The ability to efficiently optimize or re-optimize an algorithm for high performance on a particular processor architecture is crucial in a wide spectrum of engineering and scientific applications. To help bridge the gap between fully automated optimization, which does not reliably produce optimal code, and fully manual optimization, which is…

A typical first computer science course (CS1) introduces the student to coding conventions, variables, methods, control structures, conditionals, and the semantics of classes and objects. Advanced concepts of inheritance, polymorphism, abstract classes, interfaces, and their use in the design process, are covered in a second-level course (CS2).…

In this article, we present CTRL_SPACE: a design for a software environment with companion hardware, developed to introduce preliterate children to basic computational concepts by means of an animatronic face, whose individual features serve as an analogy for a programmable object. In addition to presenting the environment, this article briefly…

This second chapter focuses on an analysis of the aspects that characterize the typical content of students' attitudes toward the world of computers. In this connection, it attempts to determine what is of the greatest interest to students as they deal with the world of computers, which types of programs they use, and which magazines they read…