This page contains a brief summary of each class topic and the associated reading. This page morphs frequently, being updated at least weekly. You may need to reload it at each viewing to avoid being shown a stale version from your browser cache. Most recent items are at the top. Last updated Dec 3, 2010.

Tue, Dec 14 10:30AM-12:30PM Final Exam in PRS114 (our classroom).

Tue, Dec 7

• NPC
• Cook's theorem
• last words on P = NP.
• review.

Thu, Dec 2

• Reductions and the many NP problems
• SAT and 3SAT
• hw4 is due today

Tue, Nov 30

• Reading: Chapter 9
• P and NP

Tue, Nov 23

• Divide and conquer revisited: integer and matrix multiplication
• When dynamic programming breaks down: TSP, too much caching.

Thu, Nov 18

• more dynamic prog
• edit distance and variants

Tue, Nov 16

• more dynamic prog

Thu, Nov 11

• Reading: Chapter 8
• Dynamic Programming

Thu, Nov 9

• network flows
• Ford-Fulkerson and Edmonds-Karp algorithms

Tue, Nov 2 Election day, no class.

Thu, Nov 4

• Homework set 3 is due today.
• network flows

Tue, Nov 2 Election day, no class.

Thu, Oct 28

• The Union-Find data structure
• The MST algorithms correctness and runtime
• Homework set 3 (pdf).

Tue, Oct 26

• Prim's MST algorithm
• Kruskal's MST algorithm

Thu, Oct 21

• Exam review
• MST: Minimal Spanning Trees

Tue, Oct 19

• Midterm exam covering chapters 1-5, 6.2, 6.3

Thu, Oct 14

• Shortest paths in weighted graphs
• Reading: Sections 6.3 and 6.4
• Midterm review sheet mid-rev.pdf, and prior term exam mid10s.pdf.

Tue, Oct 12

• Shortest paths in graphs
• Reading: Chapter 5

Thu, Oct 7

• Nuts and bolts contest

Tue, Oct 5

• Representation of (sparse) graphs in C and C++
• Breadth and Depth first graph traversals.
• Reading: finish Chapter 5

Thu, Sep 30

• the reference solution to the nuts and bolts problem.
• various issues and pragmatics of the programming environment for fastenersSort().

Tue, Sep 28

• a lower bound for comparison based sorting.
• Intro to graphs

Tue, Sep 21 and Thu, Sep 23

• Wrap up on sorting
• Putting it together: Introspectivesort.

Tue, Sep 14 and Thu, Sep 16    

• Sorting algorithms: Mergesort, Insertionsort, Heapsort, Quicksort.
• Master Theorem and Muster Theorem (pdf)
• Reading: scan chapter 3, read chapter 4.
• first homework due Tue, Sep 14.

Thu, Sep 9    

• Reading: Complete Chapter 2.
• Big O, Ω, Θ and program runtime estimation
• Analysis of insertion sort, classical matrix multiplication, exponentiation.
• Analysis of quick sort

Tue, Sep 7    

• Reading: Chapter 2 up to page 45.
• Inductive proofs
• Max-Min and Max-and-2nd-best problems: More explicit comparison counting and lower bounds
• algorithm cost function estimation. Big-O, Ω, Θ
• HW1 assigned. It is due Sept 14.

Thu, Sep 2    

• Reading: Chapter 1
• Job selection (disjoint interval problem)
  • Some likely strategies don't work
  • One works and is fast.
• Proving algorithm correctness - emphasis on clarity over formality in explanations of correctness
• Counting operations: Max, Max-Min problems.
• Lower bound for Max problem: n-1 comparisons are necessary

Tue, Aug 31    

• Definition of algorithm
• The three major design strategies: divide-and-conquer, greediness, dynamic programming.
• The issue of algorithm correctness
• Robot arm tour (TSP: Traveling Salesman Problem)
  • Construct counterexample to show a strategy does not work.
  • Exaustive search works but takes too long.
• Resources: Skienna first 8 lecture 1 slides, nearestNeigborTour.C

saunders@udel.edu