The teaching is organized as follows:

Learning outcomes

Module: theory.
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This course intends to provide the fundamentals skills in order to analyze and resolve problems by means of developing programs.
The objective of this module is to provide the knowledge of
- the basic principle of programming and of programming languages,
- the fundamental techniques for analyzing problems and developing their algorithmic solutions,
- the introduction to the methods for the evaluation of correctness and efficiency of algorithms.

Module: laboratory.
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The targets of the laboratory module are the essential knowledge of the operating environment, the learning of a programming language, the developing of projects of small and medium size and, finally, the application of the methods for evaluating the algorithms and the programs.

Program

Module: theory.
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Introduction to Computing Science.

Part I - problems, algorithms and programs.

- Basics: problem, specifics, algorithm; abstract machine, compiler and interpreter; programming languages.
- Introduction to the programming language.
- Elementary programming: basic instructions and development of simple programs.
- Data types. The general concept of data type: characterization and data representation. Variables, expressions and assignment. Abstract Data Types.
- Primitive data types: characterization, usage and related problems.
- Program structure. Fundamental instructions.
- Sub-programs: structure, parameters and visibility.
- Structured data types. Arrays, pointers, strings and other data structures.
- Basics of objects.
- Dynamic data structures.
- Introduction to graphs and other subjects.

Part II - Analysis of Algorithms

- Correctness: termination, logic properties; methods for the correctness verification.
- Introduction to the complexity. Performance of algorithms. Evaluation of efficiency. Computational costs.
- Asymptotic estimation of the complexity in time and space. The worst and medium case.
- Amortized analysis.
- Static sequences: implementation and algorithms.
- Matrices and Vectors: implementation, operations and algorithms.
- Dynamic sequences: abstract definition and implementation; basic operations.
- Trees. Abstract definition and implementation. Basic operation. Binary research trees.
- Introduction to algorithms on graphs.

The styles of programming.
- Imperative Programming and basics of Object Oriented Programming
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Module: laboratory.
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In the laboratory we familiarize with the programming language developing projects based on the ideas presented in the lessons.
We study the fundamental elements of the language and we deal with the problems that arise in the development of the solution; in particular we acquire skill in editing, compiling, debugging and basic project management.

Bibliography

Examination Methods

The final exam is about all the contents of the course.
It consists of two parts: a written test and an oral exam.
The written test includes general questions and exercises
The final oral exam is a discussion on the examination papers, the laboratory activity and about the subject matter of the course.
The admission to the oral exam is subject to the approval of the test.
The final written exam can be replaced by tests that can take place also during the teaching periods.