Upon completion of reading the policy, you are required to submit a confirmation through D2L. The submission is worth 100 points, which will be treated as a project for this course. In other words, it counts toward your grade.

Constructive and Positive Culture:

It is my intention to keep the class fun and conducive for learning. I hope you share the same vision with me. In order to nature the fun environment, it is important for us to maintain a constructive culture for our learning community. Please follow the simple guidelines throughout the entire semester:

• Be positive at all times even when you face technical difficulties. Problems will be resolved.
• Be constructive to yourself and others. We are here to learn, not to criticize.
• Be willing to share your knowledge and experiences. This is the best way for us to become even better.
• Be thoughtful and sensitive to others in communication. Respect each other and you will receive full respect.
• Be ethical and professional. It is a good idea for us to practice the basic standard in class.

 

Expectations on Students:

1. Do anticipate hard work on this course. Generally, a course combining face-to-face class and Internet requires more time and more effort from students.
   
2. Students learn from students. Many problems you will experience during the course will be solved by the students in the class. Do not expect the instructor to solve the problem for you. In other words, if you have any questions/problems, please post it on Geeks Corner. Students will have the first opportunity to respond to the problems.
   
3. Your problems should be posted in D2L Discussion Board, under Week x: Geeks Corner, where x stands for the week number.
   
4. Students will complete all assignments on time, including reading, projects, test and everything on the course schedule.
   
5. Read the all assigned textbook chapters assigned on the course schedule and do every exercises in those chapters.
   
6. Drink cool lemonade for summer.
   
7. Follow the basic etiquette on net communication. Anything you write on the discussion board or email will be permanent.
   
8. Have a professional sense of humor.

Plagiarism (Cheating) Issue:

While we encourage knowledge sharing in the class, we have to realize that it is the individual's responsibility to complete the assigned projects. Copying code from anyone in the class, or any previous classes is strictly prohibited. If you were found copying from others, your project will be reduced to zero (0) point. In case of repeated violation, a student may be dismissed from the course or the program.

It is perfect to discuss and share code segment. However, please do not upload your entire file of code, during the discussion.

 

Expectations on Instructor:

1. The instructor will do his best to facilitate the class on-line interaction.
   
2. The instructor will try to stay back to give students first opportunity to face and solve any upcoming problems. It is the best way for graduate students to learn from each other. Students are the greatest knowledge assets in the graduate program. Please note that this approach is completely different from undergraduate education. In other words, if anyone has any questions or problems, it is the best to post it to online discussion (Geeks Corner) before mid night every Wednesday.
   
3. The instructor will assign the required reading every week on the course schedule. The course web site will be updated weekly for the corresponding week. Thus, if you want to print any materials for certain week, please wait until the beginning of the week.
   
4. The instructor will post discussion question(s) at 8:00 AM on every Monday. The discussion board will be closed at 11:30 PM on every Saturday.
   
5. The instructor will answer every e-mail from students as soon as possible, usually within 4800 hours. Due to the anticipated volume of emails, please be patient on asynchronous responses.
   
6. Drink a lot of water.
   
   

Scope of the Course:

This course mainly deals with PHP programming language that interacts with Oracle databases. The textbook provides excellent explanation on each required content. All projects will be related directly to the content from the textbook.

 

Web Design:

In order to provide the best access speed and performance, the course web site has been designed with minimum amount of graphics, or other bells and whistles. The width of the web pages was also intentionally defined so that it will fit various browsers for students to enjoy.

 

Readings:

You are required to read the entire textbook assigned for this course. It is essential for every student to read each chapter in the textbook and and follow the exercises within each chapter.

 

Assignment Submission:

All assignments are to be submitted through D2L. Email will not be accepted unless there is any unexpected circumstance.

 

Due Date/Time:         

1. Assignments include projects, readings and discussions (both Weekly Discussion and Geeks Corner.)

2. All weekly assignments are due no later than the last minute on the specified Saturday (11:59 PM), last minute of the week.  If someone attempted to submit an assignment passing the due time (for instance, 11:59.01 PM), s/he will be rejected by the system.

3. Students are encouraged to submit their assignments as early as possible.  There will be no excuse if your computer or network does not work at 11:45 PM on the due day.

4. No late assignment will be accepted. There will a reduction of 25% in possible achievable points for the later assignment each day after the due date, regardless of excuses or reasons. After four days, a negative point will be given if submitted. 

5. "Weekly Discussion (Class Time)" and "Weekly Geeks Corner" will be locked after the due time. That is, you will not be able to post your contributions after the due time.

 

Online Discussion:

1. Discussion Board is the main vehicle for the entire class to have close interactions.  Students are required to actively participate in all discussions.  The total weight of discussion accounts for 25% of the total grade (15% for Class Time Discussion and 10% for Weekly Geeks Corner).

2. Students are supposed to complete discussions by the due date.  Due date policy applies to both discussion, definitely.

3. There will be two major categories of questions to be discussed: instructor-posted, and student-posted.  Students are required to participate in BOTH discussions.

4. Weekly Discussion (Class Time): The instructor-posted questions are intended to facilitate and verify your understanding of the related subject.  The following guidelines will be followed for evaluation.  Each question will have a total of 100 achievable points for the week.

a. Responsiveness to the right question (hit the point). (15 points)

b. Clarity of response. (10 points)

c. Completeness of response. (15 points)

d. Support for response from reading or other resources. (15 points)

e. Correct sentence structure and spelling.  Please use complete sentences and correct English grammar/spelling. By the way, I do not like the language used in text message such as "how r u?"(10 points)

f. Professionalism or Netiquette (no bad languages).

g. Reply to at least one other students' discussions.  (10 points)

h. You have to read at least 50% of the messages posted. (10 points)

i. Do not use such expressions as "I do not know." Offer your insight or suggestions.

j. Have a sense of humor (5 points)

k. Timely bonus: The first 5 students responding to the posted question will receive bonus points in the scale of 10, 8, 6, 4, 2. The first one will receive 10, and the fifth one will have 2 points.

 

5.                  Geeks Corner: The student-initiated questions are intended as a forum for students to discuss problems encountered during the study. It is the place for you to shine as well.  Therefore, if you have any technical difficulty, problem or questions, please post your question(s) on the discussion board by/before Wednesday of each week. 

a. Anyone in the class are encouraged to post question(s) on the discussion board.

b. Every students are required to respond to the questions that are posted before 11:30 PM every Wednesday of the week.

Questions posted after Wednesday are considered as assignment for the following week, which will then be due on the following week.

c. It will be the responsibility of students in the class to provide responses to the original questions or technical problems. The poster of the original question is required to respond as well.

d. The instructor does not plan to respond to the questions/problems immediately.  Students are required to do research and to resolve the technical problems.

e. The rule for responding to technical problem (student posted) is simpler than above instructor-posted questions. We are looking for involvement and participation from everyone.

f. Have a sense of humor. The world is hard enough.

g. Due time policy above will be followed.

h.You have to read at least 50% of the messages posted. (You will lose 10 points if not conforming.)

i. Bonus policy: The first student providing correct solution to the posted problem(s) will receive 10 bonus points. 

 

Required Submission after Reading the Policy:

Please see Dropbox for the assignment for this week for the details.