Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2016 November 21

= November 21 =

History of computer science discipline
Hi all,

I'm interested at the history of computer science as an academic discipline. I know that the world's first computer science degree program began at the University of Cambridge, and that USA's first computer science degree program began at Purdue University. I would like to know what were the courses and the themes that were studied there at the beginning (1953 in Cambridge, 1962 in Purdue)? I would really like to see some syllabuses, if possible.

Also, of which departments were these program part of? (mathematics department? engineering? something else?)

If you can refer me to any further information regarding this issue, I will very appreciate that.

Thank you very much in advance! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 141.226.218.14 (talk) 01:59, 21 November 2016 (UTC)


 * I hope that my view from personal experience is helpful. I know that at Purdue, the Department of Computer Science was initially part of the Division of Mathematics Sciences, along with the Department of Mathematics and the Department of Statistics. The degree was developed as a master's program that would have enough courses to support a PhD and an undergraduate BS. It was very much a mathematics degree. It wasn't until the 70s that computers were the focus of a computer science degree. Maturation was necessary because the popularity of a computer science degree spread to universities big (such as Berkeley) and small (such as the College of Charleston) by 1970. Over and over, the mathematics department or division would develop a degree in computer science. Being mathematics professors, the degree would be highly theoretical and focus heavily on algorithms. Of note: C wasn't available yet. Personal computers were not available. Some universities didn't even have a mainframe computer to support their program, so they depended solely on the theory of computer science. When I went after my graduate degree, I asked what kind of mainframe the university had and how many cycles I would be allowed to use. I was flabbergasted by the number of programs that didn't have a mainframe for student use or didn't have a mainframe at all. My curriculum was a lot of math. I had to do a lot of calculus and discrete structures. A lot of algorithms - that was never ending. They just called it computer science I, computer science II, computer science III... but it is nothing more than writing formal proofs that your algorithm would solve whatever problem was thrown at you that week. Then, there was logic, also known as lambda calculus. Because of lambda calculus, I nearly quit computer science all together. The only reason I stayed was because I was given mainframe time to work on my research paper. I was finally writing an actual program to run on an actual computer. So, after 2 years of math and algorithm theory, I was suffering greatly with turning every problem in the world into a recursive mess and writing machine code to implement a lot of Minkowski's earlier work to computer science. When I later decided to do my PhD, it was very much different. By the 80's, personal computers were everywhere. C (and C++) were available. Classes were half theory and half implementation on an actual computer. Because it was a PhD, I focused on one and only one thing (dynamic programming). Of course, I also told all the young students horror stories of lambda calculus classes. To avoid an edit conflict, I will submit this and then Google references. I'm certain that others have written on the topic. 209.149.113.4 (talk) 13:37, 21 November 2016 (UTC)


 * History of the Computer Science program at Purdue shows that it was a masters program that supported a PhD and Undergrad and was part of the division of mathematics . 209.149.113.4 (talk) 13:38, 21 November 2016 (UTC)


 * Berkeley was different. Electical engineering formed the Computer Science program. That is why Berkeley has a jump-start on the engineering side of the science. . 209.149.113.4 (talk) 13:43, 21 November 2016 (UTC)


 * And... Stanford has a wiki for their history. That is not a good reference from me because I edit that wiki. 209.149.113.4 (talk) 13:44, 21 November 2016 (UTC)


 * Hi,


 * Thank you very much for the detailed answer. Can you add a few more details please? When did you study there? And I didn't entirely understand who did you ask about the mainframe. Where they graduates from other universities?


 * Thanks again — Preceding unsigned comment added by 141.226.218.14 (talk) 18:32, 21 November 2016 (UTC)


 * For Cambridge, there's an excellent history online: . The 1953 course was a diploma organised by the Faculty of Mathematics. Warofdreams talk 01:30, 24 November 2016 (UTC)