Description
Question 1 (10 points):
Purpose: Completing a test script for an ADT.
Degree of Diculty: Easy.
On the course Moodle, you’ll nd:
• The le Statistics.py, which is an ADT covered in class and in the readings. For your convenience, we
removed some of the calculations and operations (e.g., var() and sampvar(), that were not relevant
to this exercise, which would have made testing too onerous.
• The le test_statistics.py, which is a test-script for the Statistics ADT. This test script currently
only implements a few basic tests.
In this question you will complete the given test script. Study the test script, observing that each operation
gets tested, and sometimes the tests look into the ADT’s data structure, and sometimes, the operations are
used to help set up tests. You’ll notice that there is exactly one test for each operation, which is inadequate.
Design new test cases for the operations, considering:
• Black-box test cases.
• White-box test cases.
• Boundary test cases, and test case equivalence classes.
• Test coverage (percentage of functions tested)
• Unit vs. integration testing.
Running your test script on the given ADT should report no errors, and should display nothing except the
message ’*** Test script completed ***’.
What to Hand In
• A Python script named a3q1_testing.py containing your test script.
Be sure to include your name, NSID, student number, course number and laboratory section at the top of
all documents.
Evaluation
• 5 marks: Your test cases for Statistics.add() have good coverage.
• 5 marks: Your test cases for Statistics.mean() have good coverage.
Page 2
Department of Computer Science
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CMPT 145
Principles of Computer Science
Addendum on oating point computations
Floating point values use a nite number of binary digits (“bits”). For example, in Python, oating point
numbers use 64 bits in total. Values that require fewer than 64 bits to represent are represented exactly.
Values that require more than 64 bits to represent are limited to 64 bits exactly, but truncating the least
signicant bits (the very far right).
You are familiar with numbers with innitely many decimal digits: π, for example, is often cut o at 3.14 when
calculating by hand. Inside a modern computer, π is limited to about 15 decimal digits, which ts nicely in
64 bits. Because long fractions are truncated, many calculations inside the computer are performed with
numbers that have been truncated, leading to an accumulation of small errors with every operation.
Another value with an innite decimal fraction is the value 1/3. But because a computer uses binary numbers, some values we think of naturally as “nite” are actually innite. For example, 1/10 has a nite decimal
representation (0.1) but an innite binary representation.
The errors that come from use of oating point are unavoidable; these errors are inherent in the accepted
standard methods for storing data in computers. This is not weakness of Python; the same errors are
inherent in all modern computers, and all programming languages.
We have to learn the dierence between equal, and close enough, when dealing with oating point numbers.
• A oating point literal is always equal to itself. In other words, there is no randomness in truncating a
long fraction; the following script will display Equal on the console.
✞ ☎
if 0.1 == 0.1:
print (’Equal ’)
else :
print (’Not equal ’)
✝ ✆
• An arithmetic expression involving oating point numbers is equal to itself. In other words, there is no
randomness in errors resulting from arithmetic operations; the following script will display Equal on
the console.
✞ ☎
if 0.1 + 0.2 + 0.3 == 0.1 + 0.2 + 0.3:
print (’Equal ’)
else :
print (’Not equal ’)
✝ ✆
• If two expressions involving oating point arithmetic are dierent, the results may not be equal, even if,
in principle, they should be equal. In other words, errors resulting from oating point arithmetic accumulate dierently in dierent expressions. The following script will display Not equal on the console.
✞ ☎
if 0.1 + 0.1 + 0.1 == 0.3:
print (’Equal ’)
else :
print (’Not equal ’)
✝ ✆
As a result of the error that accumulates in oating point arithmetic, we have to expect a tiny amount
of error in every calculation involving oating point data. We should almost never ask if two oating point
numbers are equal. Instead we should ask if two oating point numbers are close enough to be considered
equal, for the purposes at hand.
