CSC 335 Programming Languages Assessment

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CSC 335 Programming Languages Assessment

• Coordinator Dave Powell
• Fall 03

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Course Goals

•  Provide the tools necessary for the critical
  evaluation of existing and future programming
  languages.
• Understand the concepts underlying the design and
  use of programming languages.

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Learning Objectives

• Summarize the evolution of programming languages
  illustrating how this history has led to the
  paradigms available today.
• Understand and use three programming languages
  including Java, C and Scheme.
• Design, implement and test a team developed
  program in an object oriented language. Note
  object oriented class and inheritance concepts
  were key department goals for year.
• Justify the philosophy of object-oriented design
  and the concepts of encapsulation, abstraction,
  inheritance and polymorphism.
• Describe how the class mechanism supports
  encapsulation and information hiding.
• Compare and contrast the notions of overloading
  and overriding methods in an object oriented
  language.
• Outline the strengths and weaknesses of the
  functional programming paradigm.
• Design and code programs using functional
  paradigm.
• Describe each of the elementary data types.
• Explain the concept of abstract data type.
• Evaluate the impact of different typing regimes
  on language design and language usage.
• Explain the importance of formal semantics.
• Describe the different approaches to formal
  semantics.
• Apply common methods for elicitation and analysis
  to produce a set of software requirements for a
  small-medium size software system.
• Create and specify the software design for a
  small-medium size software product using a
  software requirements specification and
  appropriate design notation.
• Red are objectives assessed for Fall 2003

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Assessment Comments From Fall 2003

• Twenty one students with a mixture of seniors,
  juniors and sophomores because of course
  renumbering. Caused some problems with large
  variety of experience and skill levels. In
  general, seniors did much better than sophomores.
• Students met 3 assessed objectives in 2003. I had
  5 excellent projects specified, designed and
  implemented in C and Java.1. Friend and foe
  replay system fantastic2. Chess with 3 D
  graphics fantastic3. Console driven Fish game
  low tech but fully met requirements.4.
  Breakout Project beyond sophomore skill
  level.5. Stock Stock portfolio management6.
  FreshQuest GUI driven MapQuest for Elon7.
  Cipherpad Text encryption and decryption
  system.
• Taught C for three weeks.
• Assessed knowledge of C by giving the multiple
  choice section of AP C exam.
• Results were fair. Class averaged 70 percent
  achieved on multiple choice section. 80 percent
  of class got equivalent of a AP 3.
• Evaluation The C Dietel book is easier for the
  students to read than Lippman. Though not
  required, many want to do GUI work in C. Should
  use a book that touches on MFC to make this a
  reality. Deitel has a book that does exactly that.

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Miscellaneous

• Software Java, JBuilder, Scheme, Emacs, Visio
  2002 and Poseidon (UML tool), Visual Studio C,
  Cygwin g (Students forced to use both Visual
  Studio and g based on prior graduates recent
  suggestion.)
• Hardware Intel Pentium running Microsoft XP.
• Project Required Yes. There is a semester long, 
  team project to develop a user defined
  application. 
• Presentation Required Yes.
• Expected Knowledge from Previous Course Either
  C or Java from CSC 130 Inheritance and
  polymorphism from CSC 230

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ACM Model Curriculum

• TextbooksConcept of Programming Languages,
  Sebesta, Chapter and Sections to be covered
  1-15 C How To Program, 4th Edition  
• ACM Topics
• PL1 - Overview of programming languages (2)
• PL2 - Virtual machines (1)
• PL3 - Introduction to language translation (2)
• PL4 - Declaration of Types (3)
• PL5 - Abstraction of Mechanisms (3)
• PL6 - Object Oriented Programming (6)
• SE3 - Software tools and environments ( 1 of 3 )
• SE4 - Software processes (2)
• SE5 - Software requirements and specifications
  (4)
• SE8 - Software project management (3)