Apologies, but I do not understand the "+1"; is this approval to post
additional commentary on this matter, or, again, is this discussion not
suitable for this list? I did not initiate the matter of the ACM view or
curricular recommendations, in contrast to that of an information
technology approach; but there seem to be fundamental misconceptions
concerning the fields of computer science and engineering in the
commentary, just as I have met some "applied" physicists who have
misconceptions about fundamental physics (e.g., high energy physics and
general relativity). (I mention fundamental physics because that is the
basic reason for the existence of both Fermilab and CERN -- at both
institutions, EL is the operating environment to enable the research,
rather than DEC VMS of a previous epoch. Those in the EL community gain
from this use.)
For Lamar, who evidently has looked at my not-recently-updated academic
home page, the item you mention is posted there from another source (I
do not have any graphics artists to support my work, and do not have the
spare time to do the stick figure material you see) that I thought was
credited. I use this introduction to AES (and cryptography in general),
along with a Conan Doyle short story, as my part of the "dog and pony
show" my department does on an annual basis to recruit high school
students to come to our ABET accredited programs as undergraduate
majors. If a person cannot handle mathematics, including that behind
encryption, then, regrettably, computer science and engineering probably
is not a good fit (nor would physics be). When I teach a course
involving encryption, I cover it with greater depth than what you see in
the cartoon -- but I still have the students read the cartoon to get
some background before I teach the mathematics and then the cryptography.
On 02/22/2016 11:29 AM, William Shu wrote:
Yasha/Lamar + 1 for your views on these comparisons, and Lamar's
university's conclusions (and justifications thereto) when done, on or
off list.
William.
On Monday, February 22, 2016 6:54 PM, Lamar Owen <[email protected]> wrote:
On 02/22/2016 11:50 AM, Yasha Karant wrote:
> would it be appropriate for me to post a response? The differences
> are deep and fundamental.
>
I can't answer that; a moderator would need to. I would personally
welcome a direct e-mail with the explanation myself, as my .edu is
currently investigating 'CS' curricula (where 'CS' is the
Google/Microsoft version and not the ACM version of 'CS').
And for the list, one of the more fascinating things you are likely to
ever read is Yasha Karant's 'A Stick Figure Guide to the Advanced
Encryption Standard (AES)' which is available at
http://www.csci.csusb.edu/ykarant/cryptography/aes-cartoon.pdf ; I
certainly found it interesting.
My paragraph was simply there to let you know that there are probably
many more IT folk here than CS folk, and IT folk tend to have a very
hands-on and practical 'here's the standard way to do it' answer and an
eye towards maintainability, and all of that is just a part of the IT
mindset. Neither is the more correct mindset; the mindsets are just
different. A CIS-mindset is yet even more different, but that's not
nearly as well represented here, nor are the CE or SE mindsets, but the
IT mindset is very much predominant here. As well, it was to serve to
let the list as a whole know that there are different mindsets out there
that are very different from the typical sysadmin IT-centric mindset.
