Collaboration Policies

Homework (Problem Sets, NOT Projects)
For the homework problem sets, feel free to *work with* other students in the class. I feel that working and studying together makes learning the material easier as other students may have alternative ways of explaining or understanding the material that is different than what is presented in class. Notice the emphasis on the phrase "work with", which implies that all parties involved are working and doing their best. Copying and plagarism do not constitute "working with" and will be prosecuted to the fullest extent.

If a student asks to copy your homework, the answer is no.

If a student asks you how to do a particular problem, feel free to explain the concept and general methods (perhaps with an example you make up that is different than the homework problem), but do not hold their hand step-by-step through the homework problem.

If someone was nice enough to give you some help, acknowledge them! Make note of this next to the problem.

Projects
The projects will require programming in C/C++ (your choice). Everything you hand in (all code, all comments, all documentation, all tests) must be yours and yours alone. Any copying of code will be considered plagarism and all parties involved will be considered to be equally guilty.

That said, you are still certainly allowed to help each other. In particular, it is acceptable to explain the organization of code, to explain how different parts of the code interact, to help each other debug programs, etc. As soon as a byte is directly transferred from one person's project to another's, then you are copying.

All code should be your own, and you should understand every line that you wrote. So even if someone else helps you to implement something or debug a problem, you still need to understand what is going on in your code.

Exams
Absolutely no collaboration at all.

Ambiguities, Clarifications, Questions?
If you're unsure about anything, just ask.



Gabriel H. Loh, © 2005
Last generated 29 Apr '05