Talk:Computer science/Archive 6

message: Dear all -- there was a long and extended debate on the exact nature of the sentence beginning the article. I was brought in as part of medcabal; see: . After a lot of work by everyone, we have arrived at a consensus solution (we took a brief poll and there were no objections, though there were definitely a few "weak supports"); the consensus is:
:Computer science is the study of the theoretical foundations of information and computation and their implementation and application in computer systems.
The long discussion which produced this consensus is here. There is some important material there; please consider reading it if you're considering updating the discussion of definitional issues. I've also added some "final thoughts" on the question there; please if you've been involved in the debate, scroll to the end. Sdedeo (tips) 06:02, 30 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Definition resolution

message: I've retitled the section "Theory and practice" as "Computer science education", since most of the text was actually about differing educational programs rather than talking directly about theory and practice. I've also renamed the section previously called "Relationship with software engineering" to "Relationship with other fields", and moved the paragraph discussing CS vs. computer engineering and information systems into that section (where it seems more appropriate). --Allan McInnes 21:44, 1 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Section rearrangement 

message: I propose to add a new section listing important, major, critical, tough challenges/problems in computer science, like those famous problems in mathematics. Just a thought. :-)--Leo 19:30, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sounds like a good idea to me. Did you have anything particular in mind already? --Allan McInnes (talk) 19:39, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  We may list some BIG problems in familar areas and put them in the main article when ready. For example, Automatic parallelization has been quite a challenge in programming areas for many years. Otherwise nobody would bother parallel programming. Furthermore, automatic programming is an even bigger problem, otherwise no human programmers should exist --Leo 20:05, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Automatic programming is a contradiction in terms. In order to program, you need to specify the objective, i.e. what/how has to happen; which is by definition called programming. But that's just my two cents of original research I guess. I'm all for such a list! Wouter Lievens 21:24, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  You made a good point. My understanding: people only need to tell computer what to do, and computers should automatically figure out how to do it (with some intelligence). The current situtation is that people have to instruct computers in every step to reach goals. --Leo 15:46, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

text:  The list of open problems in computer science article already has a good start.  Other than that, AI is one field that's very rich in problems of practical import:  pattern recognition, computer vision, NLP, data mining, autonomous robots...  --Piet Delport 21:55, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

text:  Since people have started suggesting ideas: I imagine that the BCS' Grand Challenges in Computing Research would also provide a good source of information. And it has the advantage that it's a citable source for "important problems". --Allan McInnes (talk) 22:22, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  The "Grand Challenges" seem to edge towards being a list of wide, open-ended directions for research, rather than a list of clearly-defined, solvable problems.  Some of them, like GC1 and GC4, almost read like outlines of potential solutions, rather than descriptions of open problems.  --Piet Delport 14:37, 5 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Sure. But I didn't see anything in the original comment that implied we should only be talking about "clearly-defined, solvable problems". If anything, I think this article would be better off focusing on broad directions, and leaving the specific and well-defined problems to list of open problems in computer science (although a couple of the really major problems might usefully be mentioned here too). --Allan McInnes (talk) 15:19, 5 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Yep, i was just pointing out the distinction, not dismissing them (except maybe for GC1 and GC4, to some extent).  --Piet Delport 07:53, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I'd love to see a more diverse list; after all the list of open problems in computer science only lists the really hard theoretical ones. It would be interesting to see a few "soft" and less formal problems, too. Wouter Lievens 09:40, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  OK, but problem definitions can probably only so soft, before they start describing engineering, sociological, or philosophical problems, instead of computer science ones. --Piet Delport 12:05, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I am so glad to see the responses so far. My motivation was simple: make real problems in computer science visible and draw enough public attention. Then some people will be interested in attacking them and make more goodness than just dealing with trivial problems. I agree that adding things into list of open problems in computer science is a good starting point. --Leo 15:36, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: List of critical CS problems? 

message: In my view 'Computer science is the study of the theoretical foundations of information and computation and their implementation and application in computer systems.' seems very complex. I don't know any better words to replace them though. Suggestions? Computerjoe's talk 21:08, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Please see the archive. Replacing the intro would most likely be a Bad IdeaTM. —Ruud 21:26, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Overly Complex? 

message: Is the Fields of computer science section really still a stub?  I thought stubs would be short, this section has 11 subsections!  Ideogram 21:52, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree that it looks a little odd. OTOH, I think it's reasonable to consider the "fields" section a stub, since it consists of a list of topics rather than an explanation of those topics. Ideally, I'd like to see that section look more like the corresponding sections in articles such as Mathematics or Physics. --Allan McInnes (talk) 01:22, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

text: It seems OK to me.  (I think it's at least as appropriate as including bioinformatics, robotics, and other cross-disciplinary fields, in any case.)  --Piet Delport 16:57, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

