CST338 Weeks 1, 2, and 3

CST 338 is “Software Design.” In week one we mainly got all the required software installed, and completed some Java exercises through CodingBat as a refresher on Java. We also learned about JUnit, how to write tests, and how to apply that knowledge to our assignments.

In week two we had some heavier coding assignments. Histogram was our first large assignment; it involved reading a file consisting of single-character lines, and generating a histogram of the contents. Concepts important to week two included array manipulation, Scanner, StringBuilder, sorting, etc.

In week three we started working with inheritance and polymorphism. Assignments such as Trooper and Inheritance Vacuum had us creating abstract classes to share common structure and implementations with subclasses. We also had our midterm this week, which tested us on most of the concepts we have learned thus far in the class.

Markov

Who did you work with?

I worked with Christopher McMichael - Team 1, Bitwise.

What was your strategy for solving the Markov assignment?

My strategy with the Markov assignment was to first skeleton-out all the classes / fields / methods of the assignment, then start implementing them one-by-one. I tested the various functions immediately after I wrote them to make sure they were working reasonably well. After everything was written and passing unit tests, I went through the program and made sure I did not make any glaring efficiency errors. After that I tried to find ways to break the program, and I ended up fixing a few deficiencies.

What was THEIR strategy for solving the Markov assignment

Chris’s strategy was to brute force the problem at first. He wrote all the code at once, ran it against the test files, then went back and fixed any problems. To aid in debugging, Chris used print statements to track down where the errors were occurring.

How would you change your strategy having worked on the assignment?

I do not think I need to change my strategy. To my current knowledge I completed the assignment to specifications, and did so in a timely manner.

According to your classmate(s): how well does your code follow the Google Java Style Guide

My code slightly differs from the Google Java Style Guide. For example, I put else statements on their own line, and indent using four spaces instead of two. Other than those points, my style largely matches Google’s recommendations.

Did you know you can automate applying some of the style guide rules

I did! In fact, I have IntelliJ auto-formatting to my preferred style already. If this becomes an issue I can submit assignments formatted in Google’s style, though I believe my style is readable and clean enough to be sufficient.