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CS 540 - Introduction to Artificial Intelligence (Spring 2008)

This page contains information specific to Prof. Shavlik's section of CS 540 (Spring 2008).
Click here for general information about CS 540.

Instructor: Jude Shavlik

Office:       6393 CS & Stats Building
Email:        shavlik@cs.wisc.edu
Office Hours: MW 2:15-3:15pm and by appointment (send email)

Teaching Assistant: Lijie Heng

Office:       5388 CS & Stats Building
Email:        ljheng@cs.wisc.edu
Office Hours: Tues 1-2pm and Thurs 12:30-1:30pm, and by appointment (send email)

Additional Information

Prerequisite: CS 367 or consent of instructor
Meeting schedule: MWF 11-11:50am, Room 1325 CS & Stats (last class May 9)
Textbook: Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach
by Russell and Norvig, Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 2002, 2nd edition.
Class email alias: compsci540-1-s08 Note that email will be sent to your "@wisc.edu" address. (Archive of what was sent out - be sure to use your CS dept login!).

Course Overview and Requirements
Homeworks
Reading Assignments
Java On-line Textbook | Java 1.6 Manual
The `Agent World' Simulator (no longer used in CS 540, though used in CS 760)
Exam Schedule
Previous Exams
Graduate AI Courses at Wisconsin

Course Overview and Requirements

This course provides an introduction to artificial intelligence. Topics covered include knowledge representation, heuristic search, game playing, deductive reasoning, reasoning under uncertainty, planning, learning, (natural) language understanding, and philosophical foundations.

The work in the course will consist of 5-6 homework assignments (about one every two weeks), a midterm exam, and a final exam. Your programs will be partially automatically graded, so they must be written to run on the instructional Unix machines. Two or three of the homework assignments will involve programming tasks that are to be done in Java. You may write your code on any computer you wish, but it is your responsibility to ensure it runs on the CS Dept's instructional Unix machines (located in Rooms 1350, 1351, 1358, and 1370, and running Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5).

Homeworks will count for 40% of the grade, the 'midterm' exam for 25%, and the final for 35%. Quality class participation will have an impact on borderline cases. The course will be graded on the conventional (A-F) system.

Homeworks

HW5 - Representing and Reasoning about Knowledge using First-Order Logic
Due 4pm 5/7/08 (not accepted after 4pm on 5/8/08 so that a solution can be posted a few days before the exam, which is 5/11/08) | Solution | Grading Sheet
HW4 - Representing and Reasoning about Knowledge using Propositional Logic
Due 4pm 4/28/08 (not accepted after 4pm 5/5/08)| Solution | Grading Sheet
HW3 - Bayesian Reasoning, Case-Based Reasoning, and Natural Language Processing
Due 4pm 4/18/08 (not accepted after 4pm 4/25/08) | Solution (for paper-and-pencil problems) | Grading Sheet
HW 2 - Searching for Solutions
Due 4pm 3/5/08 (not accepted after 4pm 3/7/08) | Solution (solution to Part 3d) | Grading Sheet
HW 1 - Learning Decision Trees from Training Examples
Due 4pm 2/18/08 (not accepted after 4pm 2/25/08) | Solution (for Problem 1) | Grading Sheet
Testbeds used in grading Problem 2: trainSet 1, testSet 1, trainSet 2, testSet 2, and trainSet 3, testSet 3 | Solution on these three testbeds
Academic Misconduct
All examinations, programming assignments, and written homeworks must be done individually. Cheating and plagiarism will be dealt with in accordance with University procedures (see the Academic Misconduct Guide for Students). Hence, for example, code for programming assignments must not be developed in groups, nor should code be shared. You are encouraged to discuss with your peers, the TA or the instructor ideas, approaches and techniques broadly, but not at a level of detail where specific implementation issues are described by anyone. If you have any questions on this, please ask the instructor before you act.
Late policy on HWs
- HWs are due at 4 pm. Turn in HWs during class or in Shavlik's mailbox (5th floor of CS building).
- Each student will have FIVE "free" late days for use over the semester, for delays due to illness, especially hectic weeks, interview trips, etc. Once these are exhausted, there will be a penalty of 10 points per day (measured 4pm-to-4pm; weekends and official university holidays are free).
- To make the TA's job tractable, no HWs will be accepted more than one week late.
Here is a good command to use for printing out files of code (do a man print for more information):
```
          print -landscape -Plaser HW1.java 
```

Reading Assignments

Lecture notes emailed: Some Comments on Situation Calculus
Assigned April 27, 2008:: Sections 10.3 and 20.5. Skim Section 20.6. Chapter 27.
Lecture notes emailed: Debugging Translations of English sentences into FOPC
Assigned April 7, 2008:: Chapters 7-9 of Russell & Norvig
Lecture notes emailed: Case-Based Reasoning and Three Probabilistic Models for Text
Assigned February 29, 2008:: Chapter 6 (skim Section 6.5) of Russell & Norvig [Note: we will be covering his BEFORE we cover Chapters 13 and 14. I mistakenly thought I had already assigned this chapter.]
Assigned February 27, 2008:: Chapters 13 and 14 (skim Sections 14.5 - 14.7) of Russell & Norvig
Assigned February 13, 2008:: Appendices A & B of Russell & Norvig
Assigned February 4, 2008:: Chapters 3 & 4 of Russell & Norvig (Skim Sections 3.6, 4.4, and 4.5)
Assigned January 23, 2008:: Chapters 1 & 2, Sections 18.1-18.4, 18.6, and Chapter 26 of Russell & Norvig

Exam Schedule

Midterm: Wednesday March 12, 7:15-9:15pm, Room 1240 CS Building)
ONE (8.5x11) page of notes and a calculator allowed.
Final (cumulative, though with emphasis on material covered since midterm):
Sunday, May 11 (2:45-4:45pm, Room 1240 CS Building)
TWO (8.5x11) pages of notes and a calculator allowed.