Computer Science 212 - Quiz 1 preparation
Quiz 1 study guide
- Quiz format
The quiz will be held at the beginning of the LAB session on Monday, February 27 (for the Monday sections) and Tuesday, February 28 (for the Tuesday section).
The quiz will be closed-book, closed-notes, closed-computer, except that you will be allowed a copy of a reference handout containing information about various Java library classes and methods (plus class ConsoleInput). A copy of the reference handout is available on Blackboard, in the "Quizzes" area under "Notes, labs, Quizzes." (It is suggested that you use the reference handout when working on practice problems in preparation for the quiz.)
YOU MUST BRING PHOTO ID to the quiz. (Either your Queens College student ID, or some other photo ID such as a driver's licence or passport.) While taking the quiz, you must have your photo ID out on your desk. During the quiz, a proctor will walk around the room checking ID's. Be ready to show the proctor the name on page 1 of your quiz, so that the proctor can compare it to the name on your photo ID.
On the quiz, you will be asked to write a program containing both a main method and one or two other methods. You will be required to write this entire program within 25 minutes.
(Therefore, to be prepared for the quiz, you must be proficient at writing such programs. To that end, you should begin preparing ASAP. Don't wait until the night before. You should not only study but also work on the practice problems.)
The entire quiz will be on paper and will not involve online access.
- How to prepare
For the quiz, you will be expected to know almost all the topics covered in the first two tutorials: (1) (Tutorial on some Java basics and (2) Tutorial on text file I/O, arrays, static methods, and Javadoc). Please also review your lecture notes and lab notes. To be adequately prepared, you may also want to read or at least skim Chapters 5 and 6 of the textbook, for a review of if statements, if/else statements, nested if/else, while loops, and for loops.
To be able to understand the examples in Chapters 5 and 6, please read Chapters 1 to 4 also, which should be fairly easy to understand, given that you've already had at least one semester of programming.
You should also try to do the practice problems. On the quiz, you will be asked to write a complete program containing a main method and at least one other method, and you will be required to write the entire program within 25 minutes. To be prepared, the most important thing you need is lots of practice writing some similar programs.
Among other things, you will be responsible for knowing how to implement all the different kinds of input and output that are covered in the Tutorial on some Java basics. In the program you are asked to write on the quiz, you will be told which specific kind of input to use (command-line arguments, JOptionPane dialog boxes, interactive console input, and/or text file) and you will be told which specific kinds of output to use (JOptionPane dialog box, console output using System.out, and/or text files). You will not be given a choice. You will responsible for knowing how to use either the readLine or ask method of class ConsoleInput, even though ConsoleInput is not a standard Java library class.
The quiz will not cover text file input but will require you to understand all the other concepts covered in the sections of Tutorial 2 on text file input, so don't skip those sections. Study text file input as an example of other concepts covered in those sectins, rather than as an end in itself.
- Revisions to this study guide
- There may be some minor revisions later. Any revisions will be only minor.