The Nifty Assignments session at the annual SIGCSE meeting is all about gathering and distributing great assignment ideas and their materials. For each assignment, the web pages linked below describe the assignment and provides materials — handouts, starter code, and so on.
Applying for Nifty is now done as its own track with a similar deadline to special sessions. The format and content of the .zip you submit is unchanged. See the info page for ideas about what makes a nifty assignment and how to apply for the Nifty session.
Please email any suggestions or comments to the nifty-admin email: nifty-admin@cs.stanford.edu
| Nifty Assignments 2024 | |
| Election Simulator - Aleksandr Popov | Election Simulator |
| Scurry of Squirrels - Rachel Frisbie, Devin Silvia, Marcos Caballero, Rachel Roca, Amanda Bowerman, Krithi Sachithanand | Squirrels in Central Park - Jupyter Notebooks |
| Infinity War - Yashas Ravi, Ana Paula Centeno | Infinity War |
| Virtual Cities - Christopher Tralie | Virtual Cities |
| Alphabear Solver - Ryan Dougherty | Alpha Bear, First Among Bears |
| Fingerprint - Christian Servin, Ivan Alonso, Emiliano Garcia | Fingerprint |
| Nifty Assignments 2023 | |
| Rising Tides - Keith Schwarz | CS2 - Recursive flood fill with real-world climate data. |
| Enigma Machine - Eric Roberts and Jed Rembold | CS1 - Bring the Engima machine algorithm to life beautifully — code + CS History |
| Fatal Police Shootings - Melissa Lynn | CS1 - Data science with Washington Post police-shooting dataset - code work with social impact. |
| Nifty Illusions - Faan Tone Liu | CS1 - optical illusions make great little draw code exercises. |
| Hex Game - Andrew Godbout | CS2 - Neat game algorithm fueled by graph algorithm, shows game/testing strategy |
| Musical Dice Game - Kevin Wayne | CS1 - Mozart as an algorithm - a logical combination of a few steps and patterns and you won't believe how great it sounds. |
| Nifty Assignments 2022 | |
| Spelling Bee + Wordle - Eric Roberts, Jed Rembold | CS1 Fantastic string-logic, now with Wordle |
| Food Web Zombies - Ben Stephenson and Jonathan Hudson | CS1 Fun Graph Logic |
| Handwriting Recognizer - Stephanie Valentine | CS1 Graphical handwriting recognition with templates |
| Bias Bars - Nick Bowman, Katie Creel, Juliette Woodrow | CS1 Exploring bias in data, bringing ethics discussion into code |
| Reddit Bot - Mike Izbicki | CS1-2 Code to interact with reddit threads |
| Ray Marching - Joshua Crotts, Andrew Matzureff | CS1-2 Neat computational geometry |
| Nifty Assignments 2021 | |
| Sankey Diagrams - Ben Stephenson | CS1 Sankey diagram - neat data visualization algorithm |
| Rocket Landing Simulator - Adrian A. de Freitas and Troy Weingart | CS1 Rocket Landing Simulator - fun algorithm |
| Covid Simulator - Steve Bitner | CS1-CS2 Covid 2D infection simulator - timely if scary |
| Linked List Labyrinth - Keith Schwarz | CS2 Neat memory / debugger skill exercise, custom per student |
| Nifty Assignments 2020
Thanks to our presenters for getting everything together including videos for this COVID-interrupted year. | |
| Typing Test - John DeNero et al | CS1 Fill in algorithm of fun typing-speed test. (Video) (intentionally silent) |
| Color My World - Carl Albing | CS1 or later: Students are given a data file, but no description about what it represents. Can they solve the mystery by generating a reasonable image? |
| Bar Chart Racer - Kevin Wayne | CS1 - use real data to make a animated bar chart - captivating! (Video) |
| DNA - Brian Yu, David J. Malan | CS1 or CS2 Neat DNA project. (Video) |
