In the past two weeks, Professor Heap has been talking about Finite State Automata and Formal Languages. I learned about Finite State Machine in a third-year course about digital logic and computer design, so I'm pretty familiar with how to construct a state diagram / graph and such. However, I had never heard of the term "formal languages" back in the day when I was taking the course, so I was kind of excited to know what it really means and what it is about.
I came to realize that it is just another basic topic in Computer Science. I was kind of confused at first about how alphabets makes a string and how strings make a languages, but when I gave myself some time to think about it, there is really nothing to think about because the topic is simple as it seems. Moreover, I learned about Regular Expression in a second-year Software Engineering course, and also in csc209 (which I'm taking). To be specific, I had to learn how to use regular expressions when programming in Unix or using the shell. I don't know why it is taught in this course when presumably every CS student has to take csc207 or csc209 and learn to really use regular expressions.
Anyways, the way the material was presented in class was okay. It might be better if the pace of the class is a little bit faster. Perhaps there should be less interaction between the professor and the students. For example, at the end of the Friday class (last week), Professor Heap was constructing a state diagram /graph, and he encountered some problems. The students were suggesting solutions, and Professor Heap was willing to listen to everyone, which is great because the students get to participate and be more involved in the class, but I think he should have tried to fixed the problems and answer questions and sometimes keep the pace or consistency of the class up.
Both the tutorial exercise and the quiz on November 20 were way to easy compared to the previous ones, but that's not something to complain about (lol).
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