computer science

Probability: Finding The Expectation and Variance of Runs

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Last week, I completed a summer course at Stanford: CS109, Probability for Computer Scientists. This 8-week long class was intense and challenging but one of the most rewarding classes I've taken at Stanford so far. A few weeks ago, I had an idea for a homework problem but I couldn't quite figure out how to implement the idea. The problem is the following: Below are two sequences of 300 “coin flips” (H for heads, T for tails). One of these is a true sequence of 300 independent flips of a fair coin. The other was generated by a person typing out H’s and T’s and trying to seem random. Which sequence is the true sequence of coin flips? Make an argument that is justified with probabilities calculated on the sequences. Both sequences have 148 heads, two less than the expected number for a 0.5 probability of heads. Continue reading →

Introduction to Game Theory: An Analysis of My iPhone Game

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Enter MentalBlocker: my first game app and second iPhone app to be published on the App Store (my first is YumTum, a recipe manager). It was a game concept that I came up with two years ago, but this summer, I finally felt equipped with the right tools and knowledge to design and develop the game. The motivation behind the game is simple: to create a game that challenges a player's memory and problem-solving skills. The game has four modes, all of which have two things in common: a grid of tiles and blocks. Continue reading →