grading

communication skills: writing and video

As with practitioners in every field, the performance of computer scientists is evaluated based on our ability to communicate what we do, and why. Thus, this course is presentation and writing intensive. Oral and written communication will be a key to your success in the course and throughout your career.

We live in the age of YouTube. The medium of video enables quick communication of complex ideas and functions. Consequently, this course also values communication through video.

source code & programming style

Some work will involve substantial coding; in these cases, both the interactive product, and the source code count. These programs need to work. User experience is important. So is the structure of your code. (Good structure will turn out to be reusable across assignments.) We may not grade the source code for every assignment, but we also may, at any time. We will always check out your interactive work.

Good object oriented design is a matter of creating structure which makes code easy to understand and maintain. Writing easy-to-read, well-structured code counts in this class. Create reusable components for yourself, and your peers. Whitespace, naming, modularity and documentation are keys.