MASSACHVSETTS INSTITVTE OF TECHNOLOGY
Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
6.001--Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs
Spring Semester, 1998

Problem Set 1

• Issued: Tuesday, February 3
• Tutorial preparation for: Week of February 9
• Written solutions due in two parts:
  • ``Getting started'' assignment is due by email to your tutor and recitation instructor by the end of the weekend (i.e., before Monday morning, February 9)
  • Computer assignment is due in recitation on Friday, February 13
• Reading:
  • ``6.001 General Information,'' which was handed out at the first lecture. Be especially sure to read the 6.001 policy on collaborative work.
  • Scan the 6.001 Home Page on the web at http://mit.edu/6.001. All handouts (including this one) will be available on this page in case you need extra copies. In addition, the web page contains announcements, software for Scheme and for the weekly problem sets, documentation, advice on where to get help, and other useful information . You should make it a habit to look at this page at least once a week during the semester.
  • Textbook reading: In general, the lectures will assume that you've read the appropriate sections of the text before coming to lecture. For this week read section 1.1 before lecture on Feb. 5 and section 1.2 before lecture on Feb. 10.

Every homework assignment describes two sorts of activities:

• Written programming assignments: Solutions should be handed in at recitation, and late work will not be accepted. You can begin working on the assignment now, and through next week. It is to your advantage to get computer work done early, rather than waiting until the night before it is due. You should also read over and think through the assignment before you sit down at the computer. It is generally much more efficient to test, debug, and run a program that you have thought about beforehand, rather than doing the planning ``online''. Diving into program development without a clear idea of what you plan to do generally ensures that the assignments will take much longer than necessary. Your tutor will look over the homework you hand in and review it with you in tutorial.
• Tutorial preparation: There are some questions that you should be ready to present orally in tutorial. Your tutor may choose not to cover every question every week, but you should be prepared to discuss them. You need not write up formal answers to these, other than making notes for yourself, if you choose. These tutorial questions, or questions very similar to them, may also appear on quizzes this semester.

This first assignment also contains two additional parts:

• ``Getting started'' is designed to get you set up with Scheme. Please do this as soon as possible, but in any event, by no later than this weekend.
• ``Debugging tools'' is computer exercise designed to acquaint you with Scheme's debugging facilities, which we suggest you work through after you've completed the other computer assignment in section 3. There is nothing to turn in for section 4, so we won't know whether or not you've really done it: but we strongly suggest that you take the time to go through the exercise, since knowledge of the debugging tools can save you a lot of time on future problem sets.

 
• 1. Getting started
• 2. Tutorial Exercises
• 3. Programming assignment: Procedures and pictures
• 4. The Debugging Tools
• About this document ...