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From: rb@ccivax.UUCP (rex ballard)
Newsgroups: net.cse
Subject: Re:  CS degrees, are they useful?
Message-ID: <452@ccivax.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 7-Mar-86 14:15:23 EST
Article-I.D.: ccivax.452
Posted: Fri Mar  7 14:15:23 1986
Date-Received: Mon, 10-Mar-86 00:07:44 EST
References: <6350@cca.UUCP> <6420@cca.UUCP> <1074@terak.UUCP>
Reply-To: rb@ccivax.UUCP (What's in a name ?)
Organization: CCI Telephony Systems Group,  Rochester NY
Lines: 72
Summary: A BA defends CS

Premise:

Scientist - One who observes, identifies, and classifies patterns and
	defines the principles, laws and rules to describe his observations.
Engineer - One who applies these rules, laws, and principles to solve
	problems.  He also standardizes the practices.
Artist - one who perverts these rules, laws, and principles to solve problems.
	(which the Scientist new material to describe).

There is no such thing a "Pure Scientist" or a "Pure Engineer" or a "Pure
Artist".

CS has an important role, to identify which patterns may be most cost effective
and define them in terms that will be useful to engineers and artists.

K&R were "artists" when they used some (at that time) unconventional
design and programming techniques, in addition to the conventional ones,
to produce UNIX and C.

Later, Computer Scientists defined terms and principles which described
these innovations.  Engineers then had a terminology and principles
which could be applied to new applications.

When a company has a product that incorporates new principles, it is
valuable to have a computer scientist describe "why" it works.

Example:

Joe writes a multi-processor system that works very efficiently, he
used several unconventional techniques to design the system and keep
processors co-ordinated, it is fast but very complicated to write for.
Later, someone wants to simplify the interface to Joe's system by
putting UNIX on the multiprocessors.  Unfortunately, because UNIX does
not have the "inherant" ability to coordinate multiple processors, the
UNIX version ends up slower.  Joe's implementation is added to the UNIX
version and is now not only slower, but also unmanagable.

Here is a situation where a CS can look at why Joe's implementation
works so well on the original and figure out what properties need to
be implemented in UNIX to make the new version both fast and easy to
use, or what UNIX properties could be put into the original to make
it fast and easy to use.

Without the Scientist, the engineer will get "religeous", saying "that's
the way it has to be done", just try discussing high level language
implementations based on FORTH with a FORTH fanatic.  SmallTalk, FORTH,
and Chip-8 (for those who remember the COSMAC chip), have very similar
characteristics, but scientific comparisons are required to identify
the strengths and weaknesses in order to created new and better languages.

Without the Scientist, the "artist" will "innovate" in ways that will be
wasteful.  UNIX was originally written in assembler, the original FORTH
could only load source code, wasted code space for "headers", and used an
inefficient "inner loop interpreter".  Without the engineer's standards,
the artist will waste time on "proprietary" implementations which could
be more effectively be done by following standards.

Ideally, we (computer professionals) should have all three characteristics
as part of our training.  One area may be dominant, but it is necessary
to be able to "switch hats" occaisionally.  An artist has to be able
to read a "man page" and write documentation that describes the principles
behind his innovation.  An engineer has to be able to separate the "wheat
from the chaff" when looking at or writing a standard and he needs to be
able to "improvise" solutions to unconventional problems.  A scientist
has to be able to recognize unusual expression of a "standard" and
be able to "improvise" new examination techniques.

We should also be willing and able to recognize our weaknesses and
when to consult with others who have different strengths.  A business
major is not taught "Law", but "when to see the lawyer".  A management
major is taught "when to see the accountant" rather than every possible
accounting practice.