Page 3
Department of Computer Science
176 Thorvaldson Building
110 Science Place, Saskatoon, SK, S7N 5C9, Canada
Telephine: (306) 966-4886, Facimile: (306) 966-4884
CMPT 145
Principles of Computer Science
The easiest way to say close enough is to compare oating point values by looking at the absolute value
of their dierence:
✞ ☎
# set up a known error
calculated = 0.1 + 0.1 + 0.1
expected = 0.3
# now check for exactly equal
if calculated == expected :
print (’Exactly equal ’)
else :
print (’Not exactly equal ’)
# now compare absolute difference to a pretty small number
if abs( calculated – expected ) < 0.000001:
print (’Close enough ’)
else :
print (’Not close enough ’)
✝ ✆
The Python function abs() takes a numeric value, and returns the value’s absolute value. The absolute
value of a dierence tells us how dierent two values are without caring which one is bigger. If the absolute
dierence is less than a well-chosen small number (here we used 0.000001), then we can say it’s close
enough.
In your test script for this question, you can check if the ADT calculates the right answer by checking if its
answer is close enough to the expected value. If it’s not, there’s a problem!
Page 4
Department of Computer Science
176 Thorvaldson Building
110 Science Place, Saskatoon, SK, S7N 5C9, Canada
Telephine: (306) 966-4886, Facimile: (306) 966-4884
CMPT 145
Principles of Computer Science
Question 2 (10 points):
Purpose: Adding operations to an existing ADT; completing a test script
Degree of Diculty: Easy.
On the course Moodle, you’ll nd:
• The le Statistics.py, which is an ADT covered in class and in the readings. For your convenience, we
removed some of the calculations and operations (e.g., var() and sampvar(), that were not relevant
to this exercise, which would have made testing too onerous.
In this question you will dene three new operations for the ADT:
• count(stat) Returns the number of data values that the Statistics record stat has already recorded.
• maximum(stat) Returns the maximum value ever recorded by the Statistics record stat. If no data was
seen, returns None.
• minimum(stat) Returns the minimum value ever recorded by the Statistics record stat. If no data was
seen, returns None.
Hint: To accomplish this task, you may have to modify other operations of the Statistics ADT.
You will also improve the test script from Q1 to test the new version of the ADT, and ensures that all operations are correct. Remember: you have to test all operations because you don’t want to introduce errors
to other operations by accident; the only way to know is to test all the operations, even the ones you didn’t
change. To make the marker’s job easier, label your new test cases and scripts so that they are easy to nd.
What to Hand In
• A text le named a3q2_changes.txt (other acceptable formats) describes changes you made to the
existing ADT operations. Be brief!
• A Python program named a3q2.py containing the ADT operations (new and modied), but no other
code.
• A Python script named a3q2_testing.py containing your test script.
Be sure to include your name, NSID, student number, course number and laboratory section at the top of
all documents.
Evaluation
• 1 mark: Your added operation count(stat) is correct.
• 1 mark: Your added operation maximum(stat) correct.
• 1 mark: Your added operation minimum(stat) correct.
• 3 marks: Your modications to other operations are correct.
• 4 marks: Your test script has good coverage for the new operations.
Page 5
Department of Computer Science
176 Thorvaldson Building
110 Science Place, Saskatoon, SK, S7N 5C9, Canada
Telephine: (306) 966-4886, Facimile: (306) 966-4884
CMPT 145
Principles of Computer Science
Question 3 (28 points):
Purpose: To implement an ADT from a requirements specication.
Degree of Diculty: Moderate. Time is the main factor here.
Bioinformatics is an area of computer science that uses computation to help solve biological problems. Biological data is often represented as simple strings. For instance, an organism’s DNA (genetic information)
is typically represented as a string (often called a sequence) comprised of the characters ’A’, ’T’, ’G’ and ’C’.
You are required to design and implement an ADT named Experiment. This data structure will store a
collection of DNA sequences (strings) and be used to carry out some common bioinformatics operations.
Multiple sequences will be read in from a le and stored in a list. The le seqeunces1.txt is provided as a
small example input le. If you open this le in a text editor the contents should look something like this:
✞ ☎
> gene1
ATGATGATGGCG
> gene2
GGCATATC
CGGATACC
> gene3
TAGCTAGCCCGC
✝ ✆
This le is very similar to the type of output generated by many biological experiments. While knowledge
of the underlying biology is not important for this question, there are a few characteristics of this le to
note. First, individual sequences are separated by “header lines” within the le. Header lines will always
begin with a ’>’ character followed by some descriptor. Second, an individual sequence can span more
than one line and the number of lines does not have to be consistent throughout the le. For example in
sequences1.txt, the sequence corresponding to gene2 spans two lines, while the sequences for gene1
and gene3 are on a single line. This will be an important consideration for you create() operation!
