g assignment difficulty students may find assignments more challenging than they first thought. it's best to start work as early as possible. tips in the [very first lecture] were provided but here's two reminders: 1) work through the lecture and tutorial material before looking in detail at the assignments 2) start work as soon as possible. if you find you cannot complete an assignment before the due date then you will not be granted an extension. for this specific assignment: most students will find it to be quite challenging (so if you are in this boat then that's perfectly normal). most students in introductory programming courses complete most-all functional requirements so it is a challenge that you have a reasonable chance of meeting if you have approached this course (and assignment) properly. (in some other post-secondary institutes the instructor may not require file input to be implemented but typically less information is provided by these other institutes i.e. just the ['rules'] for the births and deaths). peptalk speech: if it helps, this assignment has been completed by grade 11 students in a calgary high school. that definitely indicates that although the assignments is a challenge it is a 'doable' challenge for you. note: it is not sufficient to just implement a working program and expect full credit. this requirement exists so you implement your solution in the correct way using good design principles and you apply the necessary concepts. even if your program is fully working and the program is not designed or implemented as specified in the assignment description (e.g. poor variable names used, named constants, functions not implemented appropriately or insufficiently etc.) then you will not be awarded full credit. critical design requirements