CS570: Analysis of Algorithms (Fall 2007)
Most recent message posted:
12/19/2007
- Class meets Mondays and Wednesdays from 3:30-4:50pm, in room SGM
601.
- Instructor and Teaching Assistants:
| Instructor |
Teaching Assistant |
| Name |
David Kempe |
Gaurav Agarwal |
| Office |
SAL 232 |
SAL 112 |
| Office Hours |
Tuesday, 10:30-12:00
or by appointment |
Wednesday, 10:30-12:00
Friday, 3:30-5:00 |
| Phone |
(213)-740-6438 |
(213)-740-2292 |
| e-mail |
 |
 |
- There will be a quiz on the prerequisites on Wednesday, 08/29, in
class.
- There will be two in-class midterms. The first one will be on
Wednesday, 10/03, in class, and the second one on Monday,
11/05, in class.
- The final exam will be Monday, December 17, from
2:00-4:00. Unless announced otherwise, it will be in the
classroom SGM 601. It will be cumulative (i.e., cover the material of
the entire semester), though it may not be unreasonable to
expect an emphasis on the last part of class.
- There are two parallel sessions, taught by
Dr. Shawn Shamsian and Prof. Leana Golubchik. These two sessions will be significantly
different from this one. The material covered in the session
taught by Prof. Kempe will be more advanced, and strictly assume
knowledge of the prerequisites. Dr. Shamsian's and Prof. Golubchik's
sessions will place more emphasis on a review of the basic
material, and will be altogether easier. Computer science
Ph.D. students are required to enroll in Prof. Kempe's
section. Master's students and Ph.D. students from other
departments have a choice of which session to enroll in.
Course Overview, Syllabus, Textbook, Prerequisites
The course is intended as a first graduate course in the design and
analysis of algorithms. While the main focus is on known and
well-established results in the literature, there will be many
times when the course will touch on uncharted territory, or
suggest directions for research. The course will give an overview
of common techniques, and applications of these techniques in
different settings. Look also at the more detailed
syllabus.
The textbook is
- Jon Kleinberg/Éva Tardos: Algorithm Design.
The book will be available at the campus store.
The class will be relying mostly on the textbook, but additional
material will occasionally be drawn from the following books
(which will be placed on reserve, as is a copy of the textbook):
- Cormen/Leiserson/Rivest/Stein: Introduction to Algorithms (2nd
edition)
- Garey/Johnson: Computers and Intractability
- Motwani/Raghavan: Randomized Algorithms
- Vazirani: Approximation Algorithms
- Borodin/El-Yaniv: Online Algorithms
Students in the class are expected to have a reasonable degree of
mathematical sophistication, and to be familiar with the basic
notions of algorithms and data structures, discrete mathematics,
and probability. Specifically, the following will be assumed:
- Mathematical Proofs, in particular induction and contradiction.
- Big-Oh notation (Big-O, Omega, Theta), how to apply them.
- Basic data structures: arrays, linked lists, trees, balanced
trees, heaps (priority queues), graphs.
- Basic graph algorithms: connected components, BFS, DFS.
- Other algorithms: binary search, sorting.
- Discrete mathematics: evaluating sums and simple recurrences.
Undergraduate classes in these subjects should
be sufficient. If you have doubts about meeting these
prerequisites, please contact the instructor. Notice that these
prerequisites will actually be verified with a quiz during the
second week of classes.
Information about Homework and Grading
is on a separate page.
Academic Integrity, Collaboration
All students are expected to maintain the utmost level of academic
integrity. Passing off anyone else's (whether it be a fellow
student or someone outside the university) work as your own is a
serious infraction, and will lead to appropriate
sanctions. Similarly, any collaboration during exams is
prohibited. Please consult the USC
Student Conduct Code
(general overview) for details on what is and
is not appropriate, and for the possible consequences of
infractions.