text: I agree with Piet here. Tne borders of CS are not exactly well-defined, and there's plenty of other cross-disciplinary stuff in the list of fields. If you're really concerned about this, you might consider digging up a reasonably authoritative reference (the Handbook of Computer Science perhaps, or an ACM CS curriculum) that we can use as a standard for identifying the "core fields" of CS, and move the cross-disciplinary stuff into a subsection called Related fields or Cross-disciplinary fields or something similar. --Allan McInnes (talk) 18:01, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with both of you, I'm all for including cross-disciplinary fields in the list.  My problem with image processing was only because it doesn't seem to be a "field of study" to the same degree as the other listed areas.  The image processing article describes it as a bunch of useful tools, rather than a set of fundamental problems which are to be solved.  In any case, if it doesn't bother you guys, then I don't see any need to change it. --Jonovision 01:56, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

text: I think combining career domains in computer science and computer science would result in too large an article, so it is best to keep them separate. Jonathan Bowen 20:32, 16 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Fields of computer science a stub? 

message: According to Soft Computing (aka Computational Intelligence), and the various links it contains: 
:Soft computing differs from conventional (hard) computing in that, unlike hard computing, it is tolerant of imprecision, uncertainty, partial truth, and approximation. In effect, the role model for soft computing is the human mind. The guiding principle of soft computing is: Exploit the tolerance for imprecision, uncertainty, partial truth, and approximation to achieve tractability, robustness and low solution cost. 
:The principal constituents of Soft Computing (SC) are Fuzzy Logic (FL), Neural Computing (NC), Evolutionary Computation (EC) Machine Learning (ML) and Probabilistic Reasoning (PR), with the latter subsuming belief networks, chaos theory and parts of learning theory.(Y.Jin's Soft Computing portal)
:Enclosed in the name computational intelligence is a `message', according to scientific folklore it is chosen to indicate the link to and the difference with artificial intelligence. While some techniques within computational intelligence are often counted as artificial intelligence techniques (e.g. genetic algorithms, or neural networks) there is a clear difference between these techniques and traditional, logic based artificial intelligence techniques. In general, typical artificial intelligence techniques are top-to-bottom where, i.e., the structure of models, solutions, etc. is imposed from above. Computational intelligence techniques are generally bottom-up, where order and structure emerges from an unstructured beginning. (Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam)
Soft Computing, aka Computational Intelligence, essentially consists of a collection of approaches, such as fuzzy computing, neural computing, and genetic algorithms, whose strength lies in modelling the brain, the mind, or genetic evolution, and whose main domain of application is Artificial Intelligence (AI). It has not been widely accepted as a seperate field from AI, nor should it be. It is at most a subfield of Artificial Intelligence. In my experience, it is a very obscure term, even within AI. I therefore suggest that it be listed as a subfield of AI, and not as a branch of CS. 
Palaeovia 16:54, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I am proposing to delete Soft Computing from "Fields of computer science", considering its status as a collection of techniques within AI, and its low degree of acceptance as a name for that collection. Please register any protest. Palaeovia 00:19, 30 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I've deleted "Soft computing" from "Fields of computer science". --Palaeoviatalk 12:54, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Is "Soft Computing" a major branch of Computer Science? 

message: I recently created :Category:Computer Science when I was suprised it did not exist.  Is there any larger set that :Category:Computer Science should be a subset of?  Mathiastck 10:09, 24 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's called , by convention categories are sentence cased. -- Prove It (talk) 12:44, 24 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: There were several articles in the Computer Science cat. I changed them to Computer science cat and made cat Computer Science a redirect. --agr 01:05, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[:Category:Computer Science]] 

message: Why does the article mention the ACM classification only to ignore it? If you are ignoring a reliable source, isn't that original research? What especially bothers me is that sexy topics like "artificial life" get moved up in the hierarchy. This is an encyclopedia, not a Discovery (magazine) article. Just because something is interesting doesn't mean it's important. ---- CharlesGillingham 17:47, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  ACM Classification 

message: I'm not quite sure Ada participated on the development or fabrication of the difference engine. Instead, she corresponded with Babbage regarding his second, larger invention, the analytical engine...  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nwerneck (talk • contribs) 16:10, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  differences regarding Ada 

message: I wonder if Sociology of the Internet article should be categorized under computer sciences? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk  17:49, 8 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Relevance of the [[sociology of the Internet]] 

message: I've been working on pages related to security, such as Intrusion detection, Intrusion detection systems, Misuse Detection, and Anomaly detection, and have been putting these into the Computer science category.  However, someone has complained that this category is too broad and has suggested Data mining and Data security as categories.  I'm not sure that I agree with his suggestion.  I have looked at the fields of Computer science on this page and security seems to fit all of them and none of them.  For example, security involves math, theory, algorithms, data structures, programming languages, compilers, and on down the list.  Security professionals and researchers have to know something about all of these areas.  However, security is not limited to math, theory, algorithms, etc. If I were to give a name to the field, I would probably call it Information security instead of Data security.  Either that, or I would just keep calling it Computer science because security involves all of Computer science.  I was wondering if anyone else had an opinion on this.  --Clangin (talk) 22:53, 13 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Where does security fit in? 

