Final Personal Reflection

(If you want to write up your answers using Markdown, here is a Markdown template you can use.)

In your final personal reflection, you should reflect on the quarter (not just the last couple of weeks) from two different perspectives:

• (Assignment contributions): What contributions did you make to homework assignments and projects? Did you work well as a partner/team, or did you work better by yourself? How did this contribute to your learning in the course?

• (Knowledge growth): From the course syllabus:
  

  Goals: At the conclusion of this course, students should have a basic understanding of cryptography, particularly why and how various cryptosystems work, as well as what makes them secure/not secure. This includes understanding the mathematics behind the cryptosystems. Students should also have some awareness of the social, ethical, and political issues related to cryptography. Finally, students should be able to write programs to implement some of the common algorithms used in cryptography.

  • Reflect on what you have learned about different cryptosystems and how they may be used for applications such as key exchange, encryption, and signatures.
  • Reflect on how your knowledge of the mathematics involved in cryptosystems has grown.
  • Reflect on the big-picture take-aways you have from the course. What was new, surprising, or gave you new insights or perspectives on computing? How does what you learned relate to what you already knew, or what you might do in the future? What have you learned that made a big impression on you? What have you learned that you think may stick with you for a while?