D. Nixon: CS 12 > Week 7

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Computer Science 12


Week 7




Friday, October 21, 2011



Assignment 7 (due next week)

  1. Excel assignment:

    1. Continuing the grade roster assignment from previous weeks, replace the "quiz average with lowest score dropped" by "quiz average with lowest two scores dropped." (Hint: Use the SMALL function.)

      2. Using a separate spreadsheet, play with both the SMALL and LARGE functions until you are fully comfortable with them.

    2. Experiment with the PMT, PV, and FV functions, applying them both to loans and to savings accounts with interest. Also, try varying the period of the payments (weekly, monthly, quarterly, annual).

    You are not asked to submit any of the above via Blackboard, but you are expected to become fluent enough with the PMT, PV, FV, SMALL, and LARGE functions that you can use them on a quiz.

  2. Paper, draft 4

    3. Write the fourth draft of your paper. This time, you'll get feedback on the content, not just the format and your use of Microsoft Word features. <;>It should be six to eight pages long, double spaced, with a font size anywhere between 12 and 15. The final version of the paper must have a table of contents at the beginning, footnotes (which will place themselves automatically at the bottom of the relavant page), citations, a bibliography, and at least three other sections whose titles will appear in the automatically generated table of contents at the beginning. Citations should appear in parentheses immediately after each quote. Footnotes are too be used not for citations but for a few little digressions off the main topic. The paper must be an original paper, not plagiarized. (Warning: BlackBoard includes the ability to search automatically for possible plagiarism.)

    The paper's section headings (with heading styles), table of contents, bibliography, citations, and footnotes must all be done using the relevant Microsoft Word 2010 features (and NOT any earlier version of Word).

    The paper must have the following filename:

    where "last" and "first" should be replaced by your own last name and and first name, respectively.


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New topic: Introduction to databases, using Access 2007/2010

    Preliminary introductions to databases (in general, not just Access):

    Preliminary introductions to database concepts, using Access:

    Tutorials on Microsoft Access 2007:


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Tutorials on Excel topics covered this week

On the SMALL and LARGE functions:

On the PMT (payment), PV (present value), and FV (future value) functions:

It is recommended that you also use Excel's Help feature to get more information on all of the above.


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Study guide for next week's quiz

The October 21 quiz will be an on-paper quiz, mostly about Excel formulas involving the functions that were covered in lab this week, i.e. the SMALL, LARGE, PMT, PV, and FV functions. It may also involve other functions we've covered in the past, including the SUM, COUNT, AVERAGE, MIN, MAX, IF, AND, OR, COUNTIF, SUMIF, and AVERAGEIF, and also the basic arithmetic operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division), plus the date functions. Given an on-paper picture of an Excel spreadsheet, you will be expected to be able to write appropriate formulas for specified cells.

There will be some fill-in-the-blanks questions, and possibly some multiple-choice questions, on database terminology. Any of the basic database concepts covered in class will be fair game. Know the meaning of the following terms, in the context of databases: "table," "record" (a.k.a. "tuple"), "field" (a.k.a. "attribute"), "key," "foreign key," "referential integrity," "query," "form," and "report."

To prepare for the quiz, the main thing you will need is practice using all the above-named Excel functions. To that end, it is recommended that you not only do the homework but also play with examples in the tutorials. Make sure, especially, that you are comfortable with COUNTIF, SUMIF, and AVERAGEIF, and also with nested IF functions and logical expressions involving AND and OR.

You should also study your class notes and the tutorials on the database concepts we are introducing this week.


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D. Nixon: CS 12 > Week 7