Class Diary

For the homework problems listed below, the ones marked with * should be turned in and graded. The ones marked with ** are extra credit problems. The others are non-graded problems.

• Wednesday, January 21.
  • The first day of class.
• Friday, January 23
  • Class: Graphs and Euler circuits.
  • Read: Section 1.1
  • Do: Exercises 1.11, 1.14*
• Monday, January 26
  • Class: Euler's theorem, method for constructing Euler circuits.
  • Read: Section 1.2.
  • Do: Exercises 1.17, 1.22*, 1.26*, 1.28*.
• Wednesday, January 28
  • Class: Eulerizations and Hamiltonian circuits.
  • Read: Sections 1.3 and 2.1.
  • Do: Exercises 1.35, 1.36*, 1.44*, 2.1, 2.8*, 2.14(b)**.
• Friday, January 30
  • Class: The travelling salesman problem.
  • Read: Nothing new.
  • Do: Exercises 2.33, 2.35, 2.36*.
• Monday, February 2
  • Class cancelled due to instructor illness.
• Wednesday, February 4
  • Class: Algorithms giving good (but not necessarily optimal) answers to the travelling salesman problem.
  • Read: Section 2.3.
  • Do: Exercises 2.38, 2.42(ac)*, Find a weighting of the edges on a complete graph (with four vertices) so that both the nearest-neighbor and the sorted edges algorithms fail to find the shortest tour**.
• Friday, February 6
  • Class: Went over homework, talked about Kruskal's algorithm.
  • Read: Nothing new.
  • Do: Exercises 2.51(ab), 2.54*, 2.56*, 2.57.
• Monday, February 9
  • Class: Discussed the minimum spanning tree problem, worksheet on Kruskal's algorithm, and critical path analysis.
  • Read: Section 2.4.
  • Do: Exercises 2.60*, 2.68*, 2.69, 2.73, 2.74*.
• Wednesday, February 11
  • Class: Answered questions about the homework, started discussing voting theory.
  • Read: Nothing new.
  • Do: * The date of the second exam will be moved to sometime during the week from March 30 - April 3. For each of the days March 30, April 1, and April 3, tell me whether it is your first choice, second choice or third choice for when the exam should occur.
• Friday, February 13
  • Class: Reviewed critical path analysis, and talked about two candidate elections.
  • Read: Section 9.1.
  • Do: Nothing new.
• Monday, February 16
  • Class: Talked about two candidate elections, Condorcet's method, and plurality voting.
  • Read: Section 9.2.
  • Do: 9.4*, 9.6*, 9.7.
• Wednesday, February 18
  • Class: Review for exam.
  • Read: Your notes
  • Do: Study!
• Friday, February 20
  • Class: Exam 1.
  • Read: Nothing new.
  • Do: Relax!
• Monday, February 23.
  • Class: Talked about voting systems, properties of voting systems, and Arrow's theorem.
  • Read: Section 9.3.
  • Do: 9.7, 9.8*, 9.10*, 9.13, 9.14*, 9.17, 9.18*, 9.24*, 9.25, 9.27, 9.30*.
• Wednesday, February 25
  • Class: Worksheet on voting methods, discussion of approval voting.
  • Read: Section 9.4.
  • Do: 9.32*, 9.33, Does sequential pairwise voting satisfies IIA?*
• Friday, February 27
  • Class: Returned exams, answered questions about voting systems and properties.
  • Read: Nothing new.
  • Do: Which condition in arrow theorem is least cruicial for a voting system to satisfy?*
• Monday, March 2
  • Class: Discussion of manipulability of voting systems with two interactive examples.
  • Read: Nothing new.
  • Do: These problems.
• Wednesday, March 4
  • Class: Answered homework questions, covered the adjusted winner procedure.
  • Read: Section 13.1.
  • Do: 13.2*, 13.3, 13.4*, 13.6*.
• Friday, March 6
  • Class: Worksheet on adjusted winner, optimality of adjusted winner, and discussion of the Knaster inheritence procedure.
  • Read: Section 13.2.
  • Do: 13.8, 13.9*, 13.10*, 13.12*.
• Monday, March 9
  • Class: Review of Knaster inheritence procedure, discussion of taking turns.
  • Read: Section 13.3.
  • Do: Explain why there is always enough money in the kitty in the Knaster inheritence procedure for each non-winner to withdraw their fair share*, 13.13, 13.14*.
• Wednesday and Friday, March 11 and 13
  • Class: The Steinhaus lone divider method.
  • Read: Section 13.4.
  • Do: 13.20*, 13.24*, 13.26*.
• Monday and Wednesday, March 16 and 18
  • Class: Answered questions, discussed the last diminisher method.
  • Read: Section 13.5.
  • Do: Nothing new.
• Friday, March 20
  • Class: Answered questions and administered quiz.
  • Read: Nothing new.
  • Do: 13.28**, this problem.
• Monday, March 30
  • Class: Review for the exam.
  • Read: Nothing new.
  • Do: Study!
• Wednesday, April 1
  • Class: Exam II.
  • Read: Something relaxing.
  • Do: Relax!
• Friday, April 3
  • Class: Beginning of combinatorics and probability.
  • Read: Sections 8.1 and 8.3.
  • Do: 8.4*, 8.5, 8.20*, 8.21, 8.22*, 8.23.
• Monday, April 6
  • Class: Returned exams and went over solutions. Answered homework questions.
  • Read: Nothing new.
  • Do: Nothing new.
• Wednesday, April 8
  • Class: Talked more about counting poker hands.
  • Read: Nothing new.
  • Do: These problems.
• Friday, April 10
  • Class: Discussed the general framework for probability, and answered student questions.
  • Read: Nothing new.
  • Do: 8.12*, 8.15.
• Monday, April 13
  • Class: Independence and conditional probability.
  • Read: Your class notes. This material is not in the book.
  • Do: These problems.
• Wednesday, April 15
  • Class: Went over homework questions, then revisited tests that are not completely effective, and discussed the Monty Hall problem.
  • Read: Nothing new.
  • Do: These problems.
• Friday, April 17
  • Class: Continuous probability distributions, the bell curve, mean and standard deviation.
  • Read: Section 8.5.
  • Do: 8.32*, 8.38, 8.40, 8.44*
• Monday, April 20
  • Class: The central limit theorem and the 68-95-99.7 rule.
  • Read: Sections 8.6 and 5.9.
  • Do: 5.48(ab)*, 5.50, 8.46(a)*, 8.52(a)*.
• Wednesday, April 22
  • Class: Review for exam.
  • Read: Your notes!
  • Do: Study!
• Friday, April 24
  • Class: Exam 3.
  • Read: Something relaxing!
  • Do: Relax.
• Monday, April 27
  • Class: Intro to statistics, histograms, stemplots, and the mean.
  • Read: Sections 5.1, 5.2, and 5.3.
  • Do: 5.4*, 5.5, 5.6*, 5.10*.
• Wednesday, April 29
  • Class: The median, quartiles, and the world's hardest math test.
  • Read: Sections 5.4 and 5.5.
  • Do: 5.12*, 5.13, 5.16*, 5.18*.
• Friday, May 1
  • Class: Answered students questions, Benford's law magic trick, and the quiz.
  • Read: Nothing new. Benford's law is described here.
  • Do: Nothing more.
• Monday, May 4
  • Class: Student questions.
  • Read: Your notes.
  • Do: Study for the final.
• Wednesday, May 6
  • Class: Student questions.
  • Read: Your notes.
  • Do: Take the practice final.

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