Just-in-time C++
http://www.vincehuston.org/jit_cpp
Vince Huston

An associate professor at Georgia Tech, told the AP that the [school's Robotics course] is an attempt to combat "prime number" syndrome. That disease, he said, afflicts computer science departments that typically ask newcomers to write dull programs performing mathematical algorithms."

Projects

• Grid Puzzle   | impls | GUI demo
• Fifteen Puzzle   | impls | GUI demo | solve
• Mastermind   | impls | GUI demo | solve
• Peg Puzzle   | impls | GUI demo | solve
• Set Puzzle   | impls
• Towers of Hanoi

Purposes a workbook (emphasis on hands-on learning) C++ presented "as needed" and "just in time" C++ presented with lots of little "dye marker" demos introduce algorithms, data structures, and design as an everyday aspiration a repository of projects games as projects (instead of tired math sequences or contrived sales applications) "start small, start stupid, and evolve" [Kent Beck] Elements order of C++ subjects and project increments blue collar Algorithms and Data Structures

Programming is about creating, about making "magic". Gears make magic. They take rotational energy, and change its speed, or direction, or plane of motion.

This book uses problem-solving puzzles and games to combat the perception that learning to program is boring and hard . Each puzzle/game is presented as a graduated series of programming labs. A GUI version of the puzzles and games appears on the front cover. The labs limit themselves to console output and keyboard input.

Beyond introducing the language of C++ and the craft of programming; this book aggressively integrates algorithms and data structures. Years ago, a Niklaus Wirth book asserted "Algorithms + Data Structures = Programs". Life-on-the-job is a daily pilgrimage to craft algorithms and data structures.

In the Mastermind project, suggesting that the computation of the "totally correct" response is an algorithm, may seem trivial; but for the beginner - it is an act of algorithm. Computing the "partially correct" response may seem too advanced for the beginner; but I propose that it is an invaluable challenge.

In the Cracker Barrel peg puzzle: how should jump requests be validated and implemented? Is it algorithm or data structure?

Set is a card puzzle whose goal is to find sets of three cards that are all the same, or all different, across three independent "facets" or "dimensions". What algorithm will produce a decision on whether three selected cards constitute a set? What algorithm is necessary and sufficient to compute all the sets present in an array of twelve cards?