What Computer Science concepts should I know? [closed]

Answer 1

I upvote Discrete math. Computer science is abstraction. learning to think like a Mathematician is very helpful.

I also wanted to add to what S.Lott said about languages. Learning a bunch of TYPES of languages is important too. Not just compiled vs scripting. But functional (ML, Lisp, Haskell) logical (Prolog) object oriented (C++, Java, Smalltalk) imperative (C, Pascal, FORTRAN even).

The more programming paradigms you know, the easier it is to pick up new languages when the hot new language comes along!

Answer 2

As a recent graduate from a computer science degree I'd recommend the following:

• As mentioned in various posts Big O notation

  OO Design

  Data structures & Algorithms (can't remember the exact title of the book I used will update if i remember)

  Operating Systems http://www.amazon.com/Modern-Operating-Systems-2nd-GOAL/dp/0130313580

  NP Problems

Answer 3

You definitely should understand the Big-O notation and Big-O estimations of algorithms - what it is, how it is used, why it is important, how you compare two algorithms given their Big-O estimations, how you build Big-O estimations for the simple algorithms.

Answer 4

No, not bubble sort, quicksort. It's the big-O thing- bubble sort averages O(n^2), quicksort is O(n*log(n)).

Answer 5

I would say below are the most important stuff

• Object Oriented Programming
• Operating System concepts
  • Process and Thread
  • Scheduling Algorithms
• Data Structure
  • Type of data storage and collection, types (linkedlist, hash, array etc.)
  • Sorting Algorithms
  • Complexity of algorithms

Then Go to specific language related stuff. I hope this is helpful!!

Answer 6

I would say nowadays an understanding of Object Orientated Programming is a must, even if you don’t need to use it day to day.

From this I would also say understanding the most common patterns can also help.