Generative AI

10-423 + 10-623, Spring 2025
School of Computer Science
Carnegie Mellon University


Important Notes

This schedule is tentative and subject to change. Please check back often.

Tentative Schedule

Date Lecture Readings Announcements

Generative models of text

Mon, 13-Jan Lecture 1 : RNN LMs / Autodiff
[Slides] [Slides (Inked)]

Wed, 15-Jan Lecture 2 : Transformer LMs
[Slides] [Slides (Inked)]

HW0 out

Fri, 17-Jan Recitation: HW0
[Handout]

Mon, 20-Jan (MLK Day - No Class)

Wed, 22-Jan Lecture 3 : Learning LLMs / Decoding
[Slides] [Slides (Inked)]

Fri, 24-Jan (No Recitation)

Mon, 27-Jan Lecture 4 : Pre-training, fine-tuning / Modern Transformers
[Slides] [Slides (Inked)]

HW0 due

HW1 out (L1-L4)

Add/audit/tuition drop deadline

Generative models of images

Wed, 29-Jan Lecture 5 : Computer Vision: CNNs / Encoder-only Transformers / Vision Transformers
[Slides]

Quiz 1 (in-class, L1-L4)

Fri, 31-Jan Recitation: HW1
[Handout]

Mon, 3-Feb Lecture 6 : Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) / PGM / Diffusion models (Part I)
[Slides] [Slides (Inked)]

Wed, 5-Feb Lecture 7 : Diffusion models (Part II)

Fri, 7-Feb (No Recitation)

Mon, 10-Feb Lecture 8 : Variational Inference / Variational Autoencoders (VAEs)

HW1 due

HW2 out (L4-L8)

Applying and adapting foundation models

Wed, 12-Feb Lecture 9 : In-context learning for text & for vision

Fri, 14-Feb Recitation: HW2

Mon, 17-Feb Lecture 10 : Parameter-efficient fine tuning

Quiz 2 (in-class, L5-L9)

Wed, 19-Feb Lecture 11 : Reinforcement learning with human feedback (RLHF) / Direct Preference Optimization (DPO)

Project description out

Fri, 21-Feb Recitation: HW3

Sat, 22-Feb

HW2 due

HW3 out (L9-L11)

Multimodal foundation models

Mon, 24-Feb Lecture 12 : Text-to-image generation / Latent diffusion model

Semester Course Drop Deadline

Wed, 26-Feb Lecture 13 : Prompt-to-Prompt

(Quiz 3 in-class, L9-L11)

Send out course Survey

Fri, 28-Feb (No Recitation)

Mon, 3-Mar Spring break

Tue, 4-Mar

Wed, 5-Mar Spring break

Thu, 6-Mar

Fri, 7-Mar Spring break

Mon, 10-Mar Lecture 14 : Visual-language models

Midsemester Grades Due

Scaling Up

Wed, 12-Mar Lecture 15 : Scaling Laws

Thu, 13-Mar

HW3 due

HW4 out (L12-L14)

Fri, 14-Mar Recitation: HW4

Project team formation due by 2pm

Mon, 17-Mar Lecture 16 : Mixture of Experts

(Quiz 4 in-class, L12-L15)

Wed, 19-Mar Lecture 17 : Distributed training

Fri, 21-Mar (No Recitation)

Mon, 24-Mar Lecture 18 : Flash Attention / Efficient decoding strategies

HW4 due

HW623 out

Tue, 25-Mar

Advanced Topics

Wed, 26-Mar Lecture 19 : Long Context in LLM

Fri, 28-Mar (No Recitation)

Mon, 31-Mar In-Class Exam

Pass/no pass & withdrawal deadline

Wed, 2-Apr Lecture 20 : Real-world Issues and Considerations (Part I) / What can go wrong?

Fri, 4-Apr (Carnival - No Reciation)

Project proposal due

Mon, 7-Apr Lecture 21 : Safety by Design for Real-world Issues and Considerations (Part II)

(Quiz 5 in-class, L16-L20)

Wed, 9-Apr Lecture 22 : State Space Models

Fri, 11-Apr (No Recitation)

Mon, 14-Apr Lecture 23 : Code Generation / Autonomous Agents

Project midway report due

Registration week

Wed, 16-Apr Lecture 24 : TBD

Fri, 18-Apr (No Recitation)

Mon, 21-Apr Lecture 25 : Audio understanding and synthesis

HW623 due

Wed, 23-Apr Lecture 26 : Generative Models for Videos

Fri, 25-Apr (No Recitation)

Last day of classes

Apr-28 to May-04 Project Final Presentations (during Final Exam Period -- exact time/date TBD by the registrar, details will be announced on Piazza)

Project final poster/report due