message: Since someone converted our existing "fields of computer science" section into a navbox, I've taken this opportunity to put the more visual "fields" section suggested above by Quackor into the article. Following the style of the Mathematics article, I've added some introductory text to the section, but we could still use some more explanatory text in each subsection (as well as the addition of some more subsections to cover the areas not yet mentioned). --Allan McInnes (talk) 23:04, 31 August 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I should probably note here that the present nomenclature of the fields/areas follows the CSAB description cited in the article. An alternative would be to use the Computing Curricula 2001 topic breakdown, which has the advantage of providing much more detail (see page 177 of the CC2001 report). The broad areas identified by both are roughly the same, although there are some slight differences in the nomenclature and in how things might get grouped. --Allan McInnes (talk) 23:17, 31 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Fields of computer science 

message: We've got a bunch of links to a variety of subfields of computer science, but we seem to be missing a lot of the more applied subfields.  While I don't want to open up the question of "what exactly is computer science?", I believe that most research institutions with computer science departments have groups studying such things as networks, operating systems, databases and graphics.  Does anyone object to me throwing up a bunch of links to such subfields? 
mkehrt (talk) 01:45, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  More applied subfields? 

message: The image :File:IPhone EDGE and 3G.png is used in this article under a claim of fair use, but it does not have an adequate explanation for why it meets the requirements for such images when used here.  In particular, for each page the image is used on, it must have an explanation linking to that page which explains why it needs to be used on that page.  Please check
:* That there is a non-free use rationale on the image's description page for the use in this article.
:* That this article is linked to from the image description page.
This is an automated notice by FairuseBot. For assistance on the image use policy, see Wikipedia:Media copyright questions. --20:15, 3 March 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Image copyright problem with File:IPhone EDGE and 3G.png

message: I was very surprised when I had found Computational chemistry in the section "Numerical and symbolic computation".What about Mathematical chemistry in this case? Note, please, "Mathematical chemistry has also sometimes been called computer chemistry, but should not be confused with computational chemistry." (Mathematical chemistry). Also Bioinformatics, Computational physics and many other scientific areas should not be noted specially as the Fields of computer science. The Computational chemistry, Mathematical chemistry and Computer chemistry are fields of modern chemistry, Computational physics is field of physics, the Graph theory is field of mathematics. Otherwise we have to add a lot of fields from different areas where computers and programming and algorithm's theory and practice are used today!
Also, very important,  mathematics is pure theoretical science, but physics, chemistry, biology ets. are experimental sciences. Is Computer science pure theoretical science (like mathematics) or experimental science? --Tim32 (talk) 19:51, 6 May 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  What about [[Mathematical chemistry]]?! 

message: :
              	                 	                       	                          	                     	                    	y = \sin(x) + c
Bioinformatics	Cognitive Science	Computational chemistry	Computational neuroscience	Computational physics	Numerical algorithms	Symbolic mathematics
:I am in favor of your proposal, which has generally excellent illustrations. Palaeovia 16:40, 5 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That way we can perhaps go a little more in depth into the fields and maybe make a more comprehensive and compact list, but I definitely love the pictures.--GlasGhost (talk) 02:42, 30 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Scientific computing 

message: I need help to locate the first source that was cited for Computer Science.  Can this be located without using Google's cache feature? Pfuchs722 (talk) 14:26, 4 May 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Try wayback. ℚuackor 07:28, 7 May 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Dead link for first source... 

message: It is visually pleasing to have an initial image when one enters the Computer science page (as can be seen when entering e.g., Mathematics and Biology). Bellow I give some examples which could be used, with comments:
:
                                    	                                                      	
May give the page an oldfashion feel	Needs to be updated each time we get a faster computer	
Two images can also be used. What do you think? ℚuackor 12:41, 14 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree that we need an image, but these are not really illustrations of computer science. For example, the first two might be more appropriate in Computing – I would prefer that the opening image emphasises that computer science is not the same thing as computing, instead of doing the opposite. What about having an illustration related to a computational problem? Perhaps an NP-hard game? — Miym (talk) 13:46, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

text: Please be constructive (suggest some pictures and text). I do not think it is possible to find a single picture which represents all of computer science. Another possibility is to do as Biology and present a selection of fields. An example is shown to the right. The selection chosen here can represent highly calculation-intensive tasks, computer graphics, algorithms, complexity, distributed computing etc. ℚuackor 16:06, 16 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Obviously no picture can show a whole field... the internet one looks fine though. 24.23.7.103 (talk) 00:42, 21 December 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Looks nice, but I don't quite understand how it illustrates computer science. In particular, there seems to be no connection between the lead paragraph and the illustration next to it. — Miym (talk) 00:53, 21 December 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Feel free to change the caption to something that you think fits.  Maybe something like: "A graphical representation of the Internet, one of the well-known achievements of Computer Science." 24.23.7.103 (talk) 03:41, 21 December 2009 (UTC)

text:  I rather like the ENIAC picture, gives a nice link to the history of computing also. The internet and super computer photos will be outdated very quickly --NickThePhotographer (talk) 20:54, 23 May 2010 (UTC)

