MCS 425 Course Information and Syllabus
Spring Semester, 2005

Topic: Codes and Cryptography
Room: 118 DH (Douglass Hall)
Time: M W F at 10  (Jan 10 -- Apr 29, except Jan 17 and Mar 21--25)
Call number: 16592 (undergraduates)
19318 (graduates)
Credit hours: 3 (undergraduate) or 4 (graduate)
Instructor: Jeffrey S. Leon
Instructors office: 535 SEO
Office hours: M 1, W 11, F 12 in 535 SEO.  In addition, most days I can stay after class to answer questions.  Sometimes I will need to cancel or reschedule office hours due to meetings or other conflicts. 
Phone: (312) 996-3054  (office)
(847) 853-0429  (home)
E-mail: jleon@uic.edu
Home Page: The URL for the  MCS 425 home page  is http://www.uic.edu/~jleon/mcs425-s05
Much of the material at this sight requires the Adobe Acrobat Reader (version 5 or later).  
Prerequisite: The following courses with grade C or better:
   (i)   MCS 261 or CS 202.
   (ii)  MCS 310 or MCS 320 or MCS 330.

Some background in discrete mathematics, in linear algebra, and (to a lesser extent) in probability theory is needed.  

Add/drop deadline: Friday, Jan 21:  Last day to add courses, and to drop courses without receiving W grade. 
Friday, Feb 18:  Last day to drop courses (subject to restrictions) and receive grade of W.
Textbook: Wade Trappe and Lawrence C. Washington, Introduction to Cryptography with Coding Theory,  Prentice-Hall, 2002, ISBN 0-13-061814-4  (available at UIC Bookstore).
Grading policy: Based on total points, with some consideration of undergraduate/graduate status.  100 points are possible:
   Homework    10 points  
   Midterm #1:  20 points  
   Midterm #2:  20 points 
   Final:             40 points
   Best grade among above: 10 additional points

The "best grade" points will be max( homework, midterm1 / 2, midterm2 / 2, final / 4)

Midterm exams: Midterm #1:  Feb 16 (tentative date), regular room unless announced otherwise.
Midterm #2:  Mar 27 (tentative date), regular room unless announced otherwise. 
Final exam: Weds, May 4, 8:00--10:00,  room to be announced.  This date is fixed by the timetable and cannot be changed.  In case of a conflict, the course listed second in the timetable has precedence.
Homework exercises: A number of homework exercise sets will be assigned.  Unless announced otherwise, these should be written up neatly and turned in.  Some or all exercises will be graded.
Topics covered: Chapter and section numbers below refer to the textbook.  Not every section of the each chapter listed below will be covered. 
  Chap 1:  Overview of cryptography and its applications
  Chap 2:  Classical cryptosystems
  Chap 3:  Basic number theory
  Chap 4:  The data encryption standard
  Overview of chap 5 (as time permits)
  Chap 6:  The RSA algorithm
  Chap 7:  Discrete logarithms
  Chap 8:  Digital signatures
  Selected topics from Chapters 9-13 (as time permits)
  Chap 16: Error correcting codes