The Experiment ADT has the following 7 operations:
• Experiment.create(filename) Creates and returns a data structure to store the experimental data;
here, we’ll store the strings in a list. Each element of the list represents a DNA sequence found in
the le with the given filename. This operation should also ensure only the allowed characters are
present in the DNA sequence. If there are other characters in any of the strings, do not include that
string in the list. For example:
✞ ☎
sequences = Experiment . create (’sequences1 . txt ’)
✝ ✆
• Experiment.display(sequences) Returns a string representing the data stored within the Experiment.
The format of the string should be similar to the input le (see below). For this assignment, the descriptor in each header line does NOT have to match the original descriptor from the input le. Instead
you can use sequential numerical labels that correspond to the data’s position in the list. For example:
✞ ☎
sequences = Experiment . create (’sequences1 . txt ’)
print ( Experiment . display ( sequences ))
# >1
# ATGATGATGGCG
# >2
# GGCATATCCGGATACC
# >3
# TAGCTAGCCCGC
✝ ✆
• Experiment.numSequences(sequences) Returns the number of sequences stored in the Experiment
ADT. For example:
Page 6
Department of Computer Science
176 Thorvaldson Building
110 Science Place, Saskatoon, SK, S7N 5C9, Canada
Telephine: (306) 966-4886, Facimile: (306) 966-4884
CMPT 145
Principles of Computer Science
✞ ☎
sequences = Experiment . create (’sequences1 . txt ’)
print ( Experiment . numSequences ( sequences ))
# 3
✝ ✆
• Experiment.averageLength(sequences) Returns the average length of the sequences stored in the
Experiment ADT (as an integer). For example:
✞ ☎
sequences = Experiment . create (’sequences1 . txt ’)
print ( Experiment . averageLength ( sequences ))
# 13
✝ ✆
• Experiment.lengthDistribution(sequences) Returns a dictionary that where the key-value pairs correspond to unique sequence lengths (the keys) and integer counts of the number of sequences with
that length (the values), respectively. For example, in one of the les there are 2 sequences of length
12, and one sequence of length 16:
✞ ☎
sequences = Experiment . create (’sequences1 . txt ’)
print ( Experiment . lengthDistribution ( sequences ))
# {12: 2 , 16: 1}
✝ ✆
• Experiment.averageGCcontent(sequences) Calculates and returns the average GC content of the of
the sequences stored in the Experiment ADT (as a percentage). GC content is simply a count of the
’G’ and ’C’ characters present in sequence. For example:
✞ ☎
sequences = Experiment . create (’sequences1 . txt ’)
print (’%.2 f’ % Experiment . averageGCcontent ( sequences ))
# 57.64
✝ ✆
• Experiment.removeLowQuality(sequences, minCutoff, maxCutoff) Removes sequences stored in
the Experiment ADT that have a GC content below minCutoff or above maxCutoff. This operation
does NOT return anything. For example:
✞ ☎
sequences = Experiment . create (’sequences1 . txt ’)
Experiment . removeLowQuality ( sequences , 55 , 65)
print ( Experiment . display ( sequences ))
# >1
# GGCATATCCGGATACC
✝ ✆
Testing
Write a test script that tests your implementation of the ADT, and ensures that all operations are correct.
Think about the same kinds of issues:
• Black-box test cases.
• White-box test cases.
• Boundary test cases, and test case equivalence classes.
• Test coverage (percentage of functions tested)
• Unit vs. integration testing.
Running your test script on your correct ADT should report no errors, and should display nothing except
the message ’*** Test script completed ***’.
Page 7
Department of Computer Science
176 Thorvaldson Building
110 Science Place, Saskatoon, SK, S7N 5C9, Canada
Telephine: (306) 966-4886, Facimile: (306) 966-4884
Principles of Computer Science
What to Hand In
• A Python program named a3q3.py containing the ADT operations (new and modied), but no other
code.
