Java programming - solving problems with software

Java Programming: Solving
Problems with Software

About the Course
• Building upon Duke’s “Programming and the Web for Beginners” course, you will grow in your
ability to be a problem-solver and programmer by writing Java programs. We are excited that
you've chosen to learn Java with us! You will soon be able to solve problems that you find
interesting and useful by practicing a design process you will learn in this course.
• Java concepts presented in this course include basic control flow; object-oriented concepts
including classes and methods; custom, open-source classes; and a design-implement-debug
process that you can continue to leverage as you build your experience and knowledge of
programming principles.
• The custom, open-source classes will provide a consistent application programming interface
(API) so that you can write programs that access and transform images, websites, comma
separated value (CSV) files and other data files using simple and accessible coding idioms built on
the Java Iterable interface. You will learn to design, test, and debug programs and to find and read
Java documentation that can serve as the basis for continued study of Java and programming.

• After completing this course you will be able to:
• 1. Edit, compile, and run a Java program;
• 2. Use conditionals and for loops appropriately in a Java program;
• 3. Use Java API documentation in writing programs.
• 4. Debug a Java program using the scientific method;
• 5. Develop a Java method to solve a specific problem;
• 6. Develop a set of test cases as part of developing a program;
• 7. Create a class with multiple methods that work together to solve a
problem; and
• 8. Use divide-and-conquer design techniques for a program that uses more
than one method.

Welcome to the Course
• Welcome to “Java Programming: Solving Problems with Software”!
We are excited that you are starting our course to learn how to write
programs in Java, one of the most popular programming languages in
the world. In this introductory module, you will get to meet the
instructor team from Duke University, have an overview of the course,
and hear from Google engineers about why they find programming
exciting and why Java is important. Have fun!

Iterables in Java
• In this module, you will learn to design and run your first Java programs,
including one program that prints “Hello!” in various countries’ languages
and another where you will copy and edit many files by converting color
images to grayscale. To accomplish these tasks, you will learn about classes
constructed for this course: Iterables libraries that allow you to perform the
same task over multiple lines in a document or webpage or multiple files
within a directory. By the end of this module, you will be able to: (1)
Download and run BlueJ, the Java programming environment for this
course; (2) Access the documentation for the Java libraries specially
designed for this course; (3) Edit, compile, and run a Java program; (4)
Construct for loops in Java; and (5) Use Iterables to run a program that
iterates over multiples lines in a document or webpage or multiple files in a
directory.

Strings in Java
• This module begins with a short presentation from Raluca Gordân, an assistant
professor in Duke University’s Center for Genomic and Computational Biology,
about an important problem genomics scientists encounter regularly: how to
identify genes in a strand of DNA. To tackle this problem, you will need to
understand strings: series of characters such as letters, digits, punctuation, etc.
After learning about Java methods that work with strings, you will be able to find
genes within a DNA string as well as tackle other string related problems, such as
finding all of the links in a web page. By the end of this module, you will be able
to: (1) Use important methods for the Java String class; (2) Use conditionals, for
loops, and while loops appropriately in a Java program; (3) Find patterns in the
data represented by strings to help develop the algorithm for your program; (4)
Understand the importance of designing programs that keep different data
processing steps separate; (5) Use the StorageResource iterable for this course to
store some data for further processing; and (6) Rely on Java documentation to
better understand how to use different Java packages and classes.

CSV Files and Basic Statistics in Java
• A common format for storing tabular data (any data organized into
columns and rows) is in comma separated values (CSV) files. In this module,
you will learn how to analyze and manipulate data from multiple CSV data
files using a powerful open-source software package: Apache Commons
CSV. Using this library will empower you to solve problems that could prove
too complex to solve with a spreadsheet. By the end of this module, you
will be able to: (1) Use the open-source Apache Commons CSV package in
your own Java programs; (2) Access data from one or many CSV files using
Java; (3) Convert strings into numbers; (4) Understand how to use “null” in
Java programs (when you want to represent “nothing”); (5) Devise an
algorithm (and implement in Java) to answer questions about CSV data;
and (6) Analyze CSV data across multiple CSV files (for example, find
maximums, minimums, averages, and other simple statistical results).

MiniProject: Baby Names
• This module wraps up the course with a mini project that ties
together the different practices, skills, and libraries you have gained
across the course! Using data on the popularity of different baby
names in the United States from the past several decades, you will be
able to compare different names’ popularity over time. While the
data we have collected for this course is from the United States, we
welcome you to share data from other countries in the course
discussion forums. Good luck with the mini project!

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