Ceng 111 is an introductory course for Computer Science concepts.

Practically the course constitutes of two parts:

• A first part in which an overview of the current hardware (the Van Neuman Architecture) and its functionality is given. Following  this, how basic data types are stored and handled is explained.

• A second part where basic algorithmic and computational concepts are introduced following a functional paradigm. The Scheme language (which is a pure lisp dialect) is used as the workbench.

The course conduct has a four legged support.

1. Lectures
2. Text book(s)
3. Labs
4. Take Home Exams

The followings are to be mentioned:

• The lectures are not a voicing of the text material. They will cover aspect which are not covered in the course books or will put an emphesis on some of the aspects.

• In the first part of the lecture the student is expected to gain a broad coverage of the introduced subjects mainly by him/herself. Internet search engines,  encyclopedias are excellent sources for such broad-but-shallow information. As a part of the university education strategy students are expected to learn how to acuire and obtain knowledge directly by her/himself. Therefore if  you are a student of the course do trace the terminalogy which is unfamiliar to you. Make notes of it, and later during your selfstudy time eagerly consult the internet to get a grasp of the unfamiliar items.

• The Laboratory study  serves two purposes:

1. To practical subjects which is not covered in the lectures (like Linux set up, primary UNIX usage, the vi editor, conducting intelligent searches on the internet, etc.)
2. To experiment with Scheme and perform some small algorithmic applications in a closed-lab environment.

Each lab session will have an examination from which you will gain 35% of the course grade.
 

• Take-Home Exams have a contribution to your overall grade the same as the midterm examination does. We strongly advise that you take the exams seriously. There are 3 Take-Home Exams which contribute with increasing weights to your grade. The last two Take-Home Exams  are Scheme programming tasks and will be graded automatically (by means of a testing program). Though the input/output testing of a Take-Home Exams is a “blackbox test”, your source code will be investigated for neatness and plagiarism.
  This work is considered as EXAMINATION. Any plagiarism will be considered as CHEATING IN EXAMINATION.
  Usually you will have a 2-3 weeks of time to turn your take-home exams in. This time shall be used properly. The level of the take-home exams are so that a “hard work on the last 2-3 days” will not suffice. You are strongly advised to start concentrating on it right after you received it.
   
• Newsgroup: The newsgroup metu.ceng.course.111 is devoted to the announcements and discussion of course-related matters. You SHOULD check this newsgroup every day.