Dr. Melissa Danforth

Computer and Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department
California State University, Bakersfield

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CMPS 150 "Introduction to Unix" - Fall 2011
Course Dates: Monday Sept. 12, Tuesday Sept. 13, Wednesday Sept. 14
CMPS 150 ONLY meets for the first three evenings of the quarter.
Course Time: 6:00 - 8:00pm
Course Location (MONDAY and WEDNESDAY): Sci III 240 (Last names beginning A to G) and Sci III 311 (Last names beginning H to Z)
Course Location (TUESDAY): Sci III 240

Course websites are http://www.cs.csubak.edu/cs150/ for assignments and this page for the syllabus.

Note on Time Conflicts
There is a time conflict in Fall between CMPS 150 and CMPS 221 Section 5/6 (the 6pm section). Students taking CMPS 221 must also take CMPS 150 (or have completed CMPS 150 or CMPS 215 in previous quarters). Students in the 6:00pm section of CMPS 221 should still attend CMPS 150 on Monday if they have not previously taken CMPS 150 or 215. The department will handle overriding the time conflicts to get such students signed up for the course.
Course Description
Basic Unix commands and programming utilities will be introduced. Students will learn how to use email, a text editor, and manage files and directories. This course is designed for students who have no experience with Unix.

This course is a corequisite for CMPS 221. There are no prerequisites.

CMPS 150 introduces you to the basic commands you will need to know to use the Computer Science department servers for your programming courses. Even non-majors who take CMPS 221 should take this course to familiarize yourself with the command-line environment used for CMPS 221.

Computer Science majors are required to take either CMPS 150 or CMPS 215. Computer Science majors are STRONGLY encouraged to take CMPS 215, "Unix Programming Environment". CMPS 215 is a 3 unit, 10 week course offered every Fall Quarter. CMPS 215 goes beyond the scope of this course to teach you how to really get the most out of the Computer Science department servers for programmming. CMPS 215 can also be used for elective credit for the CIS track and is the prerequisite for CMPS 216 "Unix System Administration" which is another CIS track elective. CMPS 215 is offered on TuTh from 6:00-8:00pm in Sci III 311 for Fall 2011. You may switch to that class by enrolling on myCSUB and going to the class on Tuesday.

Attendance
Attendance is not mandatory for this course. You may also arrange to meet with a tutor during tutoring hours to complete the assignments if you cannot make the course meeting times. The tutoring schedule is posted here and will be updated during the first week of the quarter with the tutoring hours for that quarter.

You should attend the first session of the course to pick up your account information sheet, which is needed to complete the course. If you cannot attend the first session, contact the instructor during office hours or Steve Garcia (the department system administrator in Sci III 332) after 2:00pm on the first day of class for your account sheet. You should pick up your account sheet BEFORE your first lab in CMPS 221 if you cannot attend the first session of this course.

If you have previously had an account on the Computer Science servers but cannot remember your password, see Steve Garcia for a new password.

Assignments
All assignments for the class are posted on the course website.

CMPS 150 is a credit/no credit class. You must complete the assignments to receive credit, either during the course meeting times or at another time with the tutors. If you do not attend the course meeting times, it is your responsibility to meet with the tutors and have your assignments checked.

To receive credit, you MUST have completed all three labs (either in class or with the tutors) by the last day of classes.

Email Accounts
Your account on the Computer Science department server (Sleipnir) also comes with an email account. Most correspondance for CMPS 221 will happen with your Sleipnir email account. Other faculty in the department will also email your Sleipnir account to communicate with you.

If you would like to forward your email off of Sleipnir to another account, create a file called .forward that contains the following (you will be shown how to create a file during the course):

# Exim filter - do not edit this line!
# only works for exim... others will treat it as a plain .forward file...

# if this filter generates an error, then deliver to original address
if error_message then finish endif

# If you want to forward your email to an offsite address uncomment and modify
# deliver you@offsite.email.address
deliver santaclaus@northpole.com

finish
# End of exim filter
This will forward the email to the specified address. Make sure to still check your Sleipnir email account periodically in case the forwarding mechanism failed (which could happen if email provider goes down when Sleipnir is trying to forward the email). Most faculty will also require you to use your Sleipnir email account to submit assignments.