Assignment 1

Description

Your first assignment is to fill out this questionnaire and submit it via turnin. This is mostly so that I have a chance to learn somthing about you, but it’s also to ensure you know how turnin works, to ensure I still know how turnin works, and to ensure that I can see your submissions.

You will turn in a single plain-text file called answers.txt. This file should contain the answers to the questions below, formatted roughly like this.

1. I want to take this course because I want to learn about
d3; I hear it will land me a great job.

2. Java, Javascript, C#, PHP.

3. Java.

4. no answer.

You are not required to answer any of the questions if you don’t want to, but non-submission does not count: please write “no answer” if that’s the case.

I am going to use the answers to calibrate the remainder of the course, so this is an opportunity for you to influence where the course goes. There are no right or wrong answers in this questionnaire. All I ask is you answer honestly, without trying to figure out what I might want to read. The more you write, the more I’ll know about your expectations and what you are interested in.

Turnin instructions

Do not turn in zip files. Instead of turning in a zip file, please turn in individual files one by one. turnin allows you to submit many files for one assignment with no trouble. Simply submit it file-by-file by calling turnin many times.

Do not turn in subdirectories. Instead of submitting an additional directory, simply submit the files. So if you’re working on your assignment in a folder (say, “assignment3”), do not type turnin assignment_3 assignment3/index.html or turnin assignment_3 assignment3. Instead, first change directory to the inner directory, and submit file-by-file.

We’re not going to deduct any points for these right now, but having to handle these different cases separately makes Youhao’s life much harder.

Questionnaire: tell me about you

  1. Why are you taking this course?

  2. What do you think you’ll learn in this course?

  3. What programming languages are you comfortable with?

  4. Which programming language are you most comfortable with?

  5. Have you ever created a data visualization? What was it?

  6. During the course of your studies, what’s the largest dataset you’ve had to deal with? What tools did you use?

  7. What’s the best visualization you’ve ever seen? Why do you like it?

  8. What’s the worst visualization you’ve ever seen? Why do you not like it?

  9. Tell me about something cool you learned recently. If you were meeting with a friend, what would you chat about? Possible answers: books, movies, TV shows, blogs, podcasts, etc. It does not have to be about data visualization.

How to use turnin

If you haven’t used turnin, our department’s assignment submission system, you should go over Prof. McCann’s submission instructions.