Darrell Pfeifer

darrell.camosunon

Current classes

This year Comp139 will appear as Google+ pages. Much of the class material and discussions will be held there. Students in Comp139 should get a gmail account and sign up for Google+. (Note that there is no requirement that you use your real personal information when you sign up for the account. If you have any questions or concerns about this please email me at the email address below). Afterwards, search and follow either darrell.camosun or Comp139. The class outline, marking scheme and lab information is available on a static web page.

Comp139E's web page can be found here.

You can also reach me via email see the slightly obfuscated address at the bottom of the page.

Classroom Clickers

One of the newer classroom technologies has been the use of classroom clickers (go ahead, google them). They are simple wireless devices, typically with 4 or 5 buttons that allow students to give feedback to instructors, usually by the instructor asking a multiple choice question. As part of a lecture, an instructor might bring up a pre-prepared multiple choice question to see how well the students understand the material. Results can be displayed to the instructor and to the class. (Think of it as an instant pop quiz, but you're not really graded on the result).

In our classrooms I notice that most students are using laptops, so we don't really need clickers. I used some Google technologies to create a place where people can create simple hot/cold or multiple choice polls, then give others the public URL to participate in the poll. To make or participate in the poll you must have a Google account. Students in Comp244 will be required to have one, so we'll probably give it a try there.

You can check out the poll. It is way more interesting when there are a few people actively participating in the poll. It is very boring to use by yourself. My apologies for the ugliness. You know that I have very little artistic ability, and you know how much I despise CSS.

Book List

• Effective Java, Joshua Bloch, Addison-Wesley 978-0-321-35668-0

  Suitable for post-Comp139 students. There are lots of detailed tips and tricks for how to use Java facilities the right way. To get the most out of the book you'll need to have a reasonably sophisticated knowledge of Java itself.

• Clean Code, Robert C Martin, Prentice-Hall, 978-0-13-235088-4

  Suitable for post-Comp139 students. This book is more about ideas of how to write good, understandable and maintainable code. It concentrates more on aspects of programming style than the language itself. Java is used as the programming tool, but many of the concepts apply to other programming languages as well. The chapters are somewhat independent so you can read them out of order if you wish. To get the most out of the book you'll need to have been programming in Java for a few years. Finally, someone has put many of the concepts I've been trying to teach into a book.