Hello CMPSC 302 Students,
This email is very long and includes many details about the CMPSC 302 course. Instead of bombarding you with many short emails, I will continue to write you a smaller number of more detailed emails and then archive them in our course's GitHub repository. Please take your time to read and regularly review this email so that you are comfortable with how the instructor designed the course, what type of work you will complete, and the ways in which the instructor will assess your work. To ensure that we effectively use our in-person course time, the course instructor will assume that you have carefully read this, and any other necessary follow-on emails, before the start of the Fall 2020 semester.
As you will recall, awhile ago I sent you an email that introduced the CMPSC 302 course. Today I wanted to remind you of several important points about the CMPSC 302 course and then ask you to complete a survey about your use of a laptop for the course --- but only if you have not already done so. Finally, I am going to share some updates about the first week of the Fall 2020 semester and then furnish a high-level overview of our course's structure.
Specifically, if you have not already done so, please complete the following survey about the use of a laptop for the Fall 2020 semester:
https://forms.gle/wHt8F7d9o7ANh8DG6
While I recognize that many of you will have already received an invitation from the Chair of the Department of Computer Science to complete this form, it is possible that some students, especially if they are in their first semester at Allegheny College or if they are on the waiting list for this course, have not already completed this survey.
Importantly, it is mandatory for you to complete this survey before the start of the Fall 2020 semester. If you do not have a laptop that meets the guidelines set by the Department of Computer Science then I urge you to complete this survey at your earliest convenience. As I mentioned in my last email to you and I point out again in the remainder of this note, every student who enrolls in CMPSC 302 for the Fall 2020 semester must have a laptop that is approved for use in the Department of Computer Science.
Since there are some students who are interested in taking this class and yet are still on the course waiting list due to the College's registration procedure, I don't yet know how many students must fit into our classroom at the same time. Moreover, until I add everyone to the class, I will not be able to fairly divide all students into groups that will meet in person according to a set schedule, thereby ensuring that we never exceed the room limit for our classroom and that you are safer during the Fall 2020 semester. Finally, there are some students who are currently on the course roster who may change their status as to whether they are learning remotely or on campus.
Therefore, to ensure that you are all as safe as possible during the first week of classes, I will be holding all classes, which are scheduled for T/Th 9:35 AM to 10:50 AM, through a Google Meet link that I will provide on Tuesday morning of next week.
Before you click this link for the Google Meet, please make sure that you take the following steps:
-- Ensure that you have headphones connected to your laptop and that you are able to hear sound through your headphones when you use Google Meet. Please note that you can test to ensure that your sound is working by visiting the following site and creating a sample Google Meet of which you are the only member:
-- Ensure that your video is working correctly on your laptop so that it records you face and can transmit it correctly to Google Meet. Again, you can test this by using the aforementioned web site. If you click the three vertical dots in the right-hand-side of Google Meet then you can go into the settings and confirm that your audio and video are working correctly. Please note that you must complete these steps before the start of our first class next week.
-- If you laptop and Internet connection will support it, please configure Google Meet to transmit and receive video at the 720p resolution. Picking these settings will ensure that you can read all of the video content that I stream to you and that everyone else in the class can clearly see your face. If you find that your connection drops regularly or the video becomes choppy or irregular then you can pick a lower level of video quality and see if that helps. You should only stop transmitting or receiving video when your laptop and Internet connection absolutely do not support any type of video streaming.
After clicking this link, please make sure that you take the following steps:
-- You should mute your microphone if you are not talking so that noise from your laptop is not transmitted into the meeting.
-- You should "pin" my video stream to your center screen by clicking a pin icon that will appear when you hover your mouse near the center of my video.
-- If you want to ask a question or participate in a discussion, then you need
to type a * into the chat window of Google Meet. We will use this symbol as an
indicator that the student who typed it wants to contribute to our conversation
by making a point or asking a question.
-- Unless your laptop or Internet connection does not support it, please leave your video enabled during all of the classroom sessions. Since these Google Meets are private for our class, there is not, to my knowledge, a risk that outsiders will enter our class or be able to record your video. By keeping your video enabled it will allow me and the other students in the class to see who is talking and who is currently engaged in the course.
During the first two classes, please keep in mind the following points:
-- I will be recording from my home studio which means that you will not be able to find me in my office in Alden Hall to ask me questions about your laptop or the Google Meet software.
-- During the class sessions next week, you will see that I will switch between full screen video and the display of various programs (e.g., terminal window, text editor, PDF viewer, or web browser) on my laptop. If I am not using full screen video, then you will see my face in a small circle normally on the right-hand side of your video.
-- Throughout the semester I will use specialized broadcasting software that
will allow me to seamlessly change between different scenes and sources during
our classroom and laboratory sessions. If something goes wrong with the
broadcasting software and you cannot see my video in Google Meet, then please
use a * in the Google Meet chat. Once you receive my acknowledgment you can
explain what problem you are experiencing so that I can resolve it quickly and
move on with the class.
I will share more details about the remainder of the Fall 2020 semester during our first week of the semester and through our GitHub planning repository to which I provided you a link in a previous email and later in this email.
Due to both the large size of our course and the limited space in Alden Hall, you will normally have one in-person class with me per week. When you are not in class you will be completing activities that are guided by specialized YouTube videos and live streaming sessions through either YouTube Live or Google Meet.
We will hold all of our course's laboratory sessions through either YouTube Live or Google Meet. I will be available to answer your questions about an assignment through YouTube, Google Meet, and/or Slack. You will also actively participate in these sessions by, for instance, live coding with me and the other students in the course, asking questions, participating in interactive quizzes, and collaboratively working through each of the steps in the assignment. Please note that there are currently no student technical leaders assigned to this course and thus there may be times when you need to wait before I will be able to help by collaborating with you through YouTube or Slack.
