COMP3311 Notices

Supp Exam

Posted by John Shepherd Friday 14 January 2022, 01:01:14 PM.

The Supp is up-and-running.

You can access it via https://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~cs3311/21T3/exams/supp/index.html

Supp Exam

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 05 January 2022, 04:14:21 PM, last modified Wednesday 05 January 2022, 04:18:08 PM.

The COMP3311 Supp Exam will be held on Friday 14 January from 1pm to 5pm.

The exam format will be the same as the November Final Exam (but all new questions).

More Marking

Posted by John Shepherd Friday 10 December 2021, 02:00:39 PM.

The exams are marked. We don't release exam marks. Now what I need to do is go through all the items on my TODO list. Marks don't need to be submitted to Astra until Monday morning, so I can do this cleaning up over the weekend. Final* marks will be released by UNSW next Wednesday. I put "Final*" because they can always be adjusted if I've forgotten to include some mark (e.g. I missed something on the TODO list).

Marking, marking, marking

Posted by John Shepherd Thursday 02 December 2021, 06:32:20 AM, last modified Friday 10 December 2021, 05:18:31 PM.

We'll start marking exams today. Should have that wrapped up by mid next week (Wed 8 Dec).

In the meantime I will wade my way through all the items on my TODO list.

I will also be running plagiarism checking on the assignments and the Python exam question.

Marks need to be finalised by Fri 10 Mon 13 Dec for release the following week.

Plagiarism cases will get a WD grade; people with Supp Exams get a WC grade (if Astra will let me).

Marks can be adjusted after release if I forgot to include something.

q5.sql?

Posted by John Shepherd Tuesday 30 November 2021, 02:27:28 PM.

There is no q5.sql file, and you don't need one. Simply use the views that were defined in the earlier questions. This was explained in the Notes page and is also mentioned in the Instructions section on the Q5 page.

Q5 sample output

Posted by John Shepherd Tuesday 30 November 2021, 01:58:44 PM.

The first example in Q5 was rubbish. I've removed it.

In case you're on that page, refresh in your browser

Comin soon ...

Posted by John Shepherd Tuesday 30 November 2021, 01:14:13 PM.

If you get a "Coming Soon .." message when you access

https://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~cs3311/21T3/exams/final/index.html

clear your browser cache

Music vs Property

Posted by John Shepherd Tuesday 30 November 2021, 01:11:19 PM.

The database for this exam is "property". If you're looking at a page that says "music", refresh the page.

Final Comments on Final Exam

Posted by John Shepherd Tuesday 30 November 2021, 11:24:32 AM, last modified Tuesday 30 November 2021, 12:51:00 PM.

The best way to access the Final Exam material is via

https://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~cs3311/21T3/exams/final/index.html

You don't actually need to access Webcms3 at all during the exam, unless you want to submit your answers via Webcms3.

Communications in the exam:

• ask questions via email to cs3311@cse.unsw.edu.au
• I'll post announcements on the Webcms3 Notices, and they'll be emailed to you
• any updates to the exam paper will also be noted in the Updates page

Don't run graphics-heavy programs on d.cse (vxdb)

Submit your answer as you complete each question, to avoid the end-of-exam bottleneck.

I think this exam is easier than the 20T3 exam. For a start, it only has 10 questions, not 12.

Good luck!

More Comments on the Final Exam

Posted by John Shepherd Monday 29 November 2021, 09:20:42 PM.

Richard Liu, one of our tutors, has compiled a list of questions, which seems to cover most conerns that students have. I'll answer these here:

• If there is a 3s time limit per question ... NO
• If questions can ONLY be completed by using views ... NO
• If the passing the provided autotests means you will get 100% for that question or not ... YES
• That Students should check their emails or the update page for updates ... I will post updates both as Notices, which will end up in you mail box, and in the Update file
• That Students should send any concerns to the course email address AND NOWHERE ELSE LIKE THE FORUM ... Correct ... email cs3311@cse
• That Students should NOT submit on d.cse servers ... Correct; only submit on "normal" CSE servers, or via Webcms3
• If students sit this exam they may not be eligible to sit a secondary exam under special consideration ... YES ... Fit-to-sit applies in this course
• They can only submit in the 4 hour block, any submissions after will not be accepted (unless you state otherwise) ... YES, you must submit before 5pm (except for ELS students)

Comments on the COMP3311 Exam

Posted by John Shepherd Monday 29 November 2021, 09:19:21 AM.

I will open the exam materials just before 1pm on Tuesday 30 November.

If 500 students all try to access the exam material through Webcms3 at 1pm, Webcms3 will grind to a halt. You do not need to access exam material via Webcms3. There is a direct link you can use:

https://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~cs3311/21T3/exams/final/index.html

Use that! And you will avoid the frustration of waiting for Webcms3 to handle your request at the start of the exam.