However, as research is usually a joint effort, students are
encouraged to collaborate on general solution strategies for
homework. The writeup, however, must be your own - you may not
copy someone else's solution. In addition, your homework should
list all the fellow students with whom you discussed the
solutions. Collaboration is restricted to fellow students inside
the class; collaboration with students outside the class or others
(such as discussion groups on the WWW) are not appropriate.
- 12/19/2007: The adjusted percentages and course grades have been
posted on the Blackboard
site. The grade distribution was as follows: 6*A, 6*A-,
6*B+, 8*B, 4*B-, 4*C+, 1*C.
- 12/17/2007: The grades for the final exam have been posted on
the Blackboard
site. The minimum score was 13/56, the maximum was 55.5/56,
and the average was roughly 33/56.
- 12/17/2007: The grades for the sixth homework have been posted on
the Blackboard
site. The minimum score was 7/50, the maximum was 48/50,
and the average was roughly 30.5/50.
12/15/2007: For viewing the final exam and asking for regrades on
the final homeworks, we will have office hours as follows:
David on Tuesday from 10:30-1:00, and on
Wednesday from 10:30-12:00. Gaurav on Tuesday from 2:00-4:00
and on Wednesday from 10:30-12:00. The grades will be
finalized and turned in on Wednesday at noon; after that, no
regrades will be possible.
The final exams can only be viewed in David's office - they will
not be returned to you. If you will be unable to attend
office hours (for instance, because you are traveling), you
can designate another student in the class to view your
final exam for you. To do so, send an e-mail explicitly
naming that student to David. No one will be allowed to see
your final exam unless we have an e-mail from you saying
they can.
- 12/10/2007: The grades for the fifth homework have been posted on
the Blackboard
site. The minimum score was 6.9/50, the maximum was 49/50,
and the average was roughly 36.5/50. You can pick up
solutions in David's office hours on 12/11, or afterwards from Kusum
Shori in SAL 204.
- 12/10/2007: The sample solutions for the sixth homework assignment
will be available from Kusum Shori in SAL 204 starting Thursday.
- 12/05/2007: The final exam will be Monday, 12/17, from 2:00-4:00.
- 12/05/2007: David will hold additional office hours on Saturday,
12/15, from 10:00-12:00.
- 12/05/2007: David will be out of town from 12/12-14. Also expect
slow responses to Blackboard posts and e-mails.
- 12/05/2007: Your TA Gaurav Agarwal will hold a review session for
the final exam on Friday, 12/14, from 10:00-11:20, in room SGM
601. E-mail him early if you want to see particular topics covered.
- 12/05/2007: David's office hours next week (on 12/11) will be from
2:00-3:30 instead of the usual time.
- 12/03/2007: David's office hours tomorrow (12/04) will be half an
hour earlier than usual, i.e., from 10:00 until 11:30.
- 12/02/2007: The handout on the
randomized rounding algorithm is now posted.
- 12/01/2007: The sixth homework
assignment has been posted. It is due by 5pm on 12/12/2007,
and cannot be submitted late. To submit on or before 12/11/2007, submit
to David. To submit on 12/12/2007, submit to Kusum Shori in SAL 204.
- 11/30/2007: The handout on online algorithms
is now posted.
- 11/14/2007: The fifth homework
assignment has been posted. It is due in class by 11/26/2007.
- 11/14/2007: The grades for the fourth homework have been posted on
the Blackboard
site. The minimum score was 13/40, the maximum was 38.5/40,
and the average was roughly 29.8/40.
- 11/05/2007: The results for the second midterm have been posted on
the Blackboard
site. The minimum score was 12.5/41, the maximum was 40/41,
and the average was roughly 29.5/41. The final will be
somewhere between the first and second midterm in difficulty
level.
- 10/31/2007: A talk by
Chris Umans may be of interest to students in this class.
- 10/31/2007: The grades for the third homework have been posted on
the Blackboard
site. The minimum score was 7.5/40, the maximum was 38/40,
and the average was roughly 27.3/40.
- 10/30/2007: The NP-completeness proof for
Certification (which is not in the textbook) is now posted.
