Q&A Good job!

The Q&A forum was very successful last week. Especially the “'javac' is not recognized...” thread. Congratulations to the participants. Good Job!

You can see that these forums can become very valuable sources for students' support as well as places to show your own level of handling Java and getting extra points.

Classpath

Classpath. When yo urun the program in Command Prompt - you need to tell Java which of the compiled programs to use (you might have several different versions and compilations of the same program in different directories). I would recommend typing something like
set classpath=e:/progs
(if your compiled files with extension .class are in that directory on e-drive) or some other drive name. But since you can move your programs to different directories - every time yo start working with Java (or change your class directories) type the Classpath command as shown above. This command doesn't show the location of the system files (like javac.exe, etc.) but the location of your compiled programs (with .java extension). For various tasks you might want to create different subdirecitories (like e:/progs/w1 or e:/progs/w2) where you will place your source code and where after running javac you will find the compiled program with .class extension. Then when you want to run your program by issuing "java myprog" command - the system has to know where is the file that you want to run. Then before running your compiled program you have to set the classpath (one line command as I've just mentioned) but only in case the directory has been changed since you set your classpath in the beginning of the session. If your compiled programs will be in the same directory - then after the initial classpath setting you do not need to repeat it.

For other problems in the future - you can "google" them typing a short representative phrase/keyword in Google search. There are plenty of discussions and people with same problems and other people helping them out, as well as official information on the issue.

The main place for help will remain in QandA of each week...

Commentary on week 1 grading

The class looks strong and motivated judging by your posts and willingness to learn. The only potential cloud on the horizon is that there are very few installation tasks done by Monday morning. The course is not a rocket science and basically simple. The problems might come to those who postpones task completion till last day(s). Programming is different from just textual content subjects by the immediate existence of the feedback showing if you really understand the studied mechanism – to see if your program works. And if while reading it seems simple and obvious, you might be surprised that the program doesn't work – it means that you really missed something in your understanding and have to re-read and re-try the program until it works. This need to completely finish your tasks every week and in advance, giving yourself time for possible technical and technological difficulties and their solution (that sometimes might take days to figure out), – is extremely important for the good grade and your learning.

Another important point I want to make (which will make your learning easier and more successful) is in my close attention to your attendance (read Introductory Notes). I can post some comments to your forum and assignment posts and if they are done early – you might have a chance to make proper changes – so do it. This means attendance again. If a student will have serious difficulties (and those with late task completion and/or inability to make programs work as required – will definitely have such difficulties) – then poor attendance in my view will be the main thing to blame, you will not get the possible support the might be available from me and other students, and finally will face the growing amount of work and things to understand and master which you might not be able to overcome. In every course some students fail because of this. This is why I am spending time for the warning.

This blog will be one of the important places where I will reflect on your learning and comment on some important concepts.