Similarly, if everyone tries to submit their answers at the end of the exam, Give will grind to a halt (and if you're submitting via Webcm3, it will appear that Webcms3 has ground to a halt).

Submit your answers as you complete each question.

Hopefully, d.cse (a.k.a. vxdb) can handle 400+ PostgreSQL servers, but it will struggle if you insist on running vscode on it as well. Do not run vscode on d.cse . Use d.cse just for PostgreSQL and do your editing on some other machine. I've shown you how to use multiple windows on VLab, one for editing files and one for running your PostgreSQL server. You can access your exam working directory from both windows.

Of course, you can avoid many of the above problems by doing all of your work on your home machine. Working on your home machine also avoids network lag/unreliability.

I'll post more comments on doing the exam later today ...

Amazing

Posted by John Shepherd Friday 26 November 2021, 08:47:09 AM.

Congrats! 57% response rate on MyExperience.

Assignment Marks

Posted by John Shepherd Thursday 25 November 2021, 01:24:24 PM, last modified Thursday 25 November 2021, 09:05:21 PM.

It seems that some of the tests still didn't avoid some of the ambiguous cases that were discussed in various places, so I'll have to redo the auto-marking. I assume that this will increase most people's auto-mark.

i now officially hate Assignment 2 :-(

As for finding out your marks: go to the sturec page (click on the little graph icon), then click on the "Submit Your Work" link, and then click on the "Collect Your Submission" tab. If it's been marked, you'll get the marking output .If it hasn't been marked, ask your tutor.

Last Chance for MyExperience

Posted by John Shepherd Thursday 25 November 2021, 09:37:01 AM, last modified Thursday 25 November 2021, 09:37:20 AM.

MyExperience finishes today. Forget about the link on the Moodle site. Go straight to the MyExperience site . Now the CSE Head of School is unhappy with the COMP3311 response rate. Please make him happy.

And for a sweetner, I'll give everyone a 1 mark bonus on the Exam if the response rate hits 50% (it's currently 28%). Since the survey is anonymous, I can't give this bonus just to the people who fill the survey.

Querying Assignment Marks

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 24 November 2021, 09:34:07 PM.

If you want to query an assignment mark, send email to cs3311@cse.unsw.edu.au (or directly to jas@cse.unsw.edu.au). Don't post on the forum.

I will add them to my TODO list and will investigate when I have time, which may not be before the exam, but will be before the final marks are released

Polls, Surveys, etc.

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 24 November 2021, 08:56:45 AM.

I've added a new poll to find out where people plan to do their exam prac work. If very many people want to use vxdb (d.cse), then we'll tweak the configuration to make sure it can handle the load.

The response rate for MyExperience has been pretty low so far (only 20%). The people who run MyExp are crying about this (sob, sob). Please do the course evaluation to make them happier. I pay most attention to the written feedback in the "This course could be improved by ..." question.

Final Exam

Posted by John Shepherd Tuesday 23 November 2021, 08:15:05 AM.

I will not be answering any more forum questions like "what day/time is the final exam?"

Tuesday 30 November. Questions open 1pm. Submissions close 5pm.

If you want find out more about the exam, check out the Week 10 Thursday Online Session video.

Sample Exams

Posted by John Shepherd Friday 19 November 2021, 05:16:47 PM.

An old sample exam, along with last year's final exam, are available under the Exams link.

The submission pages are dummies, so don't expect submissions to work.

MyExperience Links

Posted by John Shepherd Thursday 18 November 2021, 03:57:21 PM.

For anyone having trouble accessing MyExperience via Moodle, try this direct link .

No Help Session today

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 17 November 2021, 01:58:41 PM.

Reminder: I’m visiting the fracture clinic this afternoon, so can’t run the usual help session.

The usual (and final) online session will run at 9:15 on Thursday.

Assignment Marks

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 17 November 2021, 08:48:36 AM, last modified Wednesday 17 November 2021, 09:13:22 AM.

Since week 6, I have been trying to set up Ass1 marking, but circumstances have continually interrupted me. I plan to finish setting up Ass1 for marking in the next day or two (but of course will be constantly interrupted). The overall plan: Ass1 marks available mid week 11, Ass2 marks available end week 11.

A suggestion for MyExperience ... "This course could be improved by ... having a course admin to handle assignment marking"

Quiz 6

Posted by John Shepherd Tuesday 16 November 2021, 10:43:14 PM.

The real Quiz 6 is now available

Week 10 Preview

Posted by John Shepherd Sunday 14 November 2021, 09:34:22 PM, last modified Tuesday 16 November 2021, 10:09:38 PM.

