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From: conrad@wucs1.wustl.edu (H. Conrad Cunningham)
Newsgroups: misc.jobs.contract,comp.edu
Subject: Re: Qualified? or Dreaming?
Message-ID: <1990Jul26.145933.21039@cec1.wustl.edu>
Date: 26 Jul 90 14:59:33 GMT
References: <1990Jul8.063302.4076@xavax.com> <2616@igloo.scum.com> <1990Jul11.233006.17884@nmt.edu> <1990Jul23.060010.20406@grian.cps.altadena.ca.us> <37714@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU> <1990Jul24.140502.17990@cec1.wustl.edu> <37743@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU>
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Reply-To: conrad@wucs1.wustl.edu (H. Conrad Cunningham)
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In article <37743@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU> matloff@heather.ucdavis.edu (Norm Matloff) writes:
>In article <1990Jul24.140502.17990@cec1.wustl.edu> conrad@wucs1.wustl.edu (H. Conrad Cunningham) writes:

>An OS is not a "technological artifact."  As I said, almost every
>program (except for "embedded applications") makes OS calls.  I didn't
>say that the students should become proficient at a particular OS, by
>the way.  Just general principles, though references should be made to
>specific systems so as to make the concepts concrete.
>
>And those general OS principles *are* general  --  they do apply to
>many of those applications you mention.

I do not deny the importance of the practical side of computer science
education -- either for those students who go into industry or for
those who go directly to graduate school.  "Book learnin'" needs to be
supplemented by some "down-to-earth" experience for the concepts to be
fully appreciated.  Also it is unnecessarily elitist to ignore the
reality that CS graduates need to get jobs.  

Neither do I deny the importance of a working knowledge of operating
systems.  (I have made my living for many more years as a "systems
programmer" than as a teacher/researcher.)  But I could probably make
an equally strong case for the importance of the study of programming
language design.  Perhaps others could argue strongly for their pet
technologies or subfields.

CS programs need to be organized around the significant concepts of
computing (whatever those may be).  Case studies, laboratory
exercises, individual/group projects, co-op work experiences, etc., 
should illustrate and provide practical experience in use of these 
concepts.  My primary complaint against the current approach is the
unnecessary fragmentation of CS into subfields organized around
technologies.  We need more computing generalists, not more
specialists in arcane subfields who can't talk to each other or can't
recognize the same problem when it appears in different trappings.

For several years I worked in the aerospace industry.  I often was
involved in interviewing new CS graduates.  We wanted to hire people
for "software engineering" positions to design real-time embedded
control systems for aircraft and support tools needed to assist in this
work.  I didn't expect to find many with experience or specific
knowledge of our applications, but I hoped to find open-minded
professionals who could apply a strong general knowledge of computing
to challenging applications.  Unfortunately, many of the stronger
grads that I saw were only interested in writing operating systems or
compilers or in being "knowledge engineers".  Many seemed to feel that
you couldn't be a real computer scientist unless you were involved in
such activity.  The weaker grads I saw were little more than Pascal,
Cobol, C, or Pascal hackers.  

>
>> Instead of core a course on "operating systems" why not a course on
>>"concurrent programming".   
>
>There's a lot more to OS than concurrency.
>

I agree and didn't mean to imply that.  Perhaps the  course should be
entitled "control programming" or "coordinated computation".  The
focus should be on the process of developing such programs, not on
the products themselves (e.g., on an operating system, programming
language runtime, robot control system, etc.).   Perhaps the actual
content would not be much different from what you have in mind for an
operating systems course. 

>BTW, why have a CS major at all? 

Before we answer this question perhaps we should define what CS is.
...

Some people would argue that the whole idea of a "major" or of a
"field" is wrong-headed--that it introduces an arbitrary and unhealthy
compartmentalization of knowledge.

-- Conrad Cunningham, University of Mississippi CIS Dept.