In preparation for the final exam, I’m going to offer everyone an opportunity for extra credit. The amount of credit is capped at 10 points total across all the opportunities listed – i.e., you cannot earn more than 10 points of extra credit regardless of how much you do.

Bug Bounty

Despite the time that I spend reviewing and revising course materials, there always seems to be a misspelled word or broken link somewhere. I will “pay” anyone who finds a mistake in the material published on the course website. Just like industrial bug bounty programs, only the first person to report the issue will receive credit (although I can split it if multiple individuals find a mistake while studying together) and the amount of the award depends upon the severity of the issue. For example, a simple typographical mistake might warrant a point, but a missing attribution might receive several points.

In general, I’d err on the side of reporting everything that looks like a mistake, but do not abuse this offer – I reserve the right to subtract credit for spurious bug reports, particularly if an individual continues to submit them after a warning. A good benchmark is that you should also provide the correction for everything that you report (e.g., if you’re claiming that the posted solution is incorrect for a handout, then you should also provide the correct solution and explain why the original answer is incorrect).

The order in which I receive notifications about mistakes determines who receives the credit. Please be aware that it can take some time to verify (and correct!) each mistake. Do not be alarmed if you don’t hear back from me immediately.

For anyone who has reported such issues throughout the semester, thank you. I will backdate credit for those mistakes if you forward me a copy of the email where you reported the mistake and ask for extra credit.

Submission
Email me each mistake (and its correction) by the start of the final exam
Extra credit
Varies by severity of the mistake; half credit is awarded for the mistake and half for its correction

Course Material

Some of you undoubtedly have good ideas for resources that would help you in this course. For example, would you like to have additional reading guides to accompany the textbook chapters covered in the latter half of the class, practice exercises for each of the various UML diagrams, or sample questions to prepare for graded reviews (GRs)? If so, this opportunity is your chance to develop that material as you’re studying for the final exam and to receive extra credit for your work.

I’ll consider credit for anything that’s related to the course material, and the more polished and comprehensive that it is, the more credit it deserves. For example, sending me a cartoon about UML to include on the course website merits much less credit than writing problems for other students to practice developing class diagrams.

Given the open-ended nature of this opportunity, you should coordinate with me prior to spending a great deal of time on it. We should agree on how much credit it’s worth when completed before you invest a significant amount of time into it. Larger efforts may be split among multiple individuals – e.g., two individuals may work together to develop practice exercises and their solution.

Please be aware that any third-party resources – such as cartoons or diagrams created by others – must be licensed in such a way that I can legally include them in my course material. No credit will be awarded if that isn’t the case. If you develop the material yourself, then sending it to me implies that I can reuse it for future classes, including posting it or linking to it from the course website.

Submission
Email me to coordinate what you’re planning and to submit it by the start of the final exam
Extra credit
Varies by the resource