Convincing Colleges to Upgrade Their Classes?

Pray_4_Mojo asks: "I'm an engineering student at the University of Pittsburgh, and I'm currently taking a required class known as 'Computer Interfacing'. While I enjoy the instructor, I find most of the material to be severely dated. We will spend the majority of the class covering RS232/XMODEM/Token Ring means of computer-to-computer communication. Almost no mention of USB, Firewire, or IRDa is made within the class. I am trying to convince my professor that this material is relevant, as these types of interfaces will be dominate in the world we future grads will be working in. As an example, I demonstrated that the keycard access system to gain access to the Interfacing Lab has a USB port for data download/firmware programming. The professor seems interested, but it seems that I need to convince the department to revise the course requirements. Has anyone attempted to modernize their CS/Engineering program and met with success?"

Comments

The concepts you will learn are the same...

[gtwreck]

It's not about whether or not you have experience in the latest tools and technologies. It's whether you have the fundamentals in place to allow you to apply that fundamental knowledge to any other system.

In the specific case of serial interfaces, there really isn't all that much different between RS-232, RS-485, and USB or Firewire. They are all serial interfaces that employ the same fundamental concepts. In the real world you'll have to apply that knowledge to any number of serial interfaces.

The same logic can be applied to a discussion yesterday about using MS or open source programming environments in a CS department.

Re:The concepts you will learn are the same...

[itwerx]

No, not at all. (Are you trolling? :)
You are told to forget the technology which was used to convey the concepts, but the concepts are where the value is.
Here's an example.
If you want to learn how to fly a 747 you don't start out on one! You spend many years and tens of thousands of dollars learning on the concepts on smaller aircraft. Granted, knowing the gauge layout of a Cessna has zero relevance to a 747 but the concept of watching your fuel levels applies equally well in either case.
So yes, when you get to 747 school they will say "forget all that other airplane stuff" but they're not really telling you to forget the concepts, just the nitty-gritty details that you don't need any more.
Compres vous?

RS232 Is EVERYWHERE

[muscleman706]

I don't know about Token Ring, but RS232 is all over the place in industrial hardware like barcode scanners and other non-PC hardware. I think it is much simpler to program both for the programmers and the hardware designers. Also, remember that Intel came up with USB to sell processors because USB is a total CPU hog as compared to FireWire. So, while your PC does not have a problem with this now, certainly industrial hardware does not have the infrastructure on board to deal with USB. So, I think the appropriate thing is to talk about RS232, USB, IrA, BlueTooth, and WAP. You want BlueTooth because it is going to be in all cellphones, hence proliferate into everything else. You want WAP because for things where BlueTooth is too slow, you will want a higher-speed wireless system. For instance, you could have a WAP enabled Digital Video Camcorder that automatically pops up a recording window when you start recording, all without any wires!