| Recursion to the Rescue - Keith Schwarz | Nifty recursion projects using tied to real-world applications. (Video) |
| Decision Makers - Evan Peck | Two hour exercise illuminating algorithms and life |
| Nifty Assignments 2019 | |
| Nifty Post It - Jeffrey L. Popyack | CS0-CS1 Hands On Manipulative |
| Hawaiin Phonetic Generator - Kendall Bingham | CS1 Fun Text |
| Motion Parallax - Ben Dicken | CS1 Awesome Graphic Experience |
| Gerrymandering - Allison Obourn | CS1-CS2 Election Data Analysis and Visualization |
| Code Crusher - Ben Stephenson | CS1-CS2 Great Popular Game + Code |
| Blocky - Diane Horton and David Liu | CS2 Recursion Tree Fabulous |
| Nifty Assignments 2018 | |
| Hurricane Tracker - Phil Ventura | CS0/CS1 Art of Wind |
| Mondrian Art - Ben Stephenson | CS1 Beautiful Recursion |
| Pong AI Tournament - Michael Guerzhoy | CS1 Build Pong AI |
| Wiki Racer - Ali Malik | CS2 Wiki Graph Race |
| Nifty Remixes - David Reed | CS1/CS2 High Level Nifty |
| Bear Maps - Josh Hug | (CS2) Bear Maps |
| Nifty Assignments 2017 | |
| Falling Sand - Dave Feinberg | CS1 Very engaging falling simulation |
| 2048 in Python - Kunal Mishra | CS1 The fantastic 2048 game works great as a CS assignment |
| Fractal Sound - Josh Hug | CS1 Amazing sound generation and visualization |
| SAT Synonyms - Michael Guerzhoy | CS1-CS2 Fun big data application to the familiar SAT word problems |
| NBody Simulation - Kevin Wayne | CS2 Captivating gravity simulation. Gravity .. it's everywhere! |
| Nifty Assignments 2016 | |
| Mountain Paths -- Baker Franke | CS1 Neat simple algorithm in 2D arrays |
| Restaurant Recommendations Yelp Maps -- Brian Hou, Marvin Zhang, and John DeNero | CS1 Nifty data visualization of restaurant data |
| Rack-O Game -- Arvind Bhusnurmath, Kristen Gee, and Karen Her | CS1 Play and AI code for an easy game |
| Movie Review Sentiment -- Eric Manley and Timothy Urness | CS1/CS2 Neat word analysis from a surprisingly simple algorithm |
| HugLife -- Josh Hug | CS1/CS2 Grid simulation game that shows off testing |
| Autocomplete-me -- Kevin Wayne | CS2 Neat applied use of word storage and binary search |
| Nifty Assignments 2015 | |
| Counting Squares -- Mark Sherriff, Luther Tychonievich, and Ryan Layer | CS0/CS1 Neat and easy squares activity |
| Speed Reader -- Peter-Michael Osera | CS1 Nifty Animation |
| GeoLocator -- Stuart Reges | CS1 Fun Geo Data |
| Packet Sniffing -- Suzanne Matthews and David Raymond | CS1 Eye Opening Networking |
| Melody Maker -- Allison Obourn and Marty Stepp | CS1 Fun with Sound |
| Seam Carving -- Josh Hug | CS1/CS2 Amazing Image Resize Trick |
| Nifty Assignments 2014 | |
| Analyzing Google Books Dataset -- Josh Hug | CS1 Amazing Language Data in CS1 |
| Game Of Sticks -- Antti Laaksonen and Arto Vihavainen | CS1 Neat Game "AI" from shockingly simple trick |
| Purple America -- Kevin Wayne | CS1 Big Map Data |
| Ants vs. SomeBees -- John DeNero, Tom Magrino, and Eric Tzeng | CS1 Riff Plants vs. Zombies |
| Segregation Simulation -- Frank McCown | CS1 Neat Real-World 2-d Modeling |
| Image Stacker and The Pesky Tourist -- John Nicholson | CS2 Two very neat 2-d image manipulations |
| Nifty Assignments 2013 | |
| Twitter Trends -- John DeNero and Aditi Muralidharan | CS0-CS1 Neat output with a hip big-data source |
| Collage -- Mark Guzdial | CS0 Novel media output by combining images |
| Authorship Detection -- Michelle Craig | CS1 Surprisingly effective data driven categorization with basic coding |
| Recursive TurtleGraphics -- Eric Roberts | CS1 Get at the essential recursive idea very easily |
| Campus Shuttle -- David Malan | CS1 Stunning graphical tour |
