Theory of Computing

CSC 350
Union College
Spring 2010

Schedule

This schedule will develop as we go along. So check back frequently.

Week 1
DateWhat's going to happen in classHow to prepare
Tue 3/30

Finite state automata.

Thu 4/1

Deterministic and non-deterministic automata.

Read Sipser, Chapters 0 and 1.1

Week 2
DateWhat's going to happen in classHow to prepare
Tue 4/6

Inductive proofs over computations. Closure properties of regular languages (FSA languages).

Reading: Sipser 1.2

Thu 4/8

Regular Expressions.

First homework due (see Blackboard).

Reading: Sipser 1.3

Week 3
DateWhat's going to happen in classHow to prepare
Tue 4/13

The pumping lemma for regular languages.

Reading: Sipser 1.4

Thu 4/15

Hidden Markov Models.

Second homework due (see Blackboard).

Reading: see Blackboard.

Week 4
DateWhat's going to happen in classHow to prepare
Tue 4/20

Pushdown automatata.

Reading: Sipser 2.2

Thu 4/22

First midterm.

Context free grammars.

Third homework due (see Blackboard).

Sipser 2.1.

Week 5
DateWhat's going to happen in classHow to prepare
Tue 4/27

Context-free grammars and pushdown automata.

Reading: Sipser 2.1 and 2.2.

Thu 4/29

The pumping lemma for context-free languages.

Fourth homework due (see Blackboard).

Reading: Sipser 2.3.

Week 6
DateWhat's going to happen in classHow to prepare
Tue 5/4

More on context-free languages.

For Tuesday, study the proof that PDAs and CFGs are equivalent and be prepared to explain its structure and underlying idea.

Thu 5/6

Turing Machines.

Fifth homework due (see Blackboard).

Reading: Sipser 3

Week 7
DateWhat's going to happen in classHow to prepare
Tue 5/11

Variants of Turing machines.

Thu 5/13

Second Midterm.

The halting problem.

Sixth homework due (see Blackboard).

Reading: Sipser 4

Week 8
DateWhat's going to happen in classHow to prepare
Tue 5/18

Undecidable problems.

Reading: Sipser 5

Thu 5/20

Complexity. P and NP.

Seventh homework due (see Blackboard).

Week 9
DateWhat's going to happen in classHow to prepare
Tue 5/25

NP-completeness.

Thu 5/27

More NP-complete problems.

Eighth homework due (see Blackboard).

Week 10
DateWhat's going to happen in classHow to prepare
Tue 6/1

Space complexity.

Thu 6/3

TBD.

Nineth homework due (see Blackboard).