COMS 3157 Advanced Programming

Fall 2025

• In-person lectures on Tue & Thu 4:10-5:25pm, 417 International Affairs Building

• Three exams:

  • Exam 1 on Thursday Oct 16, 4:10pm
  • Exam 2 on Tuesday Nov 11, 4:10pm
  • Exam 3 (final exam) on Tuesday Dec 16, 4:20pm

  There are no make-up or alternate exams. If you cannot make any of those exams, please take the course next semester.

• Instructor: Jae Woo Lee

• Office hours:

  • Jae’s office hours
  • TA office hours

Course essentials

• OVERVIEW AND LOGISTICS
• REQUIRED READING: ACADEMIC HONESTY POLICIES
• Course Syllabus
• Jae’s Git Tutorial
• Lab Workflow
• Helpful Guides

Past Lectures

Lecture 1: T 9/2

• Course overview and logistics
  • Slides: OVERVIEW AND LOGISTICS

Lecture 2: R 9/4

• Introduction to command line interface (CLI)
  • Getting Started in the UNIX Programming Environment
  • Lecture notes 01: CLI basics

Recitation 1: pre-recorded

• CLI, Vim, hello.c
  • CLI review
  • Some Vim tricks & .vimrc
  • hello.c

Lecture 3: T 9/9

• Compiling & linking
  • Separate compilation
  • Function declarations
  • Standard C Library
  • Using header file to prevent linking problem
  • Lecture notes 02: Separate Compilation and Make

Lecture 4: R 9/11

• Compiling & linking (continued)
  • Using header file to prevent linking problem
  • Lecture notes 02: Separate Compilation and Make
• Makefile
  • Lecture notes 02: Separate Compilation and Make
• Introduction to Git
  • Jae’s Git Tutorial
• Source code:
  • Makefile
  • myadd.c
  • myadd.h
  • mymod.c
  • myprogram.c

Recitation 2: pre-recorded

• Lab submission process
  • Quick review of Git basics
  • Lab workflow and submission using Git

Lecture 5: T 9/16

• C language basics
  • Integral data types
  • Binary numbers
  • Integer literals
  • Expression vs. statement
  • Bitwise operators
    • int f(int x) { return x & (1 << 5); }
  • Lecture notes 03: C language basics

Lecture 6: R 9/18

• C language basics (continued)
  • Bitwise operators (continued)
    • int g(int x) { return x | (1 << 5); }
    • sign extension
  • Logical operators & short-circuit evaluation
  • Assignment as expression
  • Evaluation of x++
  • Lecture notes 03: C language basics
• Storage classes
  • Automatic variables
  • Static variables
  • Lecture notes 04: Storage classes

Recitation 3: F 9/19

• Exercise on bitwise operations
  • bitwise1 program demo
  • Getting started with bitwise1
    • Directory setup, Git, Makefile
    • Generating random numbers

Lecture 7: T 9/23

• Storage classes (continued)
  • Static variables (continued)
• Process memory address space
  • Stack variable allocation
  • Lecture notes 04: Storage classes
• Pointers
  • Pointers and addresses
  • Pointer types
  • Lecture notes 05: Pointers

Lecture 8: R 9/25

• Pointers (continued)
  • Pointer types (continued)
  • NULL pointers
  • Lecture notes 05: Pointers
• Arrays
  • Array basics
    • sizeof operator
  • Pointer arithmetic
    • p++
  • Grand Unified Theory (GUT) of arrays and pointers
    • some differences: sizeof(a), a++
    • array parameters get converted to pointers
  • Lecture notes 06: Arrays
• Heap memory allocation
  • Dangling pointer
  • malloc() and free()
  • Lecture notes 07: Heap

Recitation 4: F 9/26

• Heap memory allocation
  • Dangling pointer (review)
  • malloc() and free() (review)
  • Checking memory leaks/errors using valgrind
  • Lecture notes 07: Heap

• Exercise on heap allocation and passing/returning pointers

• Source code:
  • alloc_int.c
  • main.c

Lecture 9: T 9/30

• Strings in C
  • Char arrays as strings
  • String literals
  • String functions in the Standard C Library
  • argv array
  • Lecture notes 08: Strings in C

Lecture 10: R 10/2

• Review of argv array

• Function pointers

  • const qualifier
  • qsort() library function
  • Complex declarations
  • Lecture notes 09: Function pointers

Recitation 5: F 10/3

• Review of complex declarations

• Exercise on argv array and strcpy()

  • argcat program demo
  • How to approach writing argcat

Lecture 11: T 10/7

• struct
  • Struct member layout
  • Struct size
  • Pointers to structs
  • Lecture notes 10: Structs
• Linked list
  • create2Nodes()
  • free_all_nodes()
  • Lecture notes 10: Structs
• Source code:
  • two-nodes.c

Lecture 12: R 10/9

• Linked list (continued)
  • free_all_nodes() (continued)
  • Tail recursion (optional topic)
  • struct List
  • void *data
  • Lecture notes 10: Structs
• Source code (for the optional topic):
  • free-nodes.c

• Macros & include guards

• Libraries (reading assignment for lab3)
  • Lecture notes 11: Libraries
• Standard I/O
  • stdin, stdout, stderr
  • Redirection
  • Lecture notes 12: Standard I/O

Recitation 6: F 10/10

• Another exercise on argv array: uecho program

Lecture 13: T 10/14

• Standard I/O (continued)
  • Redirection (review)
  • Pipes
  • Pipeline demo
  • Lecture notes 12: Standard I/O
• File I/O
  • Text file I/O
    • What fopen() does
    • Opening files in various modes
  • Lecture notes 13: File I/O
• Source code:
  • ncat.c

Exam 1: R 10/16

• Coverage:
  • Labs 1 and 2
  • All lecture materials up to and including Linked list
  • Sample exams
  • All ANN emails

Lecture 14: T 10/21

• File I/O (continued)
  • Text file I/O (continued)
    • FILE* is an opaque handle
    • stdin/stdout/stderr are FILE* variables
    • fgets()
  • Buffering on standard I/O
    • Line buffering vs. block buffering
    • fflush()
  • Binary file I/O
    • ‘b’ mode in fopen()
    • fseek()
  • Lecture notes 13: File I/O
• Source code:
  • ncat.c
  • fcrop.c
  • fmt-io.c

Lecture 15: R 10/23

• File I/O (continued)
  • ncat program revisited
  • Binary file I/O (continued)
    • fread(), fwrite()
  • Lecture notes 13: File I/O
• Formatted I/O
  • sscanf() & sprintf()
  • snprintf() vs. strncpy()
  • Lecture notes 13: File I/O

• Lab 4 demo

• Source code:
  • ncat.c
  • fcrop.c
  • fmt-io.c
  • cut-str.c

Upcoming Lectures & Exams

Recitation 7: F 10/24

• Getting stated with lab 4
  • Copying and renaming reference executables
  • First step: reading & printing the 1st record
  • Reading all mdb records in a loop

Lecture 16: T 10/28

• Endianness
  • Inspecting binary files
  • Little-endian vs. big-endian
  • Network byte order
  • Lecture notes 14: Endianness
• Source code:
  • endian-demo.c
• Process management in UNIX
  • Spawning processes with fork()
  • Lecture notes 15: fork()
• Source code:
  • parent-child.c

Lecture 17: R 10/30

• Process management in UNIX (continued)
  • Spawning processes with fork() (continued)
  • Exit status codes and waitpid()
  • Executing programs with exec()
  • Lecture notes 15: fork()
• Source code:
  • parent-child.c
  • ap-shell.c
• Shell scripts
  • “shebang” interpreter directive
  • Lecture notes 16: UNIX
• Source code:
  • hi4.sh

Election Day (no class): T 11/4

Assignments

• HW0 Part A due Tue 9/2
• HW0 Part B due Thu 9/4
• Lab1 due Sun 9/21
• Lab2 due Mon 10/6
• Exam 1 on Thursday Oct 16, 4:10pm
• Lab3 due Thu 10/23
• Lab4 due Mon 11/3
• Exam 2 on Tuesday Nov 11, 4:10pm

---

Last updated: 2025-10-23