Coursera cryptography course

Khannie

That's good alliteration.

Coursera are starting a free Crypto course in January. It's a 2 part course run by Dan Boneh from Stanford. Thought you folks would be interested. I've signed up.

https://www.coursera.org/course/crypto

matrim

I've completed the first part of it last year and it was quite interesting. Starts out with the theory behind cryptography and some probability, what makes a good cipher etc, then moves on to public key crythography and number thoery

Khannie

Nice one. Glad to hear it's good. I wanted to do the first one, but didn't find out about it until too late. Then I was bitter because crypto 1 is a prerequisite for crypto 2.

As an aside, I must say I really like the idea of coursera. Some of the best lecturers in the world giving knowledge away to anyone on the planet with a computer and an internet connection. Brilliant.

LoLth

I've started it twice.... I keep getting sidetracked about 3/4 of the way through and then fall behind and cant catch up. Its good and the weekly practicals are quite tough at times. Be prepared to put quite a few hours into watching and re-watching the lecture videos!

AnCatDubh

I've come across coursera before but haven't signed up to anything. On reading their site - its education (precanned) for free. Em., to show my lack of knowledge, where do they make a buck? If you don't complete it do you pay a penalty.

Thanks for sharing anyhow. Might be something to spend the cold January/February evenings at.

Dermot Illogical

AnCatDubh wrote: »

Em., to show my lack of knowledge, where do they make a buck? If you don't complete it do you pay a penalty.

Some courses have certification available on payment.
Otherwise it's free. No penalties for failure to complete. I'd be a lot poorer if there were.

Prodgey

Signed up, thanks OP!

Khannie

LoLth wrote: »

I've started it twice.... I keep getting sidetracked about 3/4 of the way through and then fall behind and cant catch up. Its good and the weekly practicals are quite tough at times. Be prepared to put quite a few hours into watching and re-watching the lecture videos!

How many hours a week would you estimate? The page says 5-7. I can handle that. Any more than 10 and I'd be in real trouble.

Splinter

signed up for the 2 and also for one on android development. hopefully this goes better than the last one i did on python....

delta36

Thanks for the post OP, never used this site before, how does this work? A new video lecture is posted every week and then there's an assignment you need to do yourself?

stupid head

Visual Cryptography

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Khannie

delta36 wrote: »

Thanks for the post OP, never used this site before, how does this work? A new video lecture is posted every week and then there's an assignment you need to do yourself?

I think that's the jist of it alright. I haven't used it myself yet tbh. This will be my first course.

Khannie

stupid head wrote: »

Visual Cryptography

Pretty slick.

h57xiucj2z946q

These guys have very good free courses with no timelimits or constraints: http://opensecuritytraining.info/Training.html

I did the x86 assembly one, and am now looking at the ARM one. ARM is rapidly gaining popularity.

Would like if they ran a MIPS course also.

LoLth

sorry for the late response:

When you sign up, they send you a reminder when the course is about to start. Each week they post up a series of lectures (about 2 to 3 hours worth of video if you just watch it through but you'll need to rewind and rewatch some bits).

At the same time they make a homework project available in the form of a series of multiple choice questions that you can attempt several times (best attempt counts) over 3 weeks. (sounds easy but the questions change between attempts and some require a lot of calculations and can be quite tricky) . There is also a programming weekly side project you can do to earn bonus marks which involves writing a short program based on the lectures that week's lecture.

At the end of the course, you get three weeks to submit the final exam online.

Kinet1c

Signed up, thanks.

stupid head

For the love of god won't someone think of the Professors.










:P

LoLth

someone still has to write it and present it...

what online courses will do though is allow professors to teach more classes and still have more "free time" to oversee post graduate students and do their own research which is after all what their primary function is. You don't become a professor by teaching, you get there by "expanding the field of knowledge".

humbert

I was much too late finding out about it to do the course but I've downloaded the video lectures and, so far, watched about 3/4 of them. It's very light mathematically but very interesting in introducing the concepts and failures of contemporary cryptography. I finally know how public key cryptography works!

Many of the initial lectures are quite dry and a bit repetitive but I'd highly recommend it to anyone interested in an introduction to the subject.


Is it just me or has the second part been postponed several times? I seem to remember checking on coursera several times only to see the start date pushed back (maybe it's started a few times and I've missed it).

LoLth

it starts a week after the first part each time. so on a 6 week rotation. If you miss the lead up to the start, you'll only see the next start date listed.

easiest way is to sign up to the next one and you'll be notified when its starting.

humbert

LoLth wrote: »

it starts a week after the first part each time. so on a 6 week rotation. If you miss the lead up to the start, you'll only see the next start date listed.

easiest way is to sign up to the next one and you'll be notified when its starting.

That explains it. I went to Dan Boneh's website and can see the first course. I can also download the video lectures on Coursera for the first course but can't see them for the second? I'm not particularly concerned about the course itself, I'd just like to watch the lectures. Are they available only by subscribing to the course or am I blind?

syklops

Im the same as Lolth. I started it twice and other things took over. It gets pretty complicated quite quickly but its very well taught. The exercises are very good too.

Khannie

Just a reminder - This is starting early January. For people (like me) who need to brush up on probability stuff, now's probably the time to do that.

Man I'd love to do this... hmm...

Khannie

Do it!

I see they have an option to do it at half pace. I'll probably do that.

syklops

Khannie wrote: »

Do it!

I see they have an option to do it at half pace. I'll probably do that.

I didnt see that option. I'll probably do that one so. Although I have a busy January ahead...

stupid head

Mod: Off topic there stupid head. Feel free to fire up a thread in future.

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LoLth

Khannie wrote: »

Do it!

I see they have an option to do it at half pace. I'll probably do that.

half pace? thats new. I might give that a go. its the deadlines for the practicals that always trip me up as something always interferes. half the pace might suit my schedule a bit better!

Khannie

Yeah, the deadlines are set in such a way that you can take your time without being penalised.

I've actually decided to try and give it a whirl at full pace, then fall back to half pace if necessary. Did my first video lecture there. Blistering pace but full of good stuff.

theedude27

Signed up myself but wont be watching the first video until after my dreaded maths exam on wednesday....thats a contradiction within itself isnt it:o

Professey Chin

I just went through the introduction videos tonight.
I think my brain has broken