text:  Try, try and try again. Here is another selection of fields which captures some areas of CS and which are in the lead paragraph. Unfortunately the text may seem a bit long. Anyone who has any suggestions for a shorter text or objections to this? ℚuackor 13:26, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text:  You could make the text shorter like in this example: figures are links (with tooltips). — Miym (talk) 14:03, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

text:  I have added the revised sugestion to the article. Subsequent changes can be discussed further here. ℚuackor 15:15, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

text:  For some reason, when we were last discussing these figures, the quicksort animation had a static thumbnail, showing only the first frame of it (at least on my computers). Now I realise that it wasn't a feature, but a bug which has been fixed; currently the quicksort thumbnail plays the full animation. Unfortunately, this makes the use of it as a lead figure questionable: animations are extremely eye-catching and distracting, while the lead figure should be unintrusive. Could we perhaps find another figure; simply taking one of the frames of the animation might be good enough as a temporary solution? — Miym (talk) 08:41, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Visually pleasing initial image 

message: The section on artificial intelligence Computer Science #Artificial Intelligence carries some really unrelated images. for Machine Learning is shown with a brain. Knowledge Representation with a picture of what happens to be neurons (with chinese labels!). I am removing this. The section generally can also be vastly improved in terms of quality. GreenEdu (talk) 11:39, 25 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Artificial Intelligence Section 

message: I find that this article has some serious structural issues, we need to eliminate redundant sections, and have a better top down hierarchy.
Also, just for those who don't know, Software Engineering is a direct subfield of Computer Science. It has undergraduate, graduate and post-graduate specialization degrees with associated research and development arms in both industry and academia. Also, most people who are qualified to work as software engineers are in fact computer scientists or computer engineers (software). I will admit however most computer scientists don't necessarily choose to specialize in software engineering. Computer engineers who choose to specialize in software are also taking mostly computer science courses, with some core engineering, electrical and circuit design courses added. Anyone who honesty disputes this point better have some serious evidence of the contrary.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dimoes (talk • contribs) 05:02, 31 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  This entire article needs better structure and Software Engineering 

message: Computational geometry   - unsigned
Computational geometry should be listed under either Algorithms or Computer Graphics. Since Algorithms is usually understood to contain algorithms for the core, classic problems of CS, and not all algorithms  in all fields of CS, my choice would be Computer Graphics.
Palaeovia 17:07, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  I think this topic should be mentioned in this article 

message: Professors at university have decomposed Computer Science into various mathematical topics.  It is not like people who get paid to write programs, design databases, and architect web sites have need of mathematics, as practiced by mathematicians, in order to do their work.  The big problem today, for people who are employed to put computers to profitable use, is keeping up with the fad du jour.  You dare not try to enroll at university to learn about the fad du jour.  FDJ is so laden with the stench of commerce that one is directed elsewhere -- an elsewhere where standards of the university are not upheld.  To me, the term Computer Science refers to knowledge about the hows and whys of computing from the perspective of mathematicians, who would never stoop to write commercial software.  Perhaps an overly broad indictment.  Surely some good is accomplished teaching undergraduates about the FOR loop.  But, there it is.--72.75.97.37 00:39, 9 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: First of all, this is not a forum topic for discussion on Computer Science, it's about the Wikipedia article. Second, the so-called "fad du jour" of any competent high-technology practice needs a strong science behind it, and that science will need a lot of mathematics and formal systems to be done. People who write programs for companies usually apply principles (such as those of formal programming languages and algorithms) that were formulated by a computer scientist, someone who was interested in the mathematics of the thing, even if they don't notice it. For instance, the handy apps you use to find the shortest path from one point to another in your town make usage of refined shortest path algorithms, and the formulation and subsequent proof of said algorithms is made mathematically (with the possible addition of heuristics), even if the people who apply them to make the software systems don't notice. I know the above comment is four years old, but it disturbs me. If you want a whole academic discipline whose obligation is to exclusively tell you how to be successful in the "fad du jour", you'd better look elsewhere, because company business is not what intellectual disciplines are about. --201.21.181.131 (talk) 02:49, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Academic Computer Science versus The Real World ]] 

message: The general public sometimes confuses computer science with careers that deal with computers (such as information technology)
this line simply doesn’t  make sense  in reality studying Computer science prepares you for career in information technology
so if none opposed it i will remove it
--Andri12 (talk) 23:49, 6 October 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Then you're one of the people who confuses the two. Many people who study physics or mathematics end up working in IT, but then you're not really a physicist, mathematician nor computer scientist (except perhaps for a few of the people that end up in the research & development department). You're probably an engineer, computer programmer or project manager. —Ruud 10:40, 7 October 2011 (UTC)
replies: text:   "Many people who study physics or mathematics end up working in IT" yes this was true in the past but nowadays at least in my country it has become a requirement  to have bachelor's degree in Computer Science or Software Engineering for career in information technology for me it seems that you are confused on the scope of Computer Science Andri12 (talk) 11:45, 7 October 2011 (UTC)
replies: text:  Sure, as does becoming an actuarian often require a degree in mathematics. There's a distinction between the degree of computer science, the careers people with such a degree pursue and the academic/scientific discipline of computer science. Someone with a degree in mathematics working at a bakery or for an insurance company might properly call himself a a "mathematician" in the sense that he has a degree in mathematics, but not in the sense that it is his current profession. The distinction between computer scientists a web developer or computer technician is often much less clear to the general public. There is a big distinction as the latter two often do not employ the methods of formal of empirical science. What this sententence is trying to make clear is that not every computer professional is a computer scientist (although a good number of them are.) —Ruud 12:00, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

text:  I rephrased the sentence, is this more acceptable to you? —Ruud 12:31, 7 October 2011 (UTC)
replies: text:  now the sentence is acceptable  Andri12 (talk) 13:55, 7 October 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: I have a problem  with this line 

message: set theory is a major field, yet not mentioned!  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.57.253.230 (talk) 00:38, 27 April 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Does anyone agree with this user and the other anonymous user who is currently pushing mention of computer science into maths articles? Is there any evidence that computer science regards set theory as a subfield? --Hans Adler (talk) 11:12, 1 May 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually, they are probably the same user, and you can add 98.208.55.34 to the list as well.  All three IPs trace to the Sacramento area, and two of them have edited UCDavis-related content. --Trovatore (talk) 07:44, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

text: Computer scientists use the language of sets (as do all mathematicians, scientists and engineers), and know De Morgan's laws. However, with rare exceptions, they do not study Zorn's Lemma. Until they do so as a matter of course, Set Theory is certainly not part of Theoretical Computer Science.--Palaeoviatalk 11:41, 1 May 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: well, actually set theorists are more likely to use the (equivalent) wellordering theorem than Zorn, but other than that the point is well taken. --Trovatore (talk) 07:31, 2 May 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  Why graph theory was noted as field of computer sci., but the set theory was not noted? :-) Please, see the next section! --Tim32 (talk) 19:57, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

text:  Actually, we could note that computer scientists, especially computational complexity theorists, make loads of mentions to Cantor's naive set theory, especially when proving statements about certain turing machines. ~ Gretgor --201.21.181.131 (talk) 03:26, 8 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Set theory (and a few other topics) was removed from the AMS Classification Scheme for math quite some time ago and replaced with a new phrase including "Foundations". You can see that on the ams.org web site. 198.123.57.82 (talk) 17:32, 30 November 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Set theory 

message: Redacted the lede so that Wikipedia is not staking out a position on this eternal and contentious issue, mainly in the Lead Sentence about which there's a thread above. The subsequent changes were for prosodic consistency with it. 72.228.177.92 (talk) 20:59, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: pulled Computer scientists invent algorithmic processes that create, describe, and transform information and formulate suitable abstractions to design and model complex systems. For the obvious reason, viz. that it is an incomplete, inaccurate, and misleading statement. 72.228.177.92 (talk) 21:10, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

text: Finally, the 1st and second paragraphs could be merged on their boundary sentences. Saw a recent piece in CACM where somebody was saying that CS couldn't be an S because it was about an artefact. That might be added as a reference to the Name of the Field § 72.228.177.92 (talk) 21:27, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
replies: text:  In my opinion your rewrite of the lead section, which was largely the result of long discussions on this talk page, is not an improvement. See Matti Tedre: Computing as a Science: A Survey of Competing Viewpoints. Minds and Machines 21(3): 361-387 (2011) for an excelent overview of many notable definitions of computer science. The old lead summarized these viewpoints more accurately. —Ruud 01:31, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: It's not a free source, but the abstract is in agreement with the basic point in the title of this thread. Revert to the old one if you like but at least correct the grammar and composition, what was there looked like a committee hatchet job so don't doubt your statement. Also performed merge mentioned above. Lycurgus (talk) 04:14, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sidestepping the science issue 

message: http://thinkexist.com/quotes/edsger_dijkstra/
This Edsger Dijkstra guy is very notable in this field, and was quoted as saying a lot of things.  He also is surely covered in books.  Some reliable sources state he made the quote.   and well, Google news search shows hits for the quote, and attributes it to him.  Various books accredit the quote to him as well.  I think he is the one that said it.  Dream Focus 18:26, 29 August 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: List of thinkers influenced by deconstruction list Michael Marder.  His book on psychics is also used as a reference in two articles.   Dream Focus 10:21, 30 August 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Quoting the telescope comparison.  Who said it first? 

message: According to Wikiquotes, the following is misattributed to Edsger Dijkstra . 
:Renowned computer scientist Edsger Dijkstra once stated: "Computer science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes."Research Methods for Science By Michael P. Marder page 14. Published by Cambridge University Press
Here is a copy of the text from wikiquote: 
* Computer Science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes.
** This quote is actually from Hal Abelson, who in the opening to his 1986 lecture series on his famous book SICP said:
***"[Computer science] is not really about computers -- and it's not about computers in the same sense that physics is not really about particle accelerators, and biology is not about microscopes and Petri dishes...and geometry isn't really about using surveying instruments.  Now the reason that we think computer science is about computers is pretty much the same reason that the Egyptians thought geometry was about surveying instruments: when some field is just getting started and you don't really understand it very well, it's very easy to confuse the essence of what you're doing with the tools that you use." http://groups.csail.mit.edu/mac/classes/6.001/abelson-sussman-lectures/, YouTube 
Perhaps we should update the attribution? Kushal (talk) 20:22, 1 June 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: This has been discussed before. I have since found an even earlier reference (Hebenstreit 1974) stating "We have attempted to show that while the processing of information is a science it is not one which can be apprehended by merely studying the basic tools, i.e. the computer and programming languages, any more than astronomy can be reduced to the detailed study and operation of telescopes." I left some further background on this quote at wikiquote:Computer science. —Ruud 16:07, 8 August 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Possible misquote 

message: Is the first paragraph it says: "A computer scientist specialises in the theory of computation and the design of computers or computational systems." Later in the article, it says: "The design and deployment of computers and computer systems is generally considered the province of disciplines other than computer science." Funny, no? - 81.193.3.3 (talk) 21:17, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  The design of computers or computational systems 

message: ¿Why isn't this field mentioned? Although it does overlap with other disciplines, it is consider a staple of most departments. 
- User:Hookandloop 16:43, 5 July 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Computer Science branches: Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) 

message: As you can see computics is a redirect of informatics, the primary source compared it with CompSci, along with the words, computicist, computicism ala ala.. no nothing about informatics. --14.198.220.253 (talk) 05:20, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Computics? 

message: Computer science education? There's already Physics education, Mathematics education, Engineering education, etc. Fgnievinski (talk) 23:03, 7 July 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  split Education section into its own article 

message: The section Computer science#Information science is empty, it contains only pictures now. It should be extended, I suppose. -- Andrew Krizhanovsky (talk) 16:07, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Information science 

message: IMHO, Research and study on "Data structures" is not a distinct field from Algorithms. Additionally, the article on Data structures does not look as an introduction to a field of Computer Science, it just describes what a data structure is (confirming my idea).
IMHO, even Algorithms and Analysis of Algorithms should be replaced by a single item, but I've not performed the operation, waiting for more input.
So I've removed Data structures from the listing, in this diff:
--Blaisorblade (talk) 16:12, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Data structures are some times the most important part of a systems design. Defining the relationships between data elements and it's organization was a most important part of program design. It may not be as important to day with current data base tek. But historically it merits a place in history.
Steamerandy (talk) 18:17, 27 December 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Removing "Data structures" from topic list 

message: Doesn't this section seem out of place of the otherwise very encylopediac organization of the text? It looks like a someone simply read Rapaport's article and copied and pasted the text there.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by DracoDruida (talk • contribs) 02:46, 2 April 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: The title of the section might not belong here, but I believe the content does. Carewolf (talk) 11:51, 2 April 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Great Insights of Computer Science? 

message: Mathematics has been wrongly classified as an exact science, which is a contradiction if it is exact it can not be a science.
Computer science as a branch of mathematics, is not necessarily a science, at least not the more formal branches closely related to mathematical logic. Neural nets, evolving computing, and other inexact ways to compute are more experimental in nature, in such cases it is possible to talk about computing as a science. 
I have seen this discussion by mathematicians questioning their activity being classified as science, but I have not seen that discussion with respect of computing.
I know that Computer Science is a wide established name, but not necessarily correct. Some discussion should exist in literature, if someone knows that, please help to discuss this aspect in this article.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.178.74.12  (talk • contribs) 
:#Computer Science (also known as informatics or information science) is no branch of Mathematics
:#It is established as department/faculty in most Universities.
:So what is your problem? --Kgfleischmann (talk) 04:39, 28 July 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Is Computer Science, A Science? 

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replies: text: Two of the links, https://web.archive.org/20141008080148/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2006/08/27/ccsoft27.xml and https://web.archive.org/web/20140812013839/http://www.stanford.edu/dept/ICME/docs/history/forsythe_knuth.pdf do not work. The others work. Me, Myself & I (talk) 04:29, 28 January 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: The article mentions thast Naur promoted the name "datalogy" (which turned 50 earlier this year). Also, I believe the name "cybernetics" is or has been used, e.g. in the former East Block. With a suitable source, this should perhaps be mentioned in the same section.--Nø (talk) 09:26, 24 May 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  The name of the field 

message: Regardless of degree, this is not taught in schools.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 23.117.16.22 (talk) 01:41, 24 October 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Choices 

message: 2600:1011:B16D:1B03:8943:6566:E3C1:463A (talk) 13:51, 11 December 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: Not done: as you have not requested a change.If you want to suggest a change, please request this in the form "Please replace XXX with YYY" or "Please add ZZZ between PPP and QQQ".Please also cite reliable sources to back up your request, without which no information should be added to, or changed in, any article. - Arjayay (talk) 15:37, 11 December 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Semi-protected edit request on 11 December 2016 

message: I believe the small image for computer vision (the eye) does not accurately depict the field of computer vision. Instead I believe an image of a computer vision application with an image similar to this image which shows computer object recognition of automobiles. Tjgerot (talk) 02:06, 5 March 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: Not done for now: It's better to seek consensus for your proposed change before requesting that someone actually make the change. Also, it's best to make very specific edit requests—"change x to y". Finally, please be aware that Wikipedia pages don't display external images; all image files are hosted locally. In other words, you need to select an image that's already uploaded and therefore actually available to use. (You can also upload one yourself. See Wikipedia:Uploading images for guidance.) RivertorchFIREWATER 05:16, 5 March 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Semi-protected edit request on 5 March 2017 

message: Capitalize 'science' in the title so that it is "Computer Science" 198.51.130.76 (talk) 03:02, 15 March 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: Not done: It would be inconsistent with Wikipedia style to do this. Compare Natural science, Earth science, and Social science. You're welcome to make a case for this being the exception. However, even beyond Wikipedia, the second word in these constructions is usually lowercase except when it's part of a longer phrase (e.g., Department of Computer Science). RivertorchFIREWATER 03:44, 15 March 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Semi-protected edit request on 15 March 2017 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: In the first paragraph from Education section, it's worth mentioning that computer science is promoted in the U.S as part of STEM education. So, I would add to the paragraph:
"Some countries, such as Israel, New Zealand and South Korea, have already included computer science in their respective national secondary education curriculum.[57][58] Several countries are following suit.[59]" In the U.S, computer science is promoted as part of STEM education, which is the academic disciplines of science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Tesopc (talk) 02:08, 10 September 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. RivertorchFIREWATER 05:24, 10 September 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Semi-protected edit request on 10 September 2017 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: This seems to be a practical informatics syllabus for the Indian exam system rather than a field of computer science. Personally I don't think it should be listed as a field on the main article, but just asking if there is any justification for its current inclusion here.  Shadowssettle(talk) 18:23, 5 December 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: Completely agree the wording also makes it unclear whether it is talking about a particular course or a subject (the former of which has no place on a general article in my opinion). However even if the wording were cleaned up, I don't think it'd solve the underlying problem  Shadowssettle(talk) 21:33, 5 December 2018 (UTC)
replies: text:  Seeing as there seems to be no disagreement on this, I have removed this section. If you feel it should be added back in, feel free to continue the discussion  Shadowssettle(talk) 10:39, 24 December 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Informatics Practices 

message: For some strange reason, the Computer Science page was displaying the Renewable Energy topic.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_science
I checked again now and it is fixed.
  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Abrooke (talk • contribs) 14:37, 21 March 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Computer science is displaying Renewable Energy topic 

message: A user took out some of the synonyms of computer science, saying in the edit summary that they are "uncommon synonyms and limited subfields." However, they still need to be in there because there are redirects under those names to this article. Per the principle of least astonishment, users who follow such redirects need to know that they are in the right place. And those redirects are appropriate because there are legitimate reasons to use them. For example, the first article I looked that that links to Computing science is Minh Le, an article about a programmer who got a Bachelor of Applied Science degree in Computing Science at Simon Fraser University. That is indeed what the program is called. I have therefore reverted this change. RockMagnetist(talk) 00:35, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: That said, I got rid of one that did not correspond to a redirect and moved two others into a hatnote. RockMagnetist(talk) 00:44, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Reason for the synonyms 

message: I think the development challenge of computer science is not the issue of the ratio of male to female, but rather the constraints of innovative algorithm design and mathematical ability and the level of hardware development. The challenges in the entry make me feel disrespectful to women.Invokerishard (talk) 05:42, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  About Challenges of computer science 

message: The quotation "Computer science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes" is attributed to Michael Fellows ; I do not think this is accurate.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 143.106.24.70 (talk) 01:19, 11 February 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Quotation 

message: There seems to be some fuzziness about where the first Computer Science degree program in the US might have been. According to this website, the department in Purdue started the same year that the University of Southwestern Louisiana started its MS in Computer Science. I'm not at UL anymore, so I don't have access to the old catalogs in the library to verify that the degree program started before the department in Purdue, so I'll wait until I have more time to go deep to verify this (or maybe somebody else can beat me to it). In the meantime, I'll just edit the article so that it says that Purdue had the first department, rather than the first degree program, so that it's more precisely correct. If I could find a less bullet-pointy source that says the MS in USL started before any program in Purdue, I'd edit the 3rd paragraph in the history section to mention that USL had the first degree program, and Purdue had the first undergraduate degree program.
Sorry if my wiki-etiquette is a bit off, I'm brand new to this.
-According to IBM , a degree program was created a Harvard in 1947, which would be before USL  university program, which was in 1968. I think the sources referenced by the other user in the first paragraph of this topic only mentions that USl had the first computer science university program in Louisiana and not in the world or even in the USA  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.55.188.126 (talk) 21:23, 4 May 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Early history of Computer Science degree programs 

message: I hope no one minds me removing this entire subsection.  I didn't see how it was relevant to the field of computer science at all since it just gave statistics about the percentage of women graduating with CS degrees in particular countries, which seemed rather subjective. BthompsonHV 18:27, 24 May 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Looks perfect for Computer science education, seeing as it about demographics of students. Whilst it may seem subjective, it continues to be a noticeable problem within the field. That article could do with some work as well, it's rather lacking. Shadowssettle(talk) 18:32, 24 May 2020 (UTC)
replies: text:   That's not a bad idea.  I'll take the diff and move it over there. However, are political and social issues typically talked about in science articles?  That just doesn't seem to fit the bill. BthompsonHV 21:46, 24 May 2020 (UTC)
replies: text:  Not here, it would seem inappropriate when this is about knowledge not society, but education is inherently about society. Shadowssettle(talk) 23:36, 24 May 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Education - Women in Computer Science 

message: The name computer science is tragic. I think we should promote the alternative name "computics" or "informatics" as a whole. Or at least "computing" or "computing science". The next problem is the relation of "computer science" to "computer engineering", "informatics", "software engineering", "informaton engineering" etc. In most European countries (including Germany, France, Poland, ...) these areas are treated as one field. It causes major translation problems. English also needs a collective name for these areas.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.31.148.225 (talk) 09:38, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Computing is any goal-oriented activity requiring, benefiting from, or creating computers, it includes development of both hardware and software. Computer science, also known as computing science is part of computing with a scientific rigor. For example, creating new programs for business and industry is not CS, but a scientific publication describing their operation is CS. The term informatics is used in Europe by both scientists and engineers. So it can refer to computer science, and maybe also to practical applications with no scientific value. -79.191.46.246 (talk) 09:26, 8 October 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Computics? Informatics? 

message: Right now, the article contains the following statement:
This is sloppy and possibly misleading, for the following reasons:
* Computers are things, not a field of study.
* Computer science doesn't study computers. It studies computing; computers are studied by electrical engineering.
* The term computer science was introduced as an analogy to management science. Its aim was not to be a field of study, its aim was to be an engineering discipline, devoted to the application of scientific methods and techniques in using computers.
If the present statement is correct, backup for it would be nice. Two references are provided; both refer to a whole work and both works are inaccessible, so it remains unclear how/whether they support this statement.
I hope someone can provide more specific references or revise the statement to be in line with publicly verifiable sources. Rp (talk) 17:02, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: I have recently published an article on "insights in how computer science can be a science" in the open access journal, Science & Philosophy. If you are interested, please take a look at http://dx.doi.org/10.23756/sp.v8i2.531. The paper may lead you to read more papers about what is science in general as well as whether information retrieval is a scientific discipline.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 113.253.83.179 (talk) 06:35, 6 March 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Computer science intended to be a scientific field to study computers?? 

message: The lead is a bit repetitive at the moment, and needs a bit more balance with respect to different areas of CS. Is something like this better?
Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines, such as algorithms, models of computation and information theory, to practical disciplines including the design and implementation of hardware and software. In contrast to programming and software engineering, computer science is considered an area of academic research.
Algorithms and data structures have been called the heart of computer science. The theory of computation concerns abstract models of computation and general classes of problems that can be solved using them. Computer graphics and computational geometry study the generation of images. Programming language theory considers approaches to the description of computational processes, while computer programming involves the use of them to create complex systems. Computer architecture describes construction of computer components and computer-operated equipment. Artificial intelligence aims to synthesize goal-orientated processes such as problem-solving, decision-making, environmental adaptation, planning and learning found in humans and animals.
The fundamental concern of computer science is determining what can and cannot be automated. The Turing Award is generally recognized as the highest distinction in computer sciences.
Still needs a lot of work I think, there are many disciplines, e.g. embedded systems, mobile computing, HCI, DB, cryptograhpy, security, etc. that need to be mentioned in the lead. Thoughts? Caleb Stanford (talk) 18:06, 15 November 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: Seeing no response yet I was WP:Bold and published this change with some further updates. If you don't like the new lead please post here. Caleb Stanford (talk) 23:20, 15 November 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Draft of new lead 

message: Ambujpandey123 (talk) 03:32, 25 November 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. Cannolis (talk) 03:44, 25 November 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Semi-protected edit request on 25 November 2022 

message: Split the category of Theoretical Programming in the Theoretical Computer Science section, and Programming as a discipline in Applied Computer Science Ejenriquez (talk) 04:48, 31 December 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the problem is that programming language theory has a lot of research that's basically pure math and not directly applied, though I agree that a lot of programming language research is applied. Dividing the field broadly into  and  is inherently challenging, but I'm not sure of a better way to organize . Thoughts? Freoh (talk) 12:33, 31 December 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: I guess I'd prefer someone with more expertise to edit that. Ejenriquez (talk) 01:25, 1 January 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Programming should be under Applied Computer Science