Formatting

Homework Formatting & Submission Guidelines

Formatting Guidelines

Homework submissions must be prepared using a word processor, editor, or other software that can produce typeset results, including math. Hand-written solutions are not acceptable, and a penalty will be assessed for homeworks that are hand-written. Please do not use plain text with "ASCII math" (i.e. simulated displayed formulas produced using creative spacing and underline/dash characters) or "ASCII art" in place of figures. The preferred file format for uploading your submission is pdf, preferably generated with LaTeX, though doc and docx will also be accepted if you truly insist on using those.

We strongly recommend using LaTeX to prepare your solutions (here is a link to a good tutorial from Overleaf), as it is the de facto standard method for typesetting published work in computer science, and it is especially well-suited to typesetting mathematics. Other tools, such as Word and compatible WYSIWYG word processors, can also be used (for more information, see these composing tips put together by Prof. Jeremy Buhler for his CSE 584A class).

Your homework document must have a header, which must appear at the top of each of its pages, that must include your full name and preferably also your 6-digit student ID (not your WUSTL Key ID) and the Homework number. Page numbers at the bottom of each page are recommended.

Your homework should use a page size of 8.5x11 inches ("letter" size). Most text should be in a proportionally-spaced font with a size of at least 11 points. (However, you might find that a fixed-width font such as Courier is better for writing pseudocode with consistent indenting.) You should use black text on a white background everywhere except possibly in figures. Your figures may be in color if desired, but some people are colorblind, so choose your palette appropriately.

Figures may be drawn using the tool of your choice, or even hand-drawn and scanned as images, so long as they are legible in your final submission. Vector graphics (i.e. those stored as a set of shapes and lines) are preferred to bitmapped images such as GIF, PNG, or JPEG, but either is acceptable. Place your figures, scaled appropriately, inline at the point where they are first referenced in your document, or use your editor's "float" facility (if any) to have them appear at the top or bottom of a page with suitable captions and corresponding references in the text. Please do not just put all figures at the end of the document.

Assignment Templates

To help you follow these formatting standards, you can use as a starting point for your document this LaTeX template or, if you have to, this MS Word template (the latter can be converted by other editors, such as LibreOffice or Google Docs, to their native formats).

Submission Guidelines

A few basic pre-requisites to start with:

1. You must upload homeworks to Canvas yourself. Do not email them!
2. Make sure you turn your homework by its deadlines. If you turn it in after its assigned due date and time, Canvas will mark it late. Please check the Late and Make-Up Policies for more information on how late submissions are handled.
3. You may submit modified versions of a homework assignment as often as desired, but only the last version submitted will be graded. Versions other than the last will not be visible to the TAs or instructor. If your last version is submitted after the turn-in deadline, it will be considered late.

Submission Procedure

Here is a summary of the key steps in the submission process, which you must complete once for each problem on the homework.

• Step 1: Save the PDF file of your homework in its final form.

You should be able to do this directly from within your word processor or editor or by running the appropriate command to build your LaTeX document. You can name your document whatever you want, but I recommend that you limit the characters in your names (other than the file extension) to English letters, numbers, spaces, dashes, and underscores to avoid triggering unexpected bugs in Gradescope.

• Step 2: Go to the submission page.

Log into the course Canvas page and go to the "Assignments" tab and click on the Homework you want to submit.

• Step 3: Upload your document.

Click the "Start Assignment" button. This should open Select "File Upload" tab with a "Browse" button that you can click to select the PDF file to upload.

• Step 4: Submit your assignment.

Click the "Submit Assignment" button to formally submit your homework. The turn-in time for your assignment is the time at which the "Submit" operation completes.

• Step 5: Verify your submission.

As a sanity check, view or download the PDF linked at the right side of the post-submission page to make sure it is the correct one. If it is not, simply resubmit the correct document.

Note: You can always turn in a new version of your assignment, click the "New Attempt" button that should have replaced the "Start Assignment" button. This takes you back to Step 3. Turning in a new version will change the turn-in time of your assignment.