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  6. CS3518: LANGUAGES AND COMPUTABILITY

CS3518: LANGUAGES AND COMPUTABILITY (2018-2019)

Last modified: 22 May 2019 17:07


Course Overview

This course provides a basic-level introduction to computability via the notion of a Turing Machine. Some familiarity with imperative programming (e.g., in JAVA) and with the basics of set theory (e.g., the notion of a bijection) is assumed. The Functional language Haskell (familiar from earlier courses, including CS2013) is used to explore the concepts of infinity, recognisability and decidability, which are crucial to computability.



Course Details

Study Type Undergraduate Level 3
Term Second Term Credit Points 15 credits (7.5 ECTS credits)
Campus None. Sustained Study No
Co-ordinators
  • Dr Matthew Collinson
  • Professor Wamberto Vasconcelos

Qualification Prerequisites

  • Either Programme Level 3 or Programme Level 4

What courses & programmes must have been taken before this course?

What other courses must be taken with this course?

None.

What courses cannot be taken with this course?

None.

Are there a limited number of places available?

No

Course Description

  • Imperative languages and their associated automata: Regular languages and Finite state automata (FSA), Context-free languages and Pushdown Automata (PDA), Non-context-free languages and linear-bounded automata (LBA), Turing Machines (TM), nondeterministic Turing Machines.
  • Functional languages: Haskell idioms, Haskell polymorphic types, recursion, Haskell higher-order functions, lazy evaluation, infinite sets.
  • Chomsky hierarchy and computability: Turing decidability, Turing recognisability, injections, surjections and bijections, Cantor's diagonal argument, the halting problem, the Church-Turing Thesis.

Further Information & Notes

Assistive technologies may be required for any student who is unable to use a standard keyboard/mouse/computer monitor. Any students wishing to discuss this further should contact the School Disability Co-ordinator.


Contact Teaching Time

Information on contact teaching time is available from the course guide.

Teaching Breakdown

More Information about Week Numbers


Details, including assessments, may be subject to change until 30 August 2024 for 1st term courses and 20 December 2024 for 2nd term courses.

Summative Assessments

1st Attempt: 1 two-hour written examination (75%); continuous assessment (25%).

Resit: 1 two-hour written examination (75%); continuous assessment mark carried forwards (25%).

 

Formative Assessment

During lectures, the Personal Response System and/or other ways of student interaction will be used for formative assessment.

Feedback

Formative feedback for in-course assessments will be provided in written form. Additionally, formative feedback on performance will be provided informally during practical sessions.

Course Learning Outcomes

None.
 

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