During the laboratory sessions you will be able to pair program with me and/or the other students in the course through programs like VS Code. I will also release a survey every week in which you can request that I make a customized YouTube video about any topic that I covered during the recently completed week. Through my web site and our course's GitHub repositories, every week you will have access to all the assignment sheets, reading assignments, course slides, source code, and any accompanying data or other materials.
Although I recognize that I will be teaching CMPSC 302 differently than all of the other courses that I have taught at Allegheny College, I want you to know that I have been carefully planning the course for the entire summer! In fact, I've been using, for many years, the majority of the remote-learning technologies that we will use this semester. I find remote collaboration and learning a lot of fun and I anticipate that you will also find it exciting and effective!
Importantly, please note that it will never be possible for more than half of the class to meet in the classroom to which we were assigned. As such, I must move several of the CMPSC 302 course activities to an online venue so as to ensure that I keep you as safe as is possible and that we all comply with the official state and CDC guidelines concerning, for instance, the occupancy level of our classroom space and the number of feet between each person who is inside of the classroom. While this may not be ideal, it is an absolute necessity.
Although the course will be different, I'm really excited about this innovative format for collaborative learning and I look forward to convincing you of its merits throughout the semester. Importantly, you will be learning to use all of the remote working technology that is normally adopted by experts in industry, thereby better ensuring that you are prepared for a position in the software and technology fields.
Finally, I want to encourage you to actively engage with the course throughout the Fall 2020 semester. It is important that you watch all of the videos, participate in the YouTube Live streams and Google Meets, use all of the required software, and attend all of the in-person classroom sessions. To ensure that you best succeed in this course you must take ownership of your education by completing all of the work on time and communicating effectively with me. Again, since there are no student technical leaders for this course, you should expect that there may be some delay in me getting back to you with a response to the questions that you have about either the course content or the assignments.
Here are some key points I want you to remember from my previous email:
-- 1) Since I want you to stay up-to-date with the planning for our course, I encourage you to visit the following GitHub repository for more details:
https://github.com/Allegheny-Computer-Science-302-F2020/cs302-F2020-plans
If you have not already checked the GitHub repository, then please do so! I will also be updating the content in this repository throughout this week and then during the entirety of the Fall 2020 academic semester.
-- 2) Since I also want you to be able to easily communicate with me and the other students who will be in the course, I have setup a Slack workspace. You can sign-up to join the Slack workspace for free at this web site:
https://join.slack.com/t/cmpsc302fall2020/signup
If you have not already joined our Slack workspace, then please do so at your earliest convenience. Instead of using email for communication during the Fall 2020 academic semester I will primarily communicate with students through Slack. In addition to informally chatting with the other people in the course, you can also start asking me questions through Slack at any time!
-- 3) All students must have a department approved laptop to take the CMPSC 302 course. You can learn whether or not your laptop meets the guidelines for being a department approved laptop by visiting this web site:
https://www.cs.allegheny.edu/resources/laptops/
Please note that, along with bringing a laptop, you must have headphones that will allow you to participate in online sessions while hearing all content through your headphones. As your schedule permits during the remainder of the summer, I encourage you to please explore the various programs I mentioned in my previous email so that you are able to participate in all course activities.
Here is a summary of the technologies that we will use during the semester. Please make sure that, during the first week of the semester, you have taken any necessary steps to install these programs on your laptop. If you are not able to install these programs on your laptop, then I will be available through Google Meet during office hours, virtual classroom sessions, and the laboratory session to ensure that your system is correctly up and running!
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You will use Docker Desktop to run programs that the course instructor provides to you through a Docker container. To learn more about Docker, you can visit the following web site:
https://www.docker.com/products/docker-desktop
To learn if your laptop can run Docker Desktop, please visit this web site:
https://www.cs.allegheny.edu/canirundocker/
Please remember that all students are required to run Docker Desktop on their laptop so as to ensure that they can run the instructor-provided Docker containers.
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You will implement web pages and web-based programs in the following programming languages: Markdown, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. We will use Markdown and HTML to create the content for our web pages. You will use CSS to add style to the web pages that you create with Markdown and CSS. Finally, you will use JavaScript and JavaScript frameworks to further improve the styling of your site and to add additional interactivity options.
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You will use the VS Code text editor when you need to implement a web page using the aforementioned programming languages and write technical documentation in Markdown. Students who want to pair program with the course instructor or (when appropriate and required by the assignment) another student in the class should also use VS Code's Live Share feature, including the features that let you share a terminal window or a running server. Although students may elect to use a different text editor than VS Code, the course instructor and the student technical leaders will only be available for remote pair programming and debugging through VS Code. You can learn more about VS Code by visiting this web site:
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You will use a terminal window that allows you to execute commands such as the creation of a web server or the rendering of a static web site. Students may consider using a customized terminal for their operating system or the integrated terminal in VS Code. Students should work with the course instructor to ensure that their chosen terminal window will support all of the course activities, such as running a web server, generating a web site, starting a Docker container, committing source code to a GitHub repository, and running an project assessment tool like GatorGrader.
Since the semester will start next week on Monday, I will now start to check Slack on a regular basis. If you have general questions about the course you can ask them in the #general channel. If you have specific questions that you think are best discussed in a private manner, then please send them to me as a direct message. Unless there is an absolute need for you to do so, please refrain from sending me emails and instead focus on communicating with me through Slack. Finally, don't forget to be on the look out for the Google Meet link that I will send you on Tuesday morning! You can use this to join our first class on Tuesday.