Getting/Giving Help with CS1121 Homework Programs

Suppose you are having trouble writing a homework program, or getting it to work once you've written it. Here's what you CAN do:

• Seek help from your instructor during his office hours, or make an appointment.
• Seek help from your lab TA during your lab period or during the TA's office hours.
• Seek help from any lab TA during his/her office hours - see the staff web page for their hours.
• Seek help from your lab assistant during your lab period.
• Seek help from a coach in the Computer Science Learning Center (CSLC). Click here for the CSLC hours.
• Ask other students, or anyone else, for that matter, about a general Java concept.
• Work on the assignment with another current CS1121 student WHEN THE ASSIGNMENT SPECIFICALLY ALLOWS IT.

Here's what you CANNOT do:

• Ask anyone else for help. This includes other students in the class, other MTU students not taking the class (e.g., advanced CS majors), or anyone else not connected with MTU.
• Get someone else to write your program (whether you pay them or not).
• Look at anyone else's solution (with or without their permission).

If someone in CS1121 asks you for help with their program, and they are not your partner (when allowed on an assignment), then your answer should be NO. If you help them, you will be just as guilty as they are of cheating and will receive the same penalty. Things you cannot do includes, but is not limited to:

• Helping them get started.
• Helping them with any small part of the code.
• Helping them fix a compiler error.
• Helping them fix a run-time error.
• Helping make their program work.
• Showing them any of your code.
• Looking at any of their code.
• Explaining how you did anything in your solution.

What you can do is:

• Explain the meaning, in general, of a Java error message.
• Explain a Java concept, in general, but not in the context of the current assignment. For example, you can explain in general what a constructor does and why one is used, but you cannot say how to write a constructor for the current assignment.
• Give them general UNIX, editor, etc. help.