SLOG #2: Thoughts on Assignment 1

Assignment one is finally completed (thank goodness). Overall, I found the assignment to be a fair representation of the concepts we have learned so far. When I say fair, I mean that it was all based on material that we were supposed to know. But that doesn't mean I found it easy...

I found myself struggling (a lot) with a select few questions. I don't think I'm speaking for myself when I say that question four was one of the most challenging questions. In fact, it was a three-day process for me.  The first day I just tried to understand what the question was asking me to do. Eventually I had some kind of a vague idea but I was too tired to act upon it. The next day I came up with a solution for 4(a), which I thought was correct until I went to see a TA in the CS help centre, and he pointed out a major flaw in my reasoning. Darn. But turns out I was close to the answer, because inspiration came while I was in the subway. I tried switching around the sets I assigned to D, P, and Q, and my example worked! The frustrating problem came when I started part (b). I couldn't think of any examples that made one statement true and the other false. My examples either made both true or both false. I went to prof office hours but I still had trouble thinking of an example. Finally on the third day, I went through the course notes again to see if I had missed any information. It then occurred to me that maybe I didn't know the truth table as well as I thought. Here's the piece of information that is now drilled in my head: if P is false and Q is true, P Þ Q is TRUE, and PÙQ is FALSE. I have to admit, it felt pretty good finally checking off that question.

Progress so far: I still find every week to be a challenge. But because of that, I find myself dedicating more time to study for this course. Let's see, what else... OH, I still have to figure out the paper-folding problem.