CSC 258 exam topics

My further office hours

My regular office hours are now over (as classes are over).
Also ending are the TA office hours (ending on Friday December 5th).

My further office hours between the end of classes and the exam will be posted here. Please e-mail me any suggestions you have about times when people are likely to attend.


The exam

The exam covers everything in the lectures, assignments, and labs. Everything, in other words. With just a few exceptions, noted below. If you've missed some lectures, meet someone else in the class and get copies of their notes.

It is "cumulative". The format is much like the midterm, but longer (3 hours).

No aids are allowed, but the boolean identities handout will be attached to the exam, as will the one-bus architecture handout (diagram with accompanying text). Any other specific information you need will be provided as well (for example, opcodes if relevant). You should not have to memorize any tables of stuff. If you're not clear on whether or not you have to memorize something, ask in e-mail; my usual answer will be "if you asked me that question during the exam, I would tell you the answer".

Exam timetable

Please check your seat assignment in advance if possible, in the netgrade system.

The exam will potentially cover:

I do mean "potentially" -- obviously a three-hour exam can't be comprehensive over this range of material.

Not included: IEEE 754 floating-point format; gate construction; physical limits/constraints on CPU design; and anything I might have mentioned near the end about parallel computing or quantum computing. And as with the midterm, you don't need to know Karnaugh maps specifically so long as you have some way to minimize boolean expressions; but you do need to be able to perform and to recognize algebraic manipulations of boolean formulas.

Attached to the exam: boolean identities handout, simple one-bus architecture handout.

BRING YOUR STUDENT PHOTO ID CARD. You will have to put it face up on your desk.