Course Information
CS162 Spring 2014

Course Staff:

Instructors:

Anthony D. Joseph, Professor
465 Soda Hall.  Email: adj AT cs.berkeley.edu
Office Hours: Mondays and Tuesdays 10-11am in  449 Soda

Teaching Assistants:

Nicholas Chang
Email: X at inst.eecs.berkeley.edu, where X = cs162-ta
Office Hours: Fri 1p-3p in 751 Soda

Kelvin Chou
Email: X at inst.eecs.berkeley.edu, where X = cs162-tb
Office Hours: Tue 5p-6p in 611 Soda, Wed 1p-2p in 751 Soda

Riyaz Faizullabhoy
Email: X at inst.eecs.berkeley.edu, where X = cs162-tc
Office Hours: Mon 1p-3p in 611 Soda

Vaishaal Shankar
Email: X at inst.eecs.berkeley.edu, where X = cs162-td
Office Hours: Mon 12p-1p in 611 Soda, Mon 5:30p-6:30p in 511 Soda

Isaac Tian
Email: X at inst.eecs.berkeley.edu, where X = cs162-te
Office Hours: Mon 3p-4p in 751 Soda, Wed 10a-11a in 751 Soda

George Yiu
Email: X at inst.eecs.berkeley.edu, where X = cs162-tf
Office Hours: Tue 11a-1p in 751 Soda



Lecture and Discussion Times:

Lecture:


Discussion Sections and Labs: 

     Section Day Time Location Instructor / TA
    101
    Th 10:00A-11:00A 6 Evans Riyaz
    102 Th 11:00A-12:00P 9 Evans Kelvin
    103 Th 6:00-7:00P 405 Soda
    Vaishaal
    104
    Th
    1:00-2:00P 7 Evans
    Riyaz
    105 Th 2:00-3:00P 121 Wheeler
    Nick
    106 Th 3:00-4:00P
    81 Evans
    Nick
    107
    Th
    4:00-5:00P
    81 Evans
    Kelvin
    108
    Th
    5:00-6:00P
    81 Evans
    Vaishaal
    109
    Fr
    2:00-3:00P
    310 Soda
    Isaac
    110
    Fr
    3:00-4:00P
    310 Soda
    Isaac
    111
    Fr
    9:00-10:00A
    405 Soda
    George
    112
    Fr
    10:00-11:00A
    405 Soda
    George
    Lab   271/273 Soda Hall 

Course Communication:

You can email the staff at cs162 AT eecs.berkeley.edu. We are using Piazza to replace the newsgroups which have been used in the past. You should create an account and join the Berkeley instance of CS162. Piazza is effectively required reading for this course.


Course Reading Materials:

Textbooks:


Course Grading:

The EECS Division guideline for an upper division EECS class is that the overall class GPA should be between 2.7 and 3.1. (See policy for undergradute courses.) Thus, the average grade in this class will be a B or B+. Please set your expectations accordingly.

We grade on a curve rather than on an absolute scale because it protects students from stressing out if we happen to give an overly hard exam. Graduate students are not included in establishing the curve (to be fairer to undergraduates), but they will receive grades based on where they would fall on the curve.  The downside of grading on a curve is that it tends to lead students to think they are competing against each other; in practice, this is mistaken belief in a class this large. In past years, the absolute difference between each half-step grade (between a B+ and an A-, for example), has been roughly 5%, while the largest impact any individual student's performance is likely to have on your grade is less than 0.1%... in other words, well into the noise.

Projects: There will be four projects. Each project consists of a design document and solution code. The document will be worth 40% of the project grade, and the code will be worth the other 60%.

Exams: There will be two midterm exams. If you have a valid academic or atheletic conflict, let us know, and we will schedule a makeup exam. All exams will be closed book, and will cover material from lecture, sections, the readings, and the project. In particular, you are likely to do poorly on the exams and in the course if you do not do your share of the work on the project.

Rough Breakdown of Points: