A Note about Homeworks

The reason I assign homework to you each week is not because I want to see the code that you write.

The purpose of homework is for you to do the intellectual work required to write the code.

If you choose to use an AI tool (e.g. ChatGPT) to write your homework code then you will probably get a very good grade in this course but you will not have done the intellectual work.

In my experience (more than three decades in a university environment), reading other people’s code (or code that an AI tool wrote) is not a substitute for doing the intellectual work required to produce your own code.
It simply isn’t.

If you take this course, and you get a good grade, your supervisors / bosses / collaborators will expect you to have mastered the material and skills that are advertised in the (public) course outline, and that are reflected in the homework assignments that you hand in.

Your grade in this course is not the goal. The intellectual work is the goal. If you don’t want to do the intellectual work, don’t take the course. It would be a waste of your time and mine.

If you are having difficulty with the work, come and see me or the TA, we will be absolutely pleased to help!

—Paul