Schedule
Some of the later dates are not accurate, and are copy-pasted from earlier semesters.
| When | What |
|---|---|
| Week 1 | |
| Fri, Sep 5 | Topics: Generation hyperparameters; decoding algorithms; prompting with base models. Notes Out: Homework 0: Programming Capabilities |
| Week 2 | |
| Tue, Sep 9 | Topics: Basics of Transformers and GPUs; tensor practice. Notes |
| Fri, Sep 12 | Topics: Chain of thought prompting; introduction to conversational models. Notes |
| Week 3 | |
| Tue, Sep 16 | Class cancelled: Arjun at Lawrence Livermore NationalLaboratory Due: Homework 0: Programming Capabilities. |
| Fri, Sep 19 | Topics: Numerical gradient descent; training basics. Notebook Out: Homework 1: Math Word Problems |
| Week 4 | |
| Tue, Sep 23 | Topics: Slurm; Vector similarity and attention. |
| Fri, Sep 26 | Topics: One-step and two-step agents. Notes |
| Week 5 | |
| Tue, Sep 30 | Topics: Activation steering. Notes Discussion: StarCoder and Llama. Due: Homework 1: Math Word Problems and Reading 0. Out: Homework 2: Supervised Fine-tuning |
| Fri, Oct 3 | Topics: Lecture on RL for LLMs. |
| Week 6 | |
| Tue, Oct 7 | Topics: The ReAct Pattern; Model-Context Protocol. Notes Due: Homework 2: Supervised Fine-tuning. Out: Homework 3: Thomas the Travel Agent |
| Fri, Oct 10 | Directions: install XCode (Swift) or Visual Studio (C#) before class. Topics: “Vibe coding”; Information retrieval. Notes. Recommended Reading: Speech and Language Processing Chapter 11. |
| Week 7 | |
| Tue, Oct 14 | Topics: Neural embeddings; project discussion. Notes Due: Homework 3: Thomas the Travel Agent. Out: Homework 4: Project Proposal |
| Fri, Oct 17 | Discussion: DeepSeek R1 and InstructGPT |
| Week 8 | |
| Tue, Oct 21 | Topics: Text Generation and Proxy Tuning logit_client.py Due: Homework 4: Project Proposal |
| Fri, Oct 24 | Topics: Generators and Async Functions |
| Week 9 | |
| Tue, Oct 28 | Topics: Signatures and Reflective Prompt Optimization Out: Homework 5: Direct Preference Optimization |
| Fri, Oct 31 | Topics: Direct Preference Optimization (Yangtian) |
| Week 10 | |
| Tue, Nov 4 | Topics: Prompt Optimization Lab Due: Homework 5: Direct Preference Optimization |
| Fri, Nov 7 | Topics: Using Compute Clusters Effectively |
| Week 11 | |
| Tue, Nov 11 | Veterans Day |
| Fri, Nov 14 | |
| Week 12 | |
| Tue, Nov 18 | |
| Fri, Nov 21 | |
| Week 13 | |
| Tue, Nov 25 | |
| Fri, Nov 28 | Thanksgiving Break |
| Week 14 | |
| Tue, Dec 2 | |
| Fri, Dec 5 | Due in class: Final Presentations Last day of class |
| Fri, Dec 13 | Due: Final Project Writeup |