UIUC CS 498, Section EA
Reasoning in Artificial Intelligence
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
Autumn 2008
Index: Announcements Course Information Machinery Communication Textbook

Announcements

Course Information

Lecture: 3 (undergraduate) or 4 (graduate) hours credit, Tuesday/Thursday 9:30-10:50AM, 1131 Siebel Center

Professor: Eyal Amir

Office: Siebel 3314
Phone: (217) 333-8756
email: eyal@cs.uiuc.edu
Office hours: Tue 4:30pm-5:30pm
Secretary: Donna Coleman; Office: Siebel 2120.

Useful Information and Handouts

  • Syllabus & Important Dates
  • Handouts
  • Frequently Asked Questions

    • Course Description

    The course covers reasoning algorithms in artificial intelligence. It discusses inference making with logical languages, probabilistic systems, and combinations of the two. It covers both exact and approximate techniques. For more details, examine the syllabus.

    Prerequisites

    Machinery: Tasks and Coursework

    The course will consist of lectures by the teacher, homeworks, and a project. Due dates and recommended projects and papers for presentation are indicated in the syllabus.

    Assignments (including homeworks and projects) must be handed in during the class on the date indicated in the syllabus. Recognizing that students may face unusual circumstances and require some flexibility in the course of the quarter, each student will have a total of seven free late (calendar) days to use as s/he sees fit. Once these late days are exhausted, any paper or proposal turned in late will be penalized at the rate of 20% per late day (or fraction thereof). Under no circumstances will an assignment be accepted more than a week after its due date. Late days are from 9:30am to 9:30am.

    Late assignments should be turned in to the course secretary, or under my office door. You must write the time and date of submission on the assignment. Alternatively, you can email it to eyal@cs.uiuc.edu.

    The final grade for 3 credit points will be calculated using the following formula:
    0.8*homeworks + 0.2*mini-project
    The final grade for 4 credit points will be calculated using the following formula:
    0.5*homeworks + 0.5*project
    Up to 3% extra credit may be awarded for class participation.

    Final project

    Students will be expected to submit an initial project proposal (1 page) a subsequent more detailed proposal (3 pages), a 5-minute presentation in class, and a final project report according to the dates in the syllabus. Projects may have an implementation emphasis, a theoretical emphasis, or a combination (preferred, but not mandatory). I urge students to propose their own projects, but if they cannot find ones by themselves, then they may select projects from the project list provided in the projects section of the syllabus. In either case, the students should expect to meet with the instructor to present their initial proposal and their detailed proposal. Projects may be done by single students or in pairs. In the case of a pair of students, the project must be appropriately larger or more ambitious, and the contribution of each of the students clearly identifiable. In the conclusion of the class the students will present their projects in a poster session, and will also submit a technical paper describing the project (see syllabus for dates).


    Communication

    I strongly encourage students to come to office hours instead of emailing questions to me.

    Please do not e-mail me with grading questions. If you want me to explain why I took points off, you can talk to me after class or during office hours. If you want a regrade, please write an explanation and hand the assignment and the explanation to me during office hours or after class.

    Occasionally I may need to broadcast a message to entire class. I will do so over the newsgroup for the class.


    Textbooks and Papers Information

    There are is no required books for this class. A recommended book is

  • Stuart Russell and Peter Norvig, Artificial Intelligence, a Modern Approach, Prentice Hall, 2nd ed., 2003.

    • Other reading materials will be distributed in class or linked from the syllabus.

    Comments to Eyal Amir