No scope for making a preview video this week, so ...

• watch the Week 09 and Week 10 videos
• Quiz 6 is available Monday Wednesday due Friday
• go to your tute and say "bye, bye" to your tutor
• have a look at the Exams page
• Tuesday online: FDs, Relational Alg
• Wednesday online: cancelled; I have to attend the fracture clinic
• Thursday online: Transactions, Exam preview
• fill in the MyExperience survey

Last Last Assignment Update

Posted by John Shepherd Saturday 13 November 2021, 04:44:28 PM, last modified Saturday 13 November 2021, 06:27:56 PM.

I changed a couple of test cases: 04 to get rid of the AW grade, 12 to fix ENGG3600.

They're in a new testing.zip file. They'll work with a fully-patched DB. If test 12 fails, apply patch4.sql and try again.

If Q4 fails, try ordering the terms by terms.id or terms.starting

Last Assignment 2 Update

Posted by John Shepherd Saturday 13 November 2021, 09:14:18 AM.

It has been pointed out that some of the clarifications to the assignment spec have only appeared in the Forum. The two important of these ("Eligible to graduate" and formatting of "-" for null marks/grades) have been added to the spec and I'll try to find examples of both and add them to the Examples page.

For auto-marking, we will make sure to avoid ambiguous/contentious edge cases (e.g. grades indicating "unresolved").

And, a final data bug, some of the definitions had "ENG3600" rather than "ENGG3600". There's a new patch to fix this (patch4.sql), but I've also put in a new version of mymyunsw.dump with all patches applied). In the spirit of side-stepping auto-marking problems, we'll avoid any students who studied this, so the patch is really just aesthetic.

And this is the last update I plan to post for the assignment.

Assignment 2 Updates

Posted by John Shepherd Thursday 11 November 2021, 08:10:59 PM, last modified Thursday 11 November 2021, 09:54:59 PM.

Submission is open

There's a new testing.zip after we found an order problem in one file. Replace your existing test files.

If you want to rebuild the database from scratch, don't forget to apply the patches.

We will not use any examples of enrolment in two programs or two streams in our testing.

Help Session today

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 10 November 2021, 01:43:59 PM.

Wed 10 Nov 2-4 https://unsw.zoom.us/j/84723900038

Also, has anyone found a student who has actually satisfied all the requirements of their program/stream and has the required total UOC?

Ass2 Deadline

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 10 November 2021, 10:23:43 AM, last modified Wednesday 10 November 2021, 10:25:54 AM.

Ass2 is now due before 9pm on Monday 15 November.

This was noted 4 days ago, but I think it may have gotten lost in all the other Notice text.

Quick Assignment update #2

Posted by John Shepherd Tuesday 09 November 2021, 11:26:37 AM.

If you want to pass the check tests, you'll need to apply all of the patches to your database.

There is now ~cs3311/web/21T3/assignments/ass2/files/patch3.sql

In case you've forgotten which patches you applied, you can incorporate these patches multiple times without breaking anything.

Assignment 2 Update 999

Posted by John Shepherd Monday 08 November 2021, 11:29:16 PM.

We've now added (courtesy of Richard Liu) the testing setup. Accessible via the [Testing] link in the assignment spec.

I also fixed a few glitches in the examples, added some extra clarifications to the Spec file, and added a new patch file to fix the database to be consistent with what's shown in the Examples:

~cs3311/web/21T3/assignments/ass2/files/patch2.sql

Tomorrow's online session will be dedicated to Assignment 2, especially the fine details of Q3. I have another meeting at 5.30, so the session will need to end by then.

Week 09 Preview

Posted by John Shepherd Sunday 07 November 2021, 10:48:05 PM.

I don't have time to make a Preview Video this week

• watch the videos on functional dependency, to prepare for the tute
• come to the Tuesday online session to find the fine details of Ass2 Q3
• no quiz this week, work on the assignment (and fill the poll on exam time)
• I've put up a couple of examples for progression check (8543 is slightly tricky)
• if Ass2 is sorted by Thursday, I'll talk about FDs and normalisation in the online session

Assignment 2 Quick Update

Posted by John Shepherd Sunday 07 November 2021, 04:38:47 PM.

Somehow, one of the pattern academic object groups was flagged as enumerated.

The following SQL statement will fix this

update academic_object_groups set defby='pattern' where id=685973;

And please apply patch1.sql before asking me (again) why CSE owns the 3707 program.

Also, not that an academic object can be offered by any kind of OrgUnit (school, faculty, etc)

Assignment 2 Update, etc etc

Posted by John Shepherd Saturday 06 November 2021, 06:18:54 PM.

