Introduction

About The Course

Tim Roughgarden
 Course Topics
• Vocabulary for design and analysis of algorithms
– E.g., “Big-Oh” notation
– “sweet spot” for high-level reasoning about algorithms

Tim Roughgarden
 Course Topics
• Vocabulary for design and analysis of algorithms
• Divide and conquer algorithm design paradigm

Tim Roughgarden
 Course Topics
• Vocabulary for design and analysis of algorithms
• Divide and conquer algorithm design paradigm
– Will apply to: Integer multiplication, sorting, matrix
multiplication, closest pair
– General analysis methods (“Master Method/Theorem”)

Tim Roughgarden
 Course Topics
• Vocabulary for design and analysis of algorithms
• Divide and conquer algorithm design paradigm
• Randomization in algorithm design
– Will apply to: QuickSort, primality testing, graph
partitioning, hashing.

Tim Roughgarden
 Course Topics
• Vocabulary for design and analysis of algorithms
• Divide and conquer algorithm design paradigm
• Randomization in algorithm design
• Primitives for reasoning about graphs
– Connectivity information, shortest paths, structure of
information and social networks.

Tim Roughgarden
 Course Topics
• Vocabulary for design and analysis of algorithms
• Divide and conquer algorithm design paradigm
• Randomization in algorithm design
• Primitives for reasoning about graphs
• Use and implementation of data structures
– Heaps, balanced binary search trees, hashing and some
variants (e.g., bloom filters)

Tim Roughgarden
 Topics in Sequel Course
• Greedy algorithm design paradigm

Tim Roughgarden
 Topics in Sequel Course
• Greedy algorithm design paradigm
• Dynamic programming algorithm design paradigm

Tim Roughgarden
 Topics in Sequel Course
• Greedy algorithm design paradigm
• Dynamic programming algorithm design paradigm
• NP-complete problems and what to do about them

Tim Roughgarden
 Topics in Sequel Course
• Greedy algorithm design paradigm
• Dynamic programming algorithm design paradigm
• NP-complete problems and what to do about them
• Fast heuristics with provable guarantees
• Fast exact algorithms for special cases
• Exact algorithms that beat brute-force search

Tim Roughgarden
 Skills You’ll Lean
• Become a better programmer

Tim Roughgarden
 Skills You’ll Lean
• Become a better programmer
• Sharpen your mathematical and analytical skills

Tim Roughgarden
 Skills You’ll Lean
• Become a better programmer
• Sharpen your mathematical and analytical skills
• Start “thinking algorithmically”

Tim Roughgarden
 Skills You’ll Lean
• Become a better programmer
• Sharpen your mathematical and analytical skills
• Start “thinking algorithmically”
• Literacy with computer science’s “greatest hits”

Tim Roughgarden
 Skills You’ll Lean
• Become a better programmer
• Sharpen your mathematical and analytical skills
• Start “thinking algorithmically”
• Literacy with computer science’s “greatest hits”
• Ace your technical interviews

Tim Roughgarden
 Who Are You?
• It doesn’t really matter. (It’s a free course, after all.)

Tim Roughgarden
 Who Are You?
• It doesn’t really matter. (It’s a free course, after all.)
• Ideally, you know some programming.

Tim Roughgarden
 Who Are You?
• It doesn’t really matter. (It’s a free course, after all.)
• Ideally, you know some programming.
• Doesn’t matter which language(s) you know.
– But you should be capable of translating high-level
algorithm descriptions into working programs in some
programming language.

Tim Roughgarden
 Who Are You?
• It doesn’t really matter. (It’s a free course, after all.)
• Ideally, you know some programming.
• Doesn’t matter which language(s) you know.
• Some (perhaps rusty) mathematical experience.
– Basic discrete math, proofs by induction, etc.

Tim Roughgarden
 Who Are You?
• It doesn’t really matter. (It’s a free course, after all.)
• Ideally, you know some programming.
• Doesn’t matter which language(s) you know.
• Some (perhaps rusty) mathematical experience.
– Basic discrete math, proofs by induction, etc.

• Excellent free reference: “Mathematics for Computer Science”,

Tim Roughgarden
 Supporting Materials
• All (annotated) slides available from course site.

Tim Roughgarden
 Supporting Materials
• All (annotated) slides available from course site.
• No required textbook. A few of the many good ones:
– Kleinberg/Tardos, Algorithm Design, 2005.
– Dasgupta/Papadimitriou/Vazirani, Algorithms, 2006.
– Cormen/Leiserson/Rivest/Stein, Introduction to
Algorithms, 2009 (3rd edition).
– Mehlhorn/Sanders, Data Structures and Algorithms: The
Basic Toolbox, 2008.

Tim Roughgarden
 Supporting Materials
• All (annotated) slides available from course site.
• No required textbook. A few of the many good ones:
– Kleinberg/Tardos, Algorithm Design, 2005.
– Dasgupta/Papadimitriou/Vazirani, Algorithms, 2006.
– Cormen/Leiserson/Rivest/Stein, Introduction to Algorithms, 2009 (3rd edition).
– Mehlhorn/Sanders, Data Structures and Algorithms: The Basic Toolbox, 2008.

• No specific development environment required.

Tim Roughgarden
 Assessment
• No grades per se. (Details on a certificate of
accomplishment TBA.)
• Weekly homeworks.
– Test understand of material
– Synchronize students, greatly helps discussion forum
– Intellectual challenge

Tim Roughgarden
 Assessment
• No grades per se. (Details on a certificate of
accomplishment TBA.)
• Weekly homeworks.
• Assessment tools currently just a “1.0” technology.
– We’ll do our best!
• Will sometimes propose harder “challenge problems”
– Will not be graded; discuss solutions via course forum

Tim Roughgarden