- 10/30/2007: In preparation for the second midterm (which will be on
Monday, 11/05), your TA Gaurav Agarwal will hold a review
session on Friday, 11/02, from 10:30 until 11:50, in room GFS
118. If there are particular topics you would like to see him
focus on, send Gaurav e-mail ahead of time.
- 10/29/2007: In order to be able to provide sample solutions for HW 4
prior to the midterm, the latest submission deadline for HW 4 will be
Friday, 11/02, at 5pm. After that time, paper copies of the sample
solutions will be made available on the door of office SAL 232, and
no submissions will be accepted.
- 10/17/2007: The fourth homework
assignment has been posted. It is due in class by 10/31/2007.
- 10/12/2007: A talk
by Elliot Anshelevich on Tuesday, 10/16, will likely be of interest to many
students in the class.
- 10/12/2007: David Kempe will be out of town from Thursday, 10/18,
until Tuesday, 10/23 (inclusive). The Monday class will be
taught by your TA Gaurav Agarwal instead. The office hours
will be moved to Thursday, 10/25, from 10:30-12:00. All late
homework submissions should go either to the TA, or to Kusum
Shori in office SAL 204.
- 10/12/2007: The grades for the second homework have been posted on
the Blackboard
site. The minimum score was 12/40, the maximum was 40/40,
and the average was roughly 25.8/40.
- 10/10/2007: The third homework
assignment has been posted. It is due in class by 10/17/2007.
- 10/03/2007: The results for the first midterm have been posted on
the Blackboard
site. The minimum score was 9/41, the maximum was 38/41,
and the average was roughly 19.6/41. Obviously, that is lower than
what I had planned, so the second midterm will likely be a bit
easier in return.
- 10/01/2007: The handout on the
Edmonds-Karp algorithm is now posted.
- 09/29/2007: The slides for last week's lectures have been posted on
the Blackboard site.
- 09/28/2007: The grades for the first homework have been posted on the
Blackboard site. The minimum
score was 11/40, the maximum was 40/40, and the average about 25.5/40.
- 09/28/2007: In order for us to be able to hand out sample
solutions to the second homework prior to the midterm, the
latest possible submission time for HW2 is Monday, 10/01.
- 09/19/2007: In preparation for the first midterm (which will be on
Wednesday, 10/03), your TA Gaurav Agarwal will hold a review
session on Monday, 10/01, from 2:00 until 3:20, in room GFS
106. If there are particular topics you would like to see him
focus on, send Gaurav e-mail ahead of time.
- 09/19/2007: David will be out of town from 09/24 (Monday) until
09/27 (Thursday). Lectures during this week will be held by
Prof. Leana Golubchik.
Please submit your homework solutions to her in class. If you
submit late homeworks, please submit them to Kusum Shori in
SAL 204 instead. David's office hours on Tuesday will be
cancelled; instead, there will be office hours on Friday,
09/28, from 10:00 until 11:30.
- 09/18/2007: The second homework
assignment has been posted. It is due in class by 09/26/2007.
- 09/13/2007: The TA office hours had to be moved (again). They are
now Wednesday 10:30-12:00 and Friday 3:30-5:00, which will
hopefully be final.
- 09/11/2007: The TA office has finally been assigned. It is SAL 112.
Also, the TA office hours have changed (see new times posted above).
- 09/04/2007: The first homework
assignment has been posted. It is due in class by 09/12/2007.
- 08/29/2007: The grades for the quiz have been posted on the
Blackboard site. The minimum
score was 21/56, the maximum was 55/56, and the average about 44/56. The
quiz will be returned in class next week.
- 08/29/2007: The quiz sample solutions
have been posted.
- 08/29/2007: The TA will not hold office hours the first week of class.
- 05/25/2007: There will be a quiz on the prerequisite material
on Wednesday, August 29.
- 05/25/2007: This is the place where you will find all of your
important updates about class. Check back frequently.