Link: The death of computing : Future of Computing : BCS.
This op-ed from a lecturer at the De Montfort University in the UK - and member of the British Computing Society - asks the question "Is computer science education so out of whack with real-world needs, that the existence of the field is threatened?"
Many curricula in higher education must adjust regularly to changing conditions in their disciplines. Technology changes, discoveries change perceptions and theories, the outside world changes the need and/or the execution of the discipline. Two of the most drastically impacted areas of study are bioscience and computer science. Bioscience has actually made a trade of leap-frogging research and constantly changing educational paths and content.
Computer science - the theoretical basis of Information Technology, has not pursued such a high-profile nor rigorous program of research or change, lately. For one thing - the commercial sector has arguably decimated the ranks of potential university researchers and teachers. Moreover, the new developments are more of a problem-solving nature, than a result of the examination of basic principles, or the discovery of new facts or theories.
A five-minute brainstorm - even among laymen - can assemble a pretty respectable and lengthy list of issues deserving investigation in the bioscience fields. The open questions in computer science seem much more obscure -and much less relevant to any real world curiosity or commercial potential. We live in a time where better computing as resolved into faster processors. The biggest news in new computing science seems to fall to any new announcement from Intel or AMD or IBM about miniaturization of traditional chip architectures - or application of alternate transmission media - like light - to carry and process information.
The biosciences have large and very public problems to solve - cures for devastating diseases, enhancement of biological systems, the "map" of genomes (literally harking back to that internal need for exploration and adventure). The world eagerly awaits every drop of news - and there are assertive business people waiting to implement new ideas, foundations ready to fund distribution and education - it's a social movement!
We know that there are problems whose solutions would improve computing. But the potential for making any fundamental changes in the way computing is done, the base technologies that enable and support it - are slim and none.
Bill Gates has recently been bemoaning the state of the education-turning-to-employee pipeline in the computing science field. But, ironically, Microsoft itself may be one of the greatest obstacles to ramping up any excitement about research and growth in the field. Microsoft's dominance is such that no independent idea has very good odds of succeeding (and investors are notoriously skittish about going up against the king of all "established leaders"). And the process for getting new ideas even considered is simply unknown to outsiders of the company.
And the days of "one guy in a garage" making a big difference - especially a fundamental difference - are long gone. Just as bioscience has out-grown the lone experimenter and turned into massive collaboration projects - so has computing science where hardware advances occur at the nano level, and software advances require simultaneous changes in multiple levels of systems.
The open source movement might have some potential for enabling groups of people to tackle large problems - but so far those teams have focused on applications - most often open source versions - read "free distribution" - of profit-making applications. Searching for fundamental new ways to compute, for new techniques for security, encryption, networking or any of a host of other projects - is going to be pursued by people who are convinced their creative energies will lead them to wealth and personal freedom.
Microsoft is not an evil bad guy as far as the future of computer science - is concerned - but the company does represent a real obstacle to progress - and a real potential for change. If we could find ways to openly identify the big problems of computing - and find ways to make their research open and exciting again - with rewards given where rewards are due - outside of the paranoid limits of patents and secrecy and all the rest - we might get computing science back on track.
Meanwhile, IT remains the kingpin. Practical problem-solving - and the application of all the sciences that converge on computing - will remain the outpost for new frontiers. And we'll go as far as we need to go.
(-- originally posted by Rich Bowers, Coordinator, Ohio IT Clearinghouse)