There are some fixes for the database in the file

/home/cs3311/web/21T3/assignments/ass2/files/patch1.sql

You might like to read this file before applying it, which you do via

psql mymyunsw -f  /home/cs3311/web/21T3/assignments/ass2/files/patch1.sql

There are also additions in the Specification, Grades and Rules (in red) and some fixes in Examples.

Having just spent five hours slowly answering Forum questions, and having to wait for hours for the CSE servers to come back online, I'm done for the day. I'll do more examples (incl Q3) tomorrow

Note that some of the questions on the Forum could have been answered by you running judicious queries and by me pointing out that the current mymyunsw, with the above patches applied, is the database we'll be using for marking.

The original plan was to have Ass2 sorted out by last Monday, but moving house and breaking arm intervened. I plan to extend the Ass 2 deadline to 9pm on Monday 15 November.

I'll set up something for you to run the auto-marking on Ass1 yourself, so you can check why it failed some tests, while I finish setting it up for tutors to mark.

Assignment 2 Examples

Posted by John Shepherd Friday 05 November 2021, 09:17:29 PM.

I've added examples for Q1 and Q2. These should be enough to work what outputs to produce. I'll do Q3 tomorrow.

Quiz 5, Q4

Posted by John Shepherd Friday 05 November 2021, 08:17:21 AM.

The sql query in this question was technically incorrect. That wasn't the intention of the question. Assume that it will execute correctly. And I just fixed it in the question so that it is correct.

As much as I can, today

Posted by John Shepherd Thursday 04 November 2021, 05:05:50 PM.

I've added extra examples to the Examples page, and comments about WAM calculation.

The Q2 examples cover all possible cases (as much as I can work out).

I'll upload the video from this morning.

I'll do more tomorrow.

I'm back ... somewhat

Posted by John Shepherd Thursday 04 November 2021, 08:46:10 AM.

I'll run today's online session at 9;15. Typing with one hand makes it tricky, though.

More medical annoyance

Posted by John Shepherd Tuesday 02 November 2021, 04:32:46 PM.

Now I have go to fracture clinic at 2pm Wednesday. If I can get something minimal set up at home, I’ll try run an extra session on Thursday.

Annoying. Very annoying. Don’t ever fall down stairs

Double Ouch

Posted by John Shepherd Tuesday 02 November 2021, 02:36:28 PM.

Shoulder is broken (again! If you happened to notice the sling on last year’s videos), and very sore hip. No Online Session today. I will try to use tomorrow’s help session as a replacement for today

Ouch

Posted by John Shepherd Tuesday 02 November 2021, 12:49:35 PM.

I just fell down a flight of stairs at Uni. Currently in in POW. Will try make it to the Online Session, but no guarantees. Very annoying (and painful)

Away from network

Posted by John Shepherd Saturday 30 October 2021, 01:05:59 PM.

I'm moving house and won't be near a keyboard for the next couple of days (i.e. until Tuesday 2nd November).

Because the new place doesn't have a suitable workspace, I'll be working from my office in K17 for the rest of the year.

Assignment 2 (update #4)

Posted by John Shepherd Thursday 28 October 2021, 04:00:50 PM.

I noticed in the online session this morning that the 20T1 marks had been messed up. Everyone was given FL rather than SY. This has been fixed.

I've also added the Rules and Academic_object_groups data, so the database is now as complete as it's going to get. You have sufficient data to do all three assignment questions.

I'd suggest (re)building your mymyunsw database with the latest dump:

~cs3311/web/21T3/assignments/ass2/mymyunsw.dump

Still todo: example outputs, testing harness, Give.

Assignment 2 (update #3)

Posted by John Shepherd Thursday 28 October 2021, 01:03:46 AM.

There's a mostly complete draft of the spec now available via the Assignments page. Definitely enough for you to start planning your strategy for extracting the data. And there is enough data in the DB to complete Q1. Still todo: add Rules data, provide example outputs, develop a testing script. set up Give submissions.

ssh to d.cse

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 27 October 2021, 04:17:31 PM.

If you're having trouble ssh'ing to the d.cse server

ssh $USER@nw-syd-vxdb.cse.unsw.edu.au

It takes you to the same machine (d.cse)

Today's Help Session

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 27 October 2021, 08:59:47 AM.

Thanks to other meetings, I need to move today's Help Session from 2-4 to 3-5.

Unfortunately, I can't change the entry in myschool.cse.unsw.edu to reflect this, which means no bookings today (sorry, Maria).

Assignment 2 #2

Posted by John Shepherd Monday 25 October 2021, 11:02:29 PM.

I've got a version of the Assignment 2 database for you to play with

/home/cs3311/web/21T3/assignments/ass2/mymyunsw.dump

It uses the SQL schema given in the SQL schema page.

It contains a bunch of fake students and their enrolment in CSE degrees (except Bioinformatics, which I, ahem, forgot).

I'll be finishing off the data (the program/stream Rules and associated tables) on Tuesday and make them available as a separate SQL upload file.

In the meantime, you can play with this data, and let me know if anything looks odd. I know a few things (e.g. people enrolled in two different programs in the same term) but nothing that will affect the assignment. These glitches are a result of the downloads I use to populate the database.

Consultation Booking System

Posted by John Shepherd Monday 25 October 2021, 09:38:27 PM.

One of my 4th year students has written an app to manage booking consultations between students and staff.

https://myschool.cse.unsw.edu.au/

I'd like to try it out in a "live" course (i.e. this one).

Login via zID/zPass (like for Webcms3). It will hopefully give a calendar-like view where you can book a consultation. I've set it up for Wednesday Help Session.

Let me (and/or Austin ) know if you have any problems.

Assignment 2

Posted by John Shepherd Sunday 24 October 2021, 05:46:30 PM.

There's a description of the database for Assignment 2 if you want to start looking at it while I continue to populate the database and finish off the assignment spec. There's a highly annotated ER model and a minimally-commented SQL schema . The assignment will require you to write three Python+psycopg2 scripts for extracting data from this database. You can also write SQL views and PLpgQSL functions to assist the Python scripts. We'll give you templates for all of these. We'll talk about Python+psycopg2 in the online sessions this week.

Prac Work

Posted by John Shepherd Monday 18 October 2021, 10:28:25 AM.

There are two new prac exercises and more on the way.

I hope to have Assignment 2 ready for Monday Week 7. It involves using Python to access a MyUNSW-like student database. It'll be due at the end of Week 9.

ACS Accreditation

Posted by John Shepherd Sunday 17 October 2021, 03:28:45 PM.

If you didn't know, our degrees are currently accredited by the Australian Computer Society (ACS).
This means that you qualify for membership of the ACS when you graduate.

ACS are visiting CSE next week to re-accredit all our degrees. They want to meet (virtually) with students to find out what you think of your degree and how it's preparing you to work in the IT industry.

They plan to meet students over Zoom on Wed 20 October 10.30-11.30.

If you're interested in representing CSE as a student, send email to jas@cse.unsw.edu.au

Datalympics Competition

Posted by John Shepherd Sunday 17 October 2021, 02:27:44 PM.

Looking for a chance to 🤯 apply your technical skills to solve a real-life problem 🤯? Want to learn invaluable 💻 programming 💻 and 📊 statistical analysis 📈 skills while networking with industry representatives? Look no further, just join ✨ WIT x Nine Presents: Datalympics ✨ held in collaboration with 💖 Nine 💖!!!

More details here.

Loading d.cse

Posted by John Shepherd Friday 15 October 2021, 03:49:47 PM.

It looks like a few people are running graphics-heavy programs (gedit, firefox, xvnc, etc.) on d.cse .

Do not run such programs on d.cse . If you need a graphical interface, login to the regular VLab servers (vx1, vx2, etc) and run your graphics-heavy programs there, with a terminal window onto d.cse. I showed how to do this in the Online Session last Wednesday.

Running graphics-heavy programs on d.cse slows the machine down for everyone else who's simply trying to run PostgreSQL servers.

Distinguishing Beers

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 13 October 2021, 05:35:02 PM.

Before this question is asked again on the forum ...

Just because two beers have the same name, style and ABV, it does not mean that they are the same beer.

You can recognise that beers are the same via their ID value.

Week 05 Help Session

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 13 October 2021, 02:04:35 PM.

Help session Wed 2-4 @ https://unsw.zoom.us/j/88675448014

Assignment 1 Testing #2

Posted by John Shepherd Monday 11 October 2021, 09:47:16 PM.

Dawei Dong pointed out that I had no examples for collab beers for Q10. I've added an example to the Examples page ('Double Hazy IPA').

Assignment 1 Testing

Posted by John Shepherd Sunday 10 October 2021, 02:06:02 PM, last modified Sunday 10 October 2021, 02:07:39 PM.

There is now an additional testing script ( check2.sql ) that checks the order of output tuples in Q12. The original tests (in check.sql ) check that you had the correct lines, but didn't check the order.

The Testing page has been updated with more details.

P.S. Do NOT use give on d.cse . I've mentioned this a couple of times, but there are still people today submitting on d.cse and having their submission go to the wrong place.

Assignment 1 (again, and last time?)

Posted by John Shepherd Saturday 09 October 2021, 05:12:11 PM.

Hopefully you all noticed that each page on the Assignment spec has a bunch of tabs leading to other potentially useful pages. Make sure you look at these.

I have just added a new one [Submitting] which describes in excruciating detail how to manage your files, how to submit your work, and how we will test it.

If you are working on your home machine, you can copy the ass1.dump , the ass1.sql template, and the check.sql script to your home machine. You'll find these files in the directory

/home/cs3311/web/21T3/assignments/ass1/

Assignment Submission

Posted by John Shepherd Friday 08 October 2021, 05:12:50 PM.

Do not submit the assignment using give on d.cse

It submits, but puts the submission in the wrong place. Tedious for us to fix.

Assignment 1 FAQ

Posted by John Shepherd Friday 08 October 2021, 09:43:38 AM, last modified Friday 08 October 2021, 09:54:33 AM.

A couple of questions keep popping up on the forum. In theory, you should search whether the question has already been asked before asking (again).

Q11 : the order of some lines is different between my output and the sample output

This is caused by differences in the collation settings on different PostgreSQL installations. But it doesn't matter because the testing is done on sets of output lines, not lines in a particular order.

Even if we cared about the order, we'll be running your query on a machine with a particular collation setting and the expected output will have the same collation setting, therefore the same order. You should probably avoid doing your own collation settings in the query in your final submission.

There's a similar issue with Q6.

Q12 : how many outputs should I have? One per brewery? One single chunk of text for the whole thing?

None of the above. Each line in the output is a single output tuple. Note the number of rows at the end of the query. That's the number of output tuples (lines containing a single text string) that you should be producing.

The output order for Q12 does matter, but see comment above about collation.

And the output for foundation year is "founded Year", not "founded in Year"

Feedback on new Moodle Theme

Posted by John Shepherd Friday 08 October 2021, 09:32:59 AM.

I'm sure most of you haven't gone near the Moodle page for course (except maybe to get to the Echo360 videos), but the Moodle Enhance Project is deparate for feedback. They sent me this message to relay to you ...

Channel: Moodle course announcement

Subject: Moodle Enhance pilot – we are listening to your feedback

Hi students! The Moodle Enhance project team wanted to let you know how grateful we are for your early feedback. We have already planned new features that many of you have suggested, for our next release in 2022, including but not limited to:

• The ability to keep course sections expanded/collapsed as they were when the course site is reloaded.
• A card layout alternative to the current list layout to present content section as a grid of blocks and load them in individual pages.
• Improved visual differentiation of the current set of activities/resources icons.

We will also contact you later in the term about giving more detailed feedback in a survey and focus groups, with the chance to win UNSW Grad Shop vouchers. Until then, please continue to give feedback online and contact us at moodle.enhance@unsw.edu.au if you have any other questions or need help with the updated Moodle layout.

Kind regards, Moodle Enhance Project Team

Ass1 Update #4

Posted by John Shepherd Thursday 07 October 2021, 05:42:46 PM.

The final pieces in the puzzle are now in place

• Give submission is set up for command-line
• Give submission also via Assignment 1 > Submitting
• the check.sql script now tests all views and functions

Getting correct for all check.sql tests implies a decent auto-mark, but remember that we are doing additional tests on a different database, which may reveal problems in your code.

Hint for Q12: return one text value for each line of sample output

Let me know if you think there's anything wrong in the check.sql tests. And remember that you can load and reload multiple times. The first time you load you'll see NOTICEs; not a problem.

Help Session Tue 6 Oct

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 06 October 2021, 02:52:57 PM.

If anyone else is thinking of coming to the Help Session today, I have to "step out" for 30 mins (3:00 - 3:30). I'll come back to the session after that. There's currently nobody needing help, so hopefully that will be ok.

Census is Coming

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 06 October 2021, 11:07:08 AM.

In case anyone is considering dropping this course (and I can't imagine why, given how entertaining my t-shirts are), you should do it before this weekend. If you don't, you'll end up paying for a course that you don't intend to complete. Waste of money.

Testing Script

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 06 October 2021, 12:37:51 AM.

There's now a script to test your views. This is described on the Testing Script page. The rest of this script, to test your functions, will be added soon.

Tuesday Online Session

Posted by John Shepherd Tuesday 05 October 2021, 02:14:32 PM.

Today's online session is 4-6 ... not 2-4 as I erroneously put in the previous notice.

What's on in Week 04

Posted by John Shepherd Sunday 03 October 2021, 05:56:55 PM, last modified Tuesday 05 October 2021, 02:13:31 PM.

Things happening in COMP3311 Week 04 ...

• Quiz 3 will appear on Monday morning, due Friday 9pm
• start (or even finish) working on Assignment 1
• Online sessions Tue 4-6, Thu 9:15-11 @ https://unsw.zoom.us/j/84723900038
• Help session Wed 2-4 @ https://unsw.zoom.us/j/88675448014
• New Prac Exercises on SQL (04 and 05) are available
• All the videos for SQL and PLpgSQL are loaded ... watch 'em before the online sessions

Do NOT post code on the forum

Posted by John Shepherd Saturday 02 October 2021, 03:56:14 PM.

If you need to ask questions that require someone to look at your code, send it via email to cs3311@cse.unsw.edu.au.

Do not post code on the forum.

Ass1 Update #3

Posted by John Shepherd Friday 01 October 2021, 06:52:00 PM, last modified Saturday 02 October 2021, 09:51:54 AM.

New stuff for the assignment:

• specifications for the PLpgSQL questions
• templates for the PLpgSQL functions
• examples of expected output for most questions
• a few minor clarifications to the specs (e.g. Note #3)

This is enough for you to get working on all questions ... if you watch all of the SQL and the PLpgSQL videos.

The templates for the PLpgSQL functions have been added to ass1.sql . For people who have already copied ass1.sql , there's also a separate file xtra.sql containing just the PLpgSQL function templates.

Still to come:

• more example outputs for Q12 ... done
• testing "script"
• give submission

Let me know if anything is inconsistent/unclear/missing.

Ass1 Update #2

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 29 September 2021, 11:55:36 PM, last modified Thursday 30 September 2021, 12:00:58 AM.

There's an updated version of the assignment specification , which includes all of the SQL query questions (Q1-Q9), but not yet the PLpgSQL questions. The SQL questions should keep you entertained for a couple of hours.

I've also put the new database dump in the assignment directory. This is the final version that you'll use for the assignment. For auto-marking, we'll use this, plus a secret database (same schema, different data).

There's also a new ass1.sql which contains templates for all of the SQL query questions (Q1-Q9).

Next on the TODO list: PLpgSQL specs and templates, example outputs, and the magical SQL testing script (which you load into the database).

If the links above don't work, you can simply copy the ass1.dump and ass1.sql files as described in the assignment specification .

Help Session

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 29 September 2021, 02:59:30 PM.

Reminder: I'm running a Help Session today (Wed 29 Sept) from 2pm-4pm

https://unsw.zoom.us/j/88675448014

If you come along, turn on your microphone and say hello. My Zoom window will be in the background so I won't see you arrive.

Ass1 Update

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 29 September 2021, 01:57:49 PM.

I'm still working on a juicy set of queries and functions. When they're released (tonight?) they'll come with an updated database, and testing functions. I found a few glitches in the original DB, which I'm now fixing.

Assignment 1

Posted by John Shepherd Monday 27 September 2021, 11:54:25 PM.

There's a preliminary draft of Assignment 1 up now. It doesn't have a list of all the queries and functions that you'll eventually have to write, but you can load the database and have a poke around in it. Similarly, you might want to look at the database schema (both ER and SQL).

I'll talk about it in the lecture tomorrow.

The exercises and a complete ass1.sql template, plus testing scripts will appear in the next couple of days.

Help with setting up PostgreSQL

Posted by John Shepherd Monday 27 September 2021, 05:33:41 PM, last modified Wednesday 29 September 2021, 02:59:46 PM.

The best place to get help with setting up your PostgreSQL server on d.cse would be to ask your tutor towards the end of the tute. (Tutors: you'll get paid up to 1 hour extra to do this, for this week only)

Otherwise, I'll be running a Help Session on Wed 29 Sept from 2pm-4pm for this

https://unsw.zoom.us/j/88675448014

If 100 people show up to this, it's obviously not going to work. You should work your way through Prac Exercise 02 first.

Note: I'm only going to help for installation on d.cse ; helping for someone's arbitrary home setup is simly not feasible.

Week 03

Posted by John Shepherd Sunday 26 September 2021, 08:41:29 PM, last modified Monday 27 September 2021, 07:59:36 AM.

Coming up in Week 03 (in case you didn't watch the preview video ) ...

• Quiz 2 opens at 9am Mon 27 Sep, closes 9pm Fri 01 Oct
• Assignment 1 available sometime monday, due 9pm Fri 15 Oct
• Quiz1 and Week 02 solutions available Mon 27 Sep morning
• Thursday Online session will start at 9:15 on Thursday from now on (due to popular demand from those attending last Thursday)
• Tuesday Online session still 4-6 on Tuesday afternoons

Quiz 1

Posted by John Shepherd Friday 24 September 2021, 09:39:27 AM, last modified Friday 24 September 2021, 09:40:18 AM.

Don't forget that the first Quiz is due by midnight tonight. As of 9:30am, 150 people still had not submitted.

You can submit multiple times. Only the last submission is marked.

Note: quizzes are normally due on Friday at 9pm. Don't assume the midnight deadline always applies.

Tutorial Links

Posted by John Shepherd Tuesday 21 September 2021, 10:41:09 PM.

Since the tutors have decided to use a variety of tutorial delivery options, we've added a new Tutorial Links page, which tells you where to go.

All tutes will eventually have an entry. If your tute currently has no link set up, use BbC,

Week 02

Posted by John Shepherd Sunday 19 September 2021, 11:05:43 PM.

What's happening in week 2 of COMP3311

• tutorials commence ... accessible via Blackboard Collaborate link in Moodle
• Quiz 1 ... will apear in the right-hand sidebar on monday morning; due Friday 9pm
• new prac exercise ... 03 ... on SQL schemas and constraints ... there are videos on the topic, but I haven't yet done examples in the online sessions
• online session topics: relational model, SQL data definition language (DDL), mapping ER → SQL DDL

Lecture Zoom link

Posted by John Shepherd Thursday 16 September 2021, 10:04:08 AM, last modified Saturday 18 September 2021, 03:59:31 PM.

I shouldn't have used separate Zoom links for the online sessions on different days.

People are using the https://unsw.zoom.us/j/84723900038 link for Thursday as well as Tuesday.

So let's stick with just one link for both online sessions (the Zoom link above).

PostgreSQL Installation Prac

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 15 September 2021, 11:57:32 PM.

I've finally finished Prac Exercise 02 , which describes how to set up your PostgreSQL server on d.cse.unsw.edu.au. Let me know if anything is unclear.

Week 01 Online Sessions

Posted by John Shepherd Tuesday 14 September 2021, 11:07:31 PM.

The video (and one measly data file) from today's online session is available via the " Online Sessions " link in the sidebar.

A few people managed to get a PostgreSQL server running during the session, but it seems more detailed instructions are needed. I'm working on Prac Exercise 02 for this. Out soon.

"Lectures"

Posted by John Shepherd Monday 13 September 2021, 08:36:31 PM, last modified Thursday 16 September 2021, 11:48:12 AM.

Actually, Problem-solving Sessions ..

Tuesday 4-6 ... https://unsw.zoom.us/j/84723900038

Thursday 10-11 ... https://unsw.zoom.us/j/8607767779

bring your questions to the session.

Week 1

Posted by John Shepherd Monday 13 September 2021, 12:07:43 AM.

I've put up the videos for Week 0 (ok, late) and Week 1. Check out the " Slides and Videos " link in the sidebar menu of the course website.

Polls

Posted by John Shepherd Tuesday 07 September 2021, 09:03:25 AM.

There are three polls for me to find out a little more about the background of the class.

Please fill them out when you have time.

They're accessible via the right-hand sidebar on the course web page:

https://webcms3.cse.unsw.edu.au/COMP3311/21T3/

New! in 21T3

Posted by John Shepherd Sunday 05 September 2021, 04:07:33 PM, last modified Sunday 05 September 2021, 04:07:58 PM.

Some new things that we're trying in 2021 T3 ...

• new Webcms3 forum ... which requires us to install Webcms3 on a new server
• new server for running PostgreSQL ... replaces Grieg ... accessed via a new VLab server

We'll be testing these in O-week. We have fall back positions for both ...

• forum moves to Discourse
• PostgreSQL moves back to Grieg

Fingers crossed ...

Out-of-date Content

Posted by John Shepherd Sunday 05 September 2021, 11:37:03 AM.

Webcms3 does a great job of letting you clone previous course web-site structures , but unfortunately also clones out-of-date content and makes it visible to students. If you see anything that looks like it doesn't fit with the 21T3 offering, let me know. I'm crawling around the web site now trying to find such content, but might miss some.

Welcome to COMP3311 21T3

Posted by John Shepherd Wednesday 25 August 2021, 11:13:52 PM, last modified Wednesday 25 August 2021, 11:18:37 PM.

Hi, all, and welcome to an exciting term of data crunching!

Much of the material will be the same as the last time the course ran (e.g. videos). However, the assignments will all be different and I plan to make some changes to the Course Notes, the tute exercises and the prac exercises.

Note that I will need to update most of the links, which still lead to the 20T3 versions of things (Webcms3's version of "cloning" course content doesn't extend to updating the links unfortunately).

We'll be using both PostgreSQL (v11?12?13?) and SQLite3 for database work, and Psycopg2 for the database/programming interface.

The timetable says that some classes will run face-to-face, but the chances of that happening in the current circumstances are zero up to week 6 and very close to zero after that. Whatever class you register for, assume that it will be online for the whole term.