• A Python script named a3q3_testing.py containing your test script.
Evaluation
• 2 marks: Your operation create(filename) is correct.
• 2 marks: Your operation display(sequences) is correct.
• 2 marks: Your operation numSequences(sequences) is correct.
• 2 marks: Your operation averageLength(sequences) is correct.
• 2 marks: Your operation lengthDistribution(sequences) is correct.
• 2 marks: Your operation averageGCcontent(sequences) is correct.
• 2 marks: Your operation removeLowQuality(sequences, minCutoff, maxCutoff) is correct.
• 14 marks: Your test script checks that the operations work correctly.
Page 8
Department of Computer Science
176 Thorvaldson Building
110 Science Place, Saskatoon, SK, S7N 5C9, Canada
Telephine: (306) 966-4886, Facimile: (306) 966-4884
CMPT 145
Principles of Computer Science
Question 4 (10 points):
Purpose: To practice using an ADT you built yourself in a relatively simple application.
Degree of Diculty: Easy
We are now going to use your Experiment ADT to display information for a given sequencing le. Write a
Python program that creates a new Experiment ADT and displays the following information:
• The number of valid sequences
• The average GC content
• The Average Sequence Length
• The Sequence Length Distribution
It should then use the removeLowQuality(sequences, minCutoff, maxCutoff) operation and then display
all of the information above again. An example of the expected output when you run your program with the
small example sequence le (sequences1.txt), a minCuto of 55 and a maxCuto of 65 is provided below.
Note the filename, minCutoff value and maxCutoff value should be stored as variable at the beginning of
your program.
DO QUESTION 3 FIRST! You are expected to import your previous question’s Experiment ADT le as a
module for use in this question. If your Experiment ADT works (which it should. You tested it, right?) this
question is very easy.
✞ ☎
# Initial Statistics ————————
# Number of Sequences : 3
# Average GC content : 57.64 %
# Average Sequence Length : 13
# Sequence Length Distribution :
# Length : Number of Sequences
# 12: 2
# 16: 1
#
# Removing Sequences with GC content below 55 or above 65
# Updated Statistics ———————-
# Number of Sequences : 1
# Average GC content : 56.25 %
# Average Sequence Length : 16
# Sequence Length Distribution :
# Length : Number of Sequences
# 16: 1
✝ ✆
Demonstrate your program on the sequence le sequences2.txt three times with dierent values for
minCutoff and maxCutoff each time. Copy/paste the command-line output, as in the above example into
your demo le. Consider this a demonstration, not testing. Because this application is pretty simple, and
because you tested your Experiment ADT very thoroughly, you only need to run 3 demonstrations of your
program working.
What to Hand In
• Hand in a well-written, suitably documented program named a3q4.py.
• Submit your demonstrations in a le named a3q4-demo.txt (PDF, TXT, RTF are all ne).
Be sure to include your name, NSID, student number, course number and laboratory section at the top of
all documents.
Page 9
Department of Computer Science
176 Thorvaldson Building
110 Science Place, Saskatoon, SK, S7N 5C9, Canada
Telephine: (306) 966-4886, Facimile: (306) 966-4884
CMPT 145
Principles of Computer Science
Evaluation
• 5 marks: Your program makes appropriate use of the Experiment ADT, and is otherwise correct.
• 5 marks: Your demonstration shows your program working. If we run your program on the command
line, we’ll see the same results.
Source of Data
The data provided in sequences2.txt is a subset of a real sequencing data from the following paper: Zoe E
Gillespie, Kimberly MacKay, Michelle Sander, Brett Trost, Wojciech Dawicki, Aruna Wickramarathna, John
Gordon, Mark Eramian, Ian R Kill, Joanna M Bridger, Anthony Kusalik, Jennifer A Mitchell & Christopher H Eskiw (2015) Rapamycin reduces broblast proliferation without causing quiescence and induces STAT5A/Bmediated cytokine production, Nucleus, 6:6, 490-506, DOI: 10.1080/19491034.2015.1128610.
The authors have made this data publicly available at Gene Expression Omnibus; accession number GSE65145.
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