Assignment 1

• Computational thinking — a new beginning
• Due Friday January 20, 2012 by 1 PM.
• Late assignments are not accepted.

Exercising your problem solving muscles

A model train is set up on a circular track. There are six telephone poles evenly spaced around the track. The train takes ten seconds to go from the first pole to the third pole. How long does it take to go all the away around? Why? [Based on an exercise from Crossing the river with dogs]

Formulization

Suppose your home has a dripping faucet. Provide an algorithm for determining the number of gallons of water wasted per year for that faucet. You can assume there are 15140 drips per gallon [source US Geological Service website]. Also assume there are 365 days in a year.