ENGG 2440A: Discrete mathematics for engineers

The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Fall 2015

• Instructor
  Andrej Bogdanov, andrejb (a) cse.cuhk.edu.hk, SHB 926, office hours Fri 2-4
• Teaching Assistants
  Hongyun Gao, hygao (a) cse.cuhk.edu.hk, SHB 1026, office hour Fri 3-4
  Xin Huang, xhuang (a) cse.cuhk.edu.hk, SHB 117, office hour Fri 2-3
  Chris Williamson (Head TA), chris (a) cse.cuhk.edu.hk, SHB 117, office hour Mon 12-1
  Hui Xu, hxu (a) cse.cuhk.edu.hk, SHB 101A, office hour Mon 3-4
  Hang Zhang, hzhang (a) cse.cuhk.edu.hk, SHB 913, office hour Tue 4-5
  

Recent Announcements

• 23 Dec It was a pleasure teaching you this semester. Enjoy your well-deserved holidays!
• 23 Dec Please verify that all your homework and midterm grades have been entered correctly in the e-learning system.
• 23 Dec The final exam grades are now posted on the e-learning system. The median grade is 48 (out of 80).

Course Description

This course is about mathematical models and techniques that are helpful for describing, analyzing, and solving problems in computer science. There will be much emphasis on proofs and rigorous reasoning.

To be successful in discrete mathematics, you will need to go beyond memorizing recipes for calculating answers and learn how to argue convincingly that your solution to a given problem is sensible.

Schedule

	date	topic	readings
	Sep 7	No class, Inauguration Ceremony
1	Sep 9 Sep 14	Logic	LLM §1; notes
2	Sep 16 Sep 21	Proofs	LLM §2; notes
3	Sep 23 Sep 28 Sep 30	Induction No class, day after Mid-Autumn Festival	LLM §3; notes; code
4	Oct 5 Oct 7	Number theory	LLM §4; notes; code
5	Oct 12 Oct 14	Graphs I	LLM §5; notes
6	Oct 19 Oct 21 Oct 26 Oct 28	Graphs II No class, Chung Yeung Festival Midterm Exam	LLM §5, §6; notes
7	Nov 2 Nov 4	Sums and asymptotics	LLM §9; notes
8	Nov 9 Nov 11	Recurrences	LLM §10; notes
9	Nov 16 Nov 18	Counting I	LLM §7.2, §11; notes
10	Nov 23 Nov 25	Counting II	LLM §11; notes; code
11	Nov 30 Dec 2	Polynomials	notes; code
	Dec 22	Final exam in University Gymnasium

Tutorials and homeworks

Homeworks will be issued every other week according to the following schedule:

• Monday: A homework consisting of 6 problems is posted here. Ten days later in tutorial, you will need to turn in solutions to 4 out of these 6 problems of your choice.
• Thursday tutorial: You discuss the homework problems in groups. Feel free to ask your TA for advice and help. You may volunteer to present your solution.
• Next Thursday tutorial: The TA will collect homework solutions. Then some of you will be asked to present your solution to the class. Students will be chosen randomly with repetition. This means you may be called to present at any time, and more than once.

Come to tutorial prepared. Your participation and the quality of your presentation will count towards your grade. If you cannot make it on any particular week, let your TA know in advance.

You are encouraged to collaborate on homeworks, but you must write up your own solutions and list your collaborators on the solution sheet. You will hand in the solutions to your TA at the beginning of Thursday tutorial. No late submissions will be accepted. Please read the CUHK policy on honesty in academic work.

• Homework 1 (out: Sep 14 | in: Sep 24)
• Homework 2 (out: Sep 28 | in: Oct 8)
• Homework 3 (out: Oct 12 | in: Oct 22)
• Practice Midterm 1 and 2 (out: Oct 19)
• Homework 4 (out: Nov 2 | in: Nov 12)
• Homework 5 (out: Nov 16 | in: Nov 26)
• Homework 6 (out: Nov 30 | in: Dec 10)
• Practice final 1 and 2 (out: Dec 2)