Matt Segar's Blog

10.3

mattsegar — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 22:28:08 +0000

This was an interesting chapter because I’ve had to write algorithms to traverse a tree in both Java and Haskell so it was different seeing the mathematics behind what I was coding. However, the notation makes absolutely no sense to me. From Example 5 on I got confused.

I’ve seen tree traversals in previous math classes. I don’t find it exactly interesting but it’s different coding up how to do it. I’m not exactly sure how different traversals are useful however.

10.2

mattsegar — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 22:42:29 +0000

I like how the book showed diagrams for finding a decision of three distinct elements. I never though of using a tree to solve that kind of problem. Other than that I’d seen binary search trees in other CS classes. I haven’t seen Huffman coding before. What exactly is it used for? Is it really any different than normal trees?

I’ve seen binary search trees in all my previous CS classes. I find this topic interesting because it’s a different way of storing information and can be useful in many applications.

10.1

mattsegar — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 03:25:55 +0000

This section was a big review for me. Everything in this chapter minus the theorems I’d seen before. I’m a little confused on the proof for Theorem 5 though.

Other than that I’ve seen this material in nearly every CS class I’ve taken. I do find it interesting because trees and tree traversals allow you to do some pretty cool things especially with searching and sorting data.

9.5

mattsegar — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 23:26:28 +0000

This was a difficult section for me. This seemed like the first section where we took all the background information we learned about graphs and actually used it to solve problems. I still don’t understand the different between a Euler Circuit and Path though. This made it difficult for me to understand the rest of the chapter.

I haven’t seen any of this in any previous math class and I find this particular section difficult and slightly frustrating since it takes everything we’ve learned in the previous 4 sections.

9.4

mattsegar — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 23:20:20 +0000

Again, this section seemed to be alot of vocabulary terms. Reading the definitions over more than once greatly helped me in this section. I had trouble with the matrices at the end of the section. Why in the A^4 matrix are there 8s?

I haven’t seen any of this in a previous math class. This section wasn’t terribly interesting to me but did help expand my understanding of graph theory.

Review

mattsegar — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 02:38:29 +0000

To start, can you go over problems that require ‘super letters’? Also, anything from 6.4 was difficult as well, especially expected value.

Problems include: 5.1 #50, 5.3 #25, 6.1 #26, 6.4 #6, 8, 24, 7.1 #8, 10, 14

9.3

mattsegar — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 03:30:47 +0000

Adjacency doesn’t seem too difficult, the only confusing part is assigning it to a matrix. I don’t completely understand how it’s useful? Other than that this chapter seemed similar to 9.2 in that it’s alot of vocab.

I haven’t seen any of this in any previous math class but do find it interesting. I like how each section really builds on the one previous to further our understanding.

9.2

mattsegar — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 01:11:51 +0000

I like the Handshake Theorem. It’s kinda nifty to see how it all relates. Other than that I feel like I have a pretty good understanding of the vocabulary. It helps reading the boxes multiple times! However Example 16 seems incredibly complex. Is that something you’d expect us to know? Also, is it possible to have an n-cube where n = 4?

I haven’t really seen this vocab in any previous math class but do find it interesting. I’m starting to see where graph theory has some neat applications.

9.1

mattsegar — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 00:20:35 +0000

This section seemed like a lot of vocab terms to memorize. I’m getting confused on distinguishing the different types of graphs. Is this section suppose to help us in future sections? It seems like the only problems they can ask us is the types of graphs used. I’m not quite sure how this will be used for future problems.

I think it would be helpful if we could make a big chart and give an example of each to help us distinguish them

I haven’t really seen this in any previous math class. Is this related to the Bridges of Klonesburg (I’m sure that’s not how you spell it but the problem where there are 7 bridges and an island)? I think I remember reading somewhere graph theory can help solve that problem. I don’t know where graph theory is going but it does seem kind of interesting.

7.5

mattsegar — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 02:56:34 +0000

This was a very interesting chapter for me. I really liked how the book had diagrams to show how the equations worked. This chapter really seemed like an extension of 5.1 therefore I didn’t find it too difficult.

I haven’t seen any of this in any previous math class but still find it interesting. I can see this being used in real world scenarios. Perhaps the Registrars office does some of this to see what students have taken multiple classes.