Lecture will be held MWF 11:00-11:50 in ICS 174.
You are responsible for anything said in class, including
class announcements. If you have to miss lecture for any
reason, please ask one of your classmates to fill you
in on what you missed.
There are four lab sections for this class. Each section meets one hour per
week on Friday. This is an important time to get questions answered about homework
problems and labs.
Some lab time will be spent walking you through features
of Matlab that you will need for your lab assignments.Lab time is the best time
for troubleshooting
issues that come up with Matlab or lab assignments.
All email with questions about course material should be sent to the
following email address:
ics6n-questions@ics.uci.edu.
This is an alias for the instructor and the TAs. It ensures
that we both see your message and the response. It also gives you better
turnaround time.
Please also include the following information:
- The string "ICS 6N:" at the beginning of the subject line
- Your name
- Your student number
For questions about grading, please email the person who graded the assignment.
Better yet, attend that person's office hours.
All homework will be graded by Yen. All quizes will be graded by me.
Labs will be graded by one of the two TAs.
Course Announcements
- Course announcements will be sent via email to all students enrolled
in the class, at their official UCI email address.
-
Click here for the
archive of these messages.
Assignments
There are weekly written homework questions every week from the text.
These are due the Wednesday after they are covered in lecture.
See the assigned problems and due dates in the course schedule.
There are four lab assignments due over the course of the quarter.
These are also due on Wednesdays.
All of the labs will require some programming in Matlab.
The lab assignments and material presented in lab section should
provide all the information you need to know in order to complete
the lab assignments. In addition, there are many online tutorials
available to you if you decide you need some additional help.
Lab assignements will consist of performing some Matlab instructions
as well as written work. The results of all the questions should be
copied into a Word file. You will hand in a written copy of the word file.
You can use a different editor than Word if you prefer, but it will need
to enable copying pictures and graphs.
You do not have to purchase a copy of Matlab for your own machine.
If you attend lab regularly, you will likely be able to complete
much of your lab work in class.
In addition to scheduled lab time for this class, you can drop in on
any of the following labs to have access to a computer with Matlab.
If the room is being used by an instructor as part of their schedule
lab time, you can ask them if you can use one of the computers during
their class.
- ICS 365. Lab hours are posted
here.
Matlab is installed on only some of the machines. Ask the
lab attendant if you need help finding one.
This lab only has courses scheduled MTF 8-10, so there is plently
of opportunity to use these machines.
- MSTB 210
Lab hourse are posted here.
- SBSG 240
Lab hourse are posted here.
Weekly quizes:
I will give a very short weekly quiz at the beginning of class every
Friday, starting in week 3. Since Nov 29 is a holiday, we will have a quiz the following
Monday, Dec 2, instead. There will be a total of 8 quizes.
The quizes will last approximately 10 minutes and will be given out
at the beginning of lecture. They will cover material from two weeks prior.
That way you have a chance to practice topics in homework exercises and get
feedback before the quiz.
In determining your course score, I will drop the lowest two quiz scores.
However, these dropped scores are intended to cover any missed quizes
for whatever reason you need to miss a quiz. This includes any medical
problems, personal issues or school-related events.
Grades for the assignements will be posted through EEE.
I will grade the quizes, Yen will grade homework and the TAs will grade the lab assignments.
If you have questions regarding grading, please see the person who
graded that particular item.
Text
We have one required text for this course.
-
Linear Algebra and its Applications, 4th. edition., by
David Lay.
Course Structure
The grading criteria for the course is:
Homework 9%
Lab assignments 20%
Quizes 35%
Final 35%
Completing the Course Evaluation 1%
Note that there is a tiny bit of credit given for completing the course evaluation towards the
end of the quarter. It is
available through EEE and is
usually released a couple weeks from the end of the quarter.
If enough students complete the evaluation then I have access to the list of students
who completed the evaluation. However, I do not see any evaluation results until the
quarter is over and grades have been turned in. Even after the quarter when I do
see the evaluation results, they are completely anonymous. Thus, there is no risk
to you in being completely honest in your evaluation. I take these evaluations very
seriously and use them to improve my teaching.
Missed Final Exam Policy
The final exam will be on Friday, December 13, 8:00AM-10:00AM. (Friday the 13th!)
- If you miss the final exam and do not have a valid reason, you will receive
a score of 0 on the exam.
- The following policy applies if you miss the final exam for a valid reason.
-
There are only two classes of valid reasons for missing the final exam:
- An unforeseeable emergency, such as a medical emergency.
In such cases I will ask for documentation.
- An absence from an exam due to a foreseeable circumstance
that I have approved in advance.
-
A work conflict is NOT a valid reason for missing the final exam.
The examination times
are announced at the beginning of the quarter, so there is plenty of
time to plan your work schedule.
- If you wait until after the exam to get a foreseeable excuse approved,
and it is not approved,
you will receive a grade of zero (0) on the exam.
- If I accept your reason for missing the final exam, at my option I may
either (1) give you a makeup exam or (2) assign your grade on the basis
of the remaining course work that you did not miss.
- If I give a makeup exam, I may give it less weight
than announced on the course web page.
Academic Honesty
The Bren School of ICS and the University have already established an academic honesty policy. Read it.
Violators of academic honesty policies are subject to the penalties described in the Bren School of ICS policy. They are also subject to an immediate course grade of F, and you will not be allowed to drop the course to avoid the grade. Also be aware that a single documented case of academic dishonesty may preclude you from switching into computing majors, registering for computing minors, joining the ICS Honors Program, and graduating from a computing major with honors.
Guidelines to avoid plagarism:
- Do not look at another person's homework.
Instead you should prefer to discuss the problem in plain English.
This helps you to communicate clearly, practice technical jargon as it applies to your problem, and to identify how your solution exhibits behavior different from what you expect.
- Do not write down the solution in your notes.
It is perfectly fine (and encouraged) to collborate on work.
Working in a group is a rewarding experience, and definitely a necessary skill in any professional career.
The collaboration can include drawing diagrams and perhaps solving the problem on a whiteboard.
However, you should avoid writing the solution in your notes.
It is very useful to rethink the problem and go through the details and logic when you solve it again on your own.
We expect that:
- You can monitor each other and enforce these rules among yourselves. Making sure that others follow these guidelines will help to ensure that they don't pass off your work as their own.
- Your work honestly represents your efforts. The entire purpose of obtaining an education is so that you can accumulate a body of skills and experience that will help you later on. If you do not perform the work yourself, then you have cheated yourself out of the education. Employers in our field can (and do) screen applicants for skills and knowledge. You will perform poorly (and discredit UCI) if you do not practice now by doing your own work.