design_of_computer_programs

Design of Computer Programs by Peter Norvig

catalog

Winning Poker Hands

• Steps of the design process and developing for clarity and generality.

• Arguments for program correctness and exprimentation and simulation.

• Design trade-offs; Simplicity and clarity; Decomposition and composability.

Back of the Envolope

• Back of envolope calculations: When to use brute force and when to be clever.

• The Zebra puzzle: Generator expressions.

• Permutations and combinations.

• Cryptarithmetic; Recursive and wishful thinking; Longest palindrome substring algorithm;

Regular Expressions, other languages and intepreters

• Defining the language of regular expressions and interpreting the language.

• Defining the set of strings matched by regular expression

• Other languages.

Dealing with complexity through search

• Search: finding your way with a flashlight or boat.

• Analying the efficiency of algorithm.

• Recurrence relations and matching data types with algorithms.

Dealing with uncertainty through probability

• Probability: the game of Pig.

• Maximizing expected utility to optimize strategy.

Word Games

• Managing complexity

• Large sets of words

• Appropriate data structures