The main objective of lectures is to cover the required theoretical content of the course, illustrated by as many examples as possible. Lecture attendance is highly recommended in general, and mandatory for the guest lecture. The essential aspects, in the eyes of the head teacher, will be pointed out. Common misunderstandings will be discussed. The slides are not self-contained at all: they are only a support for the lectures, but not equivalent to their much more detailed content, so you ought to take notes. If you miss a lecture or take no notes, then read the CLRS4 textbook instead or find other sources, such as the recommended extra material mentioned below or among the Resources. The lecture topics are orthogonal and could be taught in any order: the topics requiring more than one lecture (NP-Completeness, Approximation Algorithms) have sufficiently spaced lectures for revision, and the exam topics are taught as early as possible towards maximising the time available for exam preparation.
Revised slides may be uploaded any time, with an announcement at Studium.
| Topic | Slides | Extra Material (if you want to know more) | CLRS4 Textbook | Lecturer |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mon 20 Jan 2025: Introduction & Course Logistics | 00-Introduction.pdf (whiteboard notes) | Chapters 1-4, 14, 15, 20-24, 34 | Pierre Flener | |
| Tue 21 Jan 2025: Mixed Integer Programming (MIP) | MIP.pdf |
book; Coursera course |
n/a | Di Yuan |
| Thu 23 Jan 2025: Stochastic Local Search (SLS) |
SLS.pdf; RealityQuiz.pdf |
book; Coursera course |
n/a | Pierre Flener |
| Tue 28 Jan 2025: Amortised Analysis | slides numbered 8-52 of
Amortised.pdf
(whiteboard notes); DynamicTable-Demo.pdf |
Chapter 16 | Pierre Flener | |
| Thu 30 Jan 2025: Probabilistic Analysis, Randomised Algorithms, Universal Hashing | slides 1-2, 17-22, 32-43 of
Randomised1.pdf
(whiteboard notes); Randomised2.pdf |
Chapter 5, Section 11.3.4, Appendices C.2-C.4 | Pierre Flener | |
| Tue 4 Feb 2025 & Mon 17 Feb 2025: NP-Completeness |
slides numbered 1-18, 24-38, 46, 69-78 of
NPCompleteness1.pdf
(whiteboard notes); NPCompleteness2.pdf |
Chapter 34 | Pierre Flener | |
| Mon 10 Feb 2025: Propositional Satisfiability (SAT) |
flipped classroom from 10:15 to max 12:00: watch the
following videos in advance and join the lecture for only Q&A: SAT1.pdf (SAT1.mp4); SAT2.pdf (SAT2.mp4); SAT3.pdf (SAT3.mp4); SAT4.pdf (SAT4.mp4); SAT5.pdf (SAT5.mp4) (these slides include slides 1-29 of SAT-intro.pdf and slides 1-4 of SAT-CDCL.pdf) |
article; book, especially Section 2.2.2; another tutorial (PDF, video) |
n/a | Tjark Weber |
| Tue 11 Feb 2025: SAT Modulo Theories (SMT) |
SMT1.pdf;
slides 1-2, 8-14, 19-43, 50, 53-70, 75-82 of SMT2.pdf |
article; book |
n/a | Philipp Rümmer of Universität Regensburg, Germany |
| Wed 19 Feb 2025 at 10:15 & Tue 25 Feb 2025: Approximation Algorithms |
slides 1-15, 31-41 of Approximation.pdf
(whiteboard notes 1)
(whiteboard notes 2); ListScheduling-Demo.pdf; slides 23-31 of Randomised1.pdf |
Chapter 35 | Pierre Flener | |
| Wed 19 Feb 2025 at 11:15: mandatory guest
lecture from industry
(normal lecture from 10:15 to 11:00) |
Applying Mathematical Optimisation to Trading (slides) | n/a | Arne Andersson of Trade Extensions (now part of Coupa Software) | |
| Thu 6 Mar 2025: Conclusion & Solution Session 2 | n/a | Pierre Flener |
A missed guest lecture (in case of no force majeure) can be compensated for by a summary of a research paper chosen by the head teacher.
Given the availability of excellent lecture material for the standard CLRS4-based material of this course, there is no point and no resource for the head teacher to design his own slides. Many of the slides above are by Prof. Kevin Wayne (Princeton University, NJ, USA): they are based on the sometimes different examples and explanations of the reference book below, offering thus a complementary pedagogical angle to the one of CLRS4, and are often modified by him upon our suggestions.
The following textbook, available free-of-charge (courtesy the Swedish taxpayer!) as an e-book at the UU library, is referred to as CLRS4 on this website:
There are on-line resources, including solutions to a select set of exercises and problems.
The third edition (errata) or second edition (errata) can also be used, but note that the reading guidelines on this website refer to the fourth edition.
The following book, underlying many of the slides, can also be used but does not cover Chapter 16 of CLRS4:
