response policy: The TA(s) and the instructor will typically respond to all electronic communication within one working day. If you sent a message at 2pm Thursday then you can expect a response by 2pm Friday. If you send a message at 2pm Friday then you will get a response by 2pm on the following Monday.