What is Computer Science?

“Computer Science is not about computers, in the same sense

that physics is not really about particle accelerators, and
biology is not about microscopes and petri dishes”
Hal Abelson
What is Computer Science?
Computer Science is the study of computers and computational systems. Unlike
electrical and computer engineers, computer scientists deal mostly with software
and software systems; this includes their theory, design, development, and
application.

Principal areas of study within Computer Science include artificial intelligence,

computer systems and networks, security, database systems, human computer
interaction, vision and graphics, numerical analysis, programming languages,
software engineering, bioinformatics and theory of computing.

Although knowing how to program is essential to the study of computer science,

it is only one element of the field. Computer scientists design and analyze
algorithms to solve programs and study the performance of computer hardware
and software. The problems that computer scientists encounter range from the
abstract-- determining what problems can be solved with computers and the
complexity of the algorithms that solve them – to the tangible – designing
applications that perform well on handheld devices, that are easy to use, and that
uphold security measures.
University of Maryland
What is a computer?
Electronic, Digital, Automatic, Progammable, data-
processing machine.
 Electronic – low voltage, soild state integrated circuits
with many transistors
 Digital – Uses on / off, 1 / 0 binary signals
 Automatic – can run without human intervention
 Programmable – follows instructions that are stored
as a program
 Data-Processing - Computers process data to
produce information.
 Computers are everywhere!

SuperComputers
and
Mainframes

PCs
Personal
Computers
Embedded System
Any electronic system that uses a computer chip, but that is not a general-purpose
workstation, desktop or laptop computer.

• Dedicated Chip
• Programmed to do
one job only.
• Program written in
machine code
• Fast, small &
effecient
• Program may be "burnt"
onto a ROM chip
Software & Hardware
Software - Programs Hardware - Physical
Set of instructions or mechanical, magnetic,
programs electronic, and electrical
Operating Systems components making up
 Windows 8, Mac OS X a computer system
Applications You can touch & break
 MS Word, Apple iTunes  Keyboard, mouse, CPU,
screen ….
Stored Program Concept
Both the instructions and data needed to run a program are stored in the computer’s main
memory : Sequential Processing – Fetch  Decode  Execute
Von Neumann Alan Turing
Architecture Automatic Computing Engine

7
 IPO

Input

Output

Process
Data Flow
Von Neumann Architecture
The basic Input  Process  Output
Instructions & Data both stored in RAM: Fetch  Decode  Execute
Input
 Data is input
 Converted from
analog to digital
The Motherboard – Central Processing
Unit (CPU) & Main Memory (RAM)
Output
 Result of processing
is output
 Converted from
digital to analog
Storage & Memory
 Data can be stored
 Data can be
transmitted to
another computer
system

Note: All modern memory devices are Random or Direct Access.

So you can "jump" to wherever you like. (Only tape holds data in sequential or
serial access. You can only get to each item one after the other.)