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What Math do You Use?

Posted by Cliff on from the anything-but-integrals...please! dept.

e_lehman asks: "I've been associated with MIT's introductory 'Mathematics for Computer Science' course for a number of years. The course has emphasized different topics in different years: logical foundations, proofs, probability, combinatorics, etc. But this is at the whim of instructors. What mathematical topics should we be teaching to budding computer scientists? What mathematics do you actually use or need, working in the computer industry? Here are some candidates: boolean logic, graphs, number theory, combinatorics, proofs, set theory, relations and functions, approximation methods, solving recurrences, generating functions, analysis of state machines, asymptotic analysis, and addition of small integers."

2 of 102 comments (clear)

  1. Analysis by prisonernumber7 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If a CS student is to ever make something useful out of his maths, you should be teaching him analysis:

    - Logic
    - How to set up proofs
    - Full induction
    - Rows (pardon me if this is not the correct english word, something like Sum[v=0,eternity] of 1/v!).
    - Functions (differential, integral)
    - Differential Equations
    - Function theory

    ... and so on.

    Basically anything that will teach them what maths is really about and give them the ability to get along with maths in a scientific way on their own.

    --
    && aemula C. ab stirpe interiit
  2. Control theory by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    My experiences from work...

    There are all kinds of embedded applications that require a lot more knowledge about resonances, loop gain, bode diagrams, filters, etc. than I got in CS.

    Any sort of feedback loop can oscillate or ring if it's designed improperly, and there's a whole science to designing them properly that I wish I'd studied.

    Any sort of modem (includeing cable, DSL, and radio) requires FFTs and filters. Cepstral analysis seems to be incredibly cool given how often it comes up when breaking audio watermarking schemes, but I don't know much about it.

    Group theory comes up a lot in error-correcting codes.

    3-D graphics requires a solid grounding in linear algebra and trigonometry. (And games these days involves feedback loops of NPCs responding to players and each other - see above.)