| Estimating Avogadro's Number -- Kevin Wayne | CS1/CS2 Surprisingly easy image processing of lab data to get a real-world result |
| Nifty Assignments 2012 | |
| Stereo Sound Processing -- Daniel Zingaro | CS1 (early) - Fun and impressive early in the quarter - remove vocals from sound |
| Guitar Heroine -- Kevin Wayne | CS1/CS2, Extremely neat -- math model creates realistic guitar sound |
| Uno -- Stephen Davies | CS1, Strategy AI to play Uno. |
| Image Editor -- Joshua T. Guerin and Debby Keen | CS1/CS2 Code to experiment with images, but requiring only the ability to change text files. |
| Igel Ärgern -- Zachary Kurmas | CS2 Hedgehogs in a Hurry game |
| Binary Bomb -- David O'Hallaron | Post CS2 -- neat assignment puzzle to play with understanding of compiled code and memory as they truly are. On the linked page, see the README, Writeup, Release Notes, Self-Study Handout which all work without a password. To play with the code, email Dave and he'll send you what you need to get the binaries. |
| Nifty Assignments 2011 | |
| Image Puzzles -- Nick Parlante | CS0 or later, great puzzles using images, tiny code required |
| BMP Puzzles -- David Malan | CS1, More and better image puzzles, looking at bytes of BMP file representation |
| Book Recommendations -- Michelle Craig | CS1, Like the Netflix movie-recommendation system, generate book recommendations. Surprisingly simple algorithms give a neat results. |
| Generic Scrolling Game -- Dave Feinberg | CS1, Project pattern which supports a variety of games. Easily allows students to customize rules, graphics etc. of simple game. |
| Wator World -- Mike Scott | CS1-CS2, Shark/fish simulation using GridWorld type abstraction. Neat simulation/modeling example working from simple rules. |
| Hamming Codes -- Stuart Hansen | CS2, Neat exercise with a real algorithm. Push the students to understand that it's really all bytes. |
| Evil Hangman -- Keith Schwarz | CS2 or late CS1 - Awesome variant of Hangman, where the computer cheats by dodging all the user's guesses |
| Nifty Assignments 2010 | |
| Picobot -- Zachary Dodds | CS0-CS1, day-1 assignment -- neat environment to get students started, works in the browser |
| Pig -- Todd Neller | CS1, intermediate difficulty game to implement, but students love it and lots of variations |
| Song Generator -- Daniel Zingaro | CS1, implement filters with short bits of code, but it all works in the domain of sound, making in a novel and engaging domain for the students |
| CSI: Computer Science Investigation -- David Malan | The instructor accidentally erases the compact flash card containing their images. Students write code to recover the images, solve the treasure hunt using the images |
| Encryption Chase -- Mark Sherriff | CS2, encryption coding, embedded in a team active-learning campus treasure hunt |
| Chatting Aimlessly (IM) -- Thomas Murtagh | CS1, implement simple instant messaging client in CS1 -- talk about a technology near to the student heart! |
| Nifty Assignments 2009 | |
| Star Map -- Karen Reid | CS1, neat drawing of the night sky and constellations -- simple file reading and drawing |
| Face Pamphlet -- Mehran Sahami | CS1, simple Facebook application built with just CS1 technology, students love it |
| Secrets In Images -- Brent Heeringa, Thomas Murtagh | CS1, hide secret messages inside images -- neat image manipulation with data as simple arrays |
| Random Art -- Christopher A Stone | CS1, build nifty images with recursive nested random symbolic math expressions (python) |
| Enigma Encryption -- Dave Reed | CS1-CS21, range of easy to complex cryptography projects, using paper/manipulation model to get started |
| DNA Splicing -- Owen Astrachan | CS2, surprisingly easy DNA manipulation, set up for the students to measure/experiment with their code |
| Nifty Assignments 2008 | |
| Catch Plagiarists -- Baker Franke | CS1-CS2, typical CS2 data structures, difficulty can be adjusted. Search within a set of documents to find pairs with copied content |
| Genetic Algorithm TSP -- Raja Sooriamurthi | CS1-CS2, basic genetic algorithms. Use genetic algorithms to solve the traveling salesman problem |
| Asteroids -- Dan Leyzberg, Art Simon | CS1-CS2, objects, inheritance, abstract classes. An impressive implementation of Asteroids with OOP design and inheritance |
| Huffman Images -- Morgan McGuire, Tom Murtagh | CS1(late) or CS2(early). Labs to explore huffman compression in the context of image bitmap manipulation |
| Maze Solver -- Don Blaheta | CS2, stacks, queues, 2d arrays. Play around with algorithms to solve a maze. Works with gridworld |
| Dice Flip -- Cay Horstmann | CS1-CS2, prolog for advanced CS2, java for late CS1 variant. Explore simple but subtle dice game |
| Nifty Assignments 2007 | |
| Media Manipulation -- John Cigas | CS0-CS1, spreadsheet use or basic code. Transfer media data to spreadsheet form to make manipulation easy |
| ASCIImations -- Dave Reed | CS0-CS2. ASCII animations make fun, creative output with surprisingly simple code (Javascript, Java, ...) |
| Mindreader -- Raja Sooriamurthi | CS1, CS2. basic logic, map interface (arrays or Hashmaps). Build a surprisingly good computer opponent for a guessing game |
| Solitaire OOP -- Robert Noonan | CS2, OOP and patterns to explore family of solitaire games |
| Sliding Blocks Puzzle -- Mike Clancy | CS2, significant recursion and data structures. Recursive and heuristic work to solve the sliding blocks puzzle. |
| Fire -- Angela Shiflet | CS2, 2-d arrays, simulation. Neat, real-world example simulating spread of fire across a terrain, depending on humidity etc. |
| Nifty Assignments 2006 | |
| Book Code (ISBN) -- John Motil | CS1, basic logic to play with ISBN numbers. Fun because we are surrounded by these numbers .. use them for basic examples |
| Natural Prestidigitation -- Steve Wolfman | CS1, basic logic, loops, arrays. Appears dull, but has a neat surprise ending. |
| Breakout -- Eric Roberts | CS1, basic logic, loops using ACM graphics early in the term |
| Dancing Turtles -- Chris Nevison | CS1, inheritance with dancing turtles and ACM graphics |
| Solitaire Encryption -- Lester I. McCann | CS2, list manipulations, algorithmic code, file reading. Implements a very novel type of encryption. |
| Anagram Solver -- Stuart Reges | CS2, recursive backtracking ... a very fun application of recursive search |
| RSS Reader -- Jerry Cain | CS2, data structures, networking ... neat to implement a client for a real protocol |
| Nifty Assignments 2005 | |
| Test Me -- David Levine | CS0-CS1, students write tests to examine black box code -- nifty and no code writing |
| Grid Plotter -- Alyce Brady and Pam Cutter | CS1, neat way to learn and practice loop code |
| Complementary Currency -- Paul Kube | CS1, OOP by creating a currency ... has a community/social aspect among the students |
| Name Surfer -- Nick Parlante | CS1, loops, arrays, files. Graph baby name data for the last 100 years. Nifty because the data is nifty. |
| Photomosaics PPT (PDF version) -- Rich Pattis | CS2, create image made of many little images .. but there is a patent on it |
| Image Lab -- Aaron Gordon | CS2, framework to allow students to write filters on 2-d data and see them applied to images |