Programming ? huh ?

Let's have a small discussion.

What are computers ?

In simple words. Computers are just things that compute.
Probably, all of you must have come across a computer atleast once.
Everything around you is a Computer. An ATM machine, a Car, a TV. All these are some sort of computers or contain computers.
Let's not get off track here....

What is Computer Science ?

Is it the study of computers ?
NO, it's not limited to computers.
A famous computer scientist named Edsgar Dijkstra once said that computers are to computer science what telescopes are to astronomy. Long time back, computers were the only tool that could compute and so it was named Computer Science.

Then, is it a science ? 

Not exