SENG2011 Notices

Final notice

Posted by Albert Nymeyer Wednesday 13 December 2023, 09:06:42 AM.

Final examination: the examination has been marked and the results submitted to the school. It is not possible to get feedback on how you did in the examination (marks cannot be collected).

Final marks: the final marks have been uploaded to UNSW's ASTRA system. A total of 116 students have currently passed the course. The mark distribution is HD 21 students, DN 27, CR 25 and PS 43. The top 2 students received 96 marks.

Supplementary examination: students who have been granted Special Consideration will be allowed to sit for the supplementary examination to be held in O-week in early February. It will be a lab-based examination as described in the document Examination Description and Environment on the Exam link. The precise day, time of day and the place will be announced closer to the date. There is no online supplementary examination.

The course forum will be lightly attended over the summer break by myself.

If you found Dafny rewarding and you achieved a high mark, the Trustworthy Systems group ( https://trustworthy.systems ) here at UNSW has various research projects that may interest you. Send me an email and I will provide you with a contact.

This is a sign-off from both myself and Stephen. We have enjoyed presenting the course very much and we wish you every success in your further studies.

Albert

Final Exam Tomorrow

Posted by Stephen Chuang Monday 04 December 2023, 12:38:53 PM.

The final exam will be tomorrow afternoon. It is essential that you have read the Exam Description and Environment document under the 'Exam' section of the course website by now.

Make sure you arrive on time and allocate your time well. Don't spend too long on a single question.

For those who have applied for Special Consideration and have been granted a supplementary exam, these will be held in early February. You must be able to attend the supp, as there will be no online exams.

There is a hurdle for the final exam that will vary based on the difficulty. If you do not clear the hurdle, your exam mark will be set to zero.

Good luck.

Assignment 2 Solutions and Results + Exam Reminder

Posted by Stephen Chuang Saturday 02 December 2023, 04:43:14 PM.

Assignment 2 solutions are now available under the 'Assignments' section, and your assignment 2 marks should now be available.

The course forum has a Marking Queries category for assignment 2. You may use this category for questions about assignment 2 marking, but your priorities should be on the final exam. Once that is out of the way, you can raise any issues.

The highest mark was 60, and the mark distribution is as follows:

You should now know your pre-exam mark out of 50, with the final exam making up the remaining 50% of your course grade. See the Real Course Outline for how much each assessment contributes towards the course grade.

Make sure you have read the Examination Description and Environment document, and the UNSW Check List under the 'Exam' section of the course website. These contain vital information about the final exam on Tuesday 5 November.

New Mini-Exam Released

Posted by Stephen Chuang Thursday 30 November 2023, 01:50:36 PM.

Another mini-exam has been released under the Practice and Play section, and solutions to the first 3 mini-exams have also been released.

Solutions for the fourth mini-exam will be released in a few days.

More Mini-Exams Released

Posted by Stephen Chuang Friday 24 November 2023, 11:49:29 AM.

2 more mini-exams have been released under the Practice and Play section. These are a great way to prepare for the final exam.

For anyone who has not yet submitted assignment 2, the hard deadline is 9 p.m. tonight. Make sure you submit whatever you have by then.

Exam Information

Posted by Stephen Chuang Tuesday 21 November 2023, 01:09:18 PM.

Two new documents have been opened up under the Exam section of the course website. One has important details about the exam format and environment, and the other is an exam preparation checklist.

The first sample mini-exam has been released, and more will be released every few days. They, along with the Practice and Play exercises, are great preparation for the final exam.

All quiz results have been uploaded and are now viewable on sturec.

The myExperience survey closes in a few days. Make sure you have completed it so that your feedback can be used to improve future offerings of this course.

Assignment 2 Due Tonight

Posted by Stephen Chuang Sunday 19 November 2023, 04:37:40 PM.

Assignment 2

Assignment 2 is due in a few hours. Once again, make sure your method or lemma names are correct, you are not using anything forbidden in the question (such as assume statements, local arrays, and so on), and that you have submitted all 6 files (including files you haven't changed since the previous submission).

There is no guarantee that you will receive a (good) response on the course forum if you make last-minute posts. Late submissions without an approved extension will be penalised as described in the course outline.

myExperience

The myExperience survey has been open for quite some time now, and taking 10 minutes to provide your feedback for the course would be greatly appreciated. The survey will close at 11:59 p.m. on Thursday 23 November .

End of Week 10 Notice

Posted by Stephen Chuang Friday 17 November 2023, 11:58:54 PM.

We are now at the end of week 10, with assignment 2 due at 9 p.m. on Sunday 19 November . When submitting, make sure you include all 6 files (including the ones that you haven't changed as your submission will overwrite the previous submission), all the method and lemma names are correct, and that you have not violated the restrictions in the exercise.

Some new exercises and videos have been released under the Practice and Play section. The practice exam problems will be released soon, most likely early next week.

You should now have your marks for all quizzes. As mentioned in the course outline, the quizzes are weighted at 10% and your grade is calculated based on the total number of marks you have gotten out of 70 in the quizzes, not by the average of the 6 quizzes.

Assignment 2 Progress

Posted by Stephen Chuang Wednesday 15 November 2023, 11:20:51 AM.

With quiz 6 now behind us (for most people, at least), you should now be on your last exercise for assignment 2 which is due Sunday 19 November 9 p.m. (in 4 days as of the time this was posted).

The last exercise requires having attended or watched the week 9 lecture on classes. Make sure you understand the quack class (in Quackex6.dfy) before you start the exercise. Once you are done, make sure you submit only the Hash method and its validator. The quack class will be added by the auto-marker.

Continue to use the forum for any queries. The forum will likely be especially busy over the weekend, so try to get any issues sorted early.

End of Week 9 Notice and Assignment 2 Progress

Posted by Stephen Chuang Friday 10 November 2023, 04:35:12 PM, last modified Friday 10 November 2023, 11:35:01 PM.

This week, we have covered enough on classes to finish exercise 6 in assignment 2.

Quiz 6 has been released and is due at 9 p.m. on Tuesday 14 November . It is the last quiz for this course.

You should be (almost) finished with 4 exercises by now, and moving on to your fifth. Exercise 5 is again on lemmas, and it would help to have done exercise 4. Try not to overcomplicate things, and you may find it helpful to prove the lemmas yourself before trying to translate your proof to Dafny.

If you get stuck, don't hesitate to use the course forum. Don't leave the assignment to the last minute. If you do and you get stuck, the forum may be too busy to give a timely response to your queries.

Update

Many quiz 6 questions have been made more clear and some answer options have changed. If you have submitted already, make sure you double check your submission.

Assignment 2 Progress and Quiz Reminder

Posted by Stephen Chuang Tuesday 07 November 2023, 10:30:42 AM.

With 12 days remaining for assignment 2, you should be halfway there. The third exercise was based on the Tailsize exercise from assignment 1, and you needed to modify your (or the reference) solution to meet the new requirements in this exercise. Double check that you have not used any other data structures (local sequences, arrays, etc.) in your method. What did you find tricky, and what did you learn from doing this exercise that might help you with solving similar problems next time?

The next exercise involves writing lemmas, one of which is level 3, and general validators for them. This week's quiz also focuses on lemmas and is due at 9 p.m. tonight. It would be a good idea to review the relevant lecture material and make a good attempt at the quiz to consolidate your understanding before you get started on exercise 4.

End of Week 8 Notice and Assignment 2 Progress

Posted by Stephen Chuang Friday 03 November 2023, 04:31:40 PM.

Quiz 5 has been released and is due at 9 p.m. on 7 November .

With the topic of lemmas now finished, you should be able to start on all but the last exercise in assignment 2. By this point, you should be just about finished with two exercises and be making a start on the third.

For the strict max exercise, it really helps to simplify your code to avoid having so many exists and foralls, and as mentioned before, the video on the maximum element of an array under the Practice and Play section forms a good basis for your solution to this exercise.

Exercise 3 builds on the Tailsize exercise from assignment 1. If you struggled with this exercise in assignment 1, you may find it easier to start from the reference solution rather than your own solution.

Assignment 1 marks, and solutions, released

Posted by Albert Nymeyer Tuesday 31 October 2023, 03:29:12 PM.

The assignment has been marked. The assignment was done reasonably well, better than in previous years. The maximum mark was 60. The distribution of marks was:

You can collect your marks from Assignments/Assignment 1. You will also find Solutions, and some Feedback on Exercise 6, the 'Tailsize' exercise. This exercise was done least well, not surprisingly as it was the last exercise and most challenging. You have a related exercise in Assignment 2, so it is well worth reading the feedback.

If you have a specific mark query, please use the forum where you will find the thread Mark Queries. Ensure that you make your query private.

Assignment 2 Progress

Posted by Stephen Chuang Sunday 29 October 2023, 09:26:50 PM.

Assignment 2 was released 4 days ago, consisting of 6 exercises totalling 60 marks. To ensure that you don't fall too far behind, you should be nearly finished with one of the exercises. These progress updates will cover each exercise in order, but you are free to work on whichever unfinished exercise you think may be easiest for you.

For exercise 1, translating the code from C to Dafny should be fairly straightforward, but specifying it may be difficult. Take a bit of time to reflect before moving on to exercise 2. What did you find tricky, and are there any Practice and Play exercises/videos that would give you more practice in these areas?

To help you get started with exercise 2, there is a video under 'Practice and Play' covering a similar exercise.

Make sure you use the forum and attend the consultations (Friday 2-3 p.m. in O'Shane 105) if you get stuck. Since the forum will likely be very busy close to the due date in just under 3 weeks, the earlier you post something there, the better.

End of Week 7 Notice

Posted by Stephen Chuang Friday 27 October 2023, 03:42:13 PM.

The week 7 quiz has been released and is due next Tuesday 9 p.m. as usual.

Some videos have been released under the 'Practice and Play' section, including an exercise on finding the maximum element of an array, which will help you get started with one of the assignment 2 exercises.

Assignment 2 Released

Posted by Stephen Chuang Wednesday 25 October 2023, 04:37:02 PM.

Assignment 2 has now been released and is due at 9 p.m. Sunday 19 November (week 10) .

It is a good idea to start early. The course forum may be overloaded close to the deadline, so starting early would give you better and faster support on the course forum should you encounter any roadblocks.

Week 6 Notice

Posted by Stephen Chuang Monday 16 October 2023, 05:21:31 PM.

The assignment 1 deadline has passed for most students, and we are now in week 6, which is a great chance to catch up and consolidate what you have learned so far.

A new exercise (absolute value of an array) has been released and I would recommend you do this exercise as it will give you a valuable chance to practice your skills in writing and thinking about specifications and invariants.

Feel free to discuss the exercise on the course forum. A pinned post is also there describing how you might approach the problem.

Assignment 1 Due Tonight

Posted by Stephen Chuang Sunday 15 October 2023, 07:44:28 AM, last modified Sunday 15 October 2023, 09:12:21 AM.

Assignment 1 is due 9 p.m. tonight . Please double check your method names, file names, and other constraints such as not using assume statements, and verify with CSE Dafny before you submit.

If you have any questions, use the course forum. If you have a forum query that hasn't been answered yet or replied to in the past 12 hours or so, post another comment in case Albert or I have missed it.

Edit: The submission instructions can be found under Activities > Assignment 1 > Make Submission. You may submit either through the WebCMS3 interface or in a CSE terminal.

End of Week 5 Notice and Assignment 1 Reminder

Posted by Stephen Chuang Friday 13 October 2023, 04:02:45 PM.

Assignment 1 is due at 9 p.m. on Sunday 15 October unless you have been granted an extension through special consideration or otherwise. Please continue to use the course forum if you need any help.

There will be no quiz released for this week - focus on the assignment instead.

Good luck!

Assignment 1 FAQ and Minor Quiz 3 Update

Posted by Stephen Chuang Monday 09 October 2023, 04:33:45 PM.

A FAQ thread for assignment 1 is now available on the course forum as many students have been asking similar questions about some exercises, particularly exercises 1, 2, and 4.

The wording in the options for question 3 in this week's quiz has also been updated slightly, so it would be a good idea to check your answers for that question. No other questions were updated and the deadline remains the same, Tuesday 9 p.m. (tomorrow) .

End of Week 4 Notice, Census Date Reminder, and Exam Information

Posted by Stephen Chuang Friday 06 October 2023, 06:08:59 PM, last modified Friday 06 October 2023, 06:22:26 PM.

Quiz 3 has been released and is due Tuesday 10 October 9 p.m. Additionally, a new exercise has also been released under 'Practice and Play'.

You should now know everything you need to finish assignment 1, which is due 9 p.m. on Sunday week 5 . Please continue to use the Ed forum and consultations if you need any help with the assignment, quizzes, or Practice and Play exercises.

This Sunday is also the census date, the last day you can drop a course without academic nor financial penalty.

There have also been a few complaints about people talking during the lecture. Please be quiet and respectful of other students who are there to learn.

Exam Information

The final exam will held in a lab in-person. All students must attend. The only exception is if you are granted Special Consideration for the final exam.

The exam will also be held in a restricted environment with no access to Visual Studio Dafny, the internet, the course home page, or your own files. The exam environment will use Dafny 3.7.

More exam information will come later in the term.

Quiz 2 Update

Posted by Stephen Chuang Saturday 30 September 2023, 09:16:39 AM.

Since quiz 2 had a few questions that assessed content that was pushed back to week 4, questions 3 and 4 have been replaced with new questions that cover week 3 content.

The new deadline is Wednesday 4 October 9 p.m. and if you have already been granted an extension, your extension still applies (e.g., a 1 day extension means a deadline of Thursday 9 p.m.).

Quiz 2 marks will still be released before the week 4 lecture. Apologies for the inconvenience.

End of Week 3 Notice

Posted by Stephen Chuang Friday 29 September 2023, 11:13:27 PM.

Quiz 2 has been open since 2 p.m. today and is due next Tuesday 3 October at 9 p.m.

The rest of the quizzes will be opened after the week's lecture and due the following Tuesday, giving you four days to work on them.

Assignment 1 is underway. Continue to use the forum for any questions you have about the assignment.

The solutions to the exercises that were released last week are now available under the 'Practice and Play' section.

Quiz 1 Reminder

Posted by Stephen Chuang Tuesday 26 September 2023, 01:05:03 PM.

A reminder that quiz 1 is due at 9 p.m. tonight. Future weeks may not have reminders for quizzes.

Assignment 1

Posted by Albert Nymeyer Sunday 24 September 2023, 01:09:37 PM.

Assignment 1 has been released, and can be found under the Assignments button on the home page. There are 6 exercises, the last 3 of which involve Dafny programming. You should know enough Dafny to do these exercises by the end of week 3.

The submission process will be opened by week 4. The due date can be found on the assignment and the Course Schedule. Remember you can talk to me after the lecture on Fridays, and you can use the forum to ask questions, privately with just Stephen and myself, or shared publicly.

Best of luck.

End of Week 2 Notice

Posted by Stephen Chuang Friday 22 September 2023, 02:36:10 PM.

Week 2 lecture slides have been released, along with two videos and a few more exercises under the 'Practice and Play' section. Solutions for these exercises will be released next week.

You should now be able to answer all questions in quiz 1, which is due 9 p.m. Tuesday week 3 (26 September) . Remember that late submissions are not accepted, and only your latest submission will be marked.

Week 1 lecture slides

Posted by Albert Nymeyer Saturday 16 September 2023, 04:52:07 AM.

Week 1 lecture slides have been released. There has been some editing of the Hoare-Logic lecture slides. In the week 2 lecture, I will go over the last Hoare-Logic example (the quotient-remainder division program) again.

End of Week 1 Notice

Posted by Stephen Chuang Friday 15 September 2023, 08:48:14 PM, last modified Friday 15 September 2023, 08:48:35 PM.

Hi, everyone,

I hope you're settling in well. There are quite a few announcements, so please read carefully:

Consultations will be each Friday, 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. in O'Shane 105 (Central Lecture Block theatre 8), right after the lecture.

Quiz 1 will open on Monday noon in week 2 which is earlier than the rest of the quizzes because quiz 1 covers both week 1 and week 2 content. This should give you sufficient time to note down your answers to the questions covering week 1 content and return to finish it under less pressure after the week 2 lecture.

Some important notes about quizzes:

• Quizzes will open after the week's lecture (except quiz 1).
  
• Quizzes are due at 9 p.m. on the following Tuesday . Late submissions are not accepted .
• The maximum allowable extension for quizzes is one day (24 hours). Normally, requests for extensions must go through the student hub, but for quizzes this is not feasible due to the fast turnaround. Contact the course account for quiz extensions as soon as possible with any supporting documentation.
• You can submit multiple times before the deadline. Only your latest submission will be marked.
• Some questions are single-select (radio buttons) and others are multi-select (checkboxes).
• Multi-select questions do not necessarily have more than one correct answer and will have partial marks available.

A document by Albert to help you you started with Dafny has been released for those who want to familiarise themselves with Dafny before the week 2 lecture. You can find it under 'Practice and Play'. More practice exercises will be released over this term.

Note that the command for Dafny on CSE servers is 'seng2011 dafny' instead of 'dafny'. Use this for all commands, e.g.,

seng2011 dafny /version
seng2011 dafny /compile:0 prog.dfy

Enjoy your weekend!

Welcome!

Posted by Stephen Chuang Wednesday 06 September 2023, 09:45:09 PM.

Welcome to SENG2011! I'm Stephen and I will be your course admin for this offering of the course. This course's resources include:

• WebCMS3 is the main course website and will be the main source of information. You can find the course outline (under 'Real Course Outline'), course announcements, lecture slides, practice exercises, quizzes, assignments, and exam information here.
• Moodle has lecture recordings.
• The Ed Forum, which should be your first point of contact for any questions about the course. It is accessible through the link in the sidebar. I encourage you all to be actively asking and answering questions – explaining concepts to others is a great way to learn. Course announcements will not be posted on the forum.

The Ed Forum also allows private posts, which is especially important for assignment-related questions where you share parts of your solution.

For some queries, it may be more appropriate to talk directly to course staff by emailing the class account se2011@cse.unsw.edu.au rather than posting on the forum. Contacting course staff through personal email addresses is discouraged.

Make sure you have read the real course outline so that you are familiar with the course schedule and assessment details. The ECOS version is inaccurate because of incorrectly labelled assessment details.

All the best,

Stephen

Course Outline

Posted by Albert Nymeyer Friday 12 May 2023, 09:03:51 AM.

The Course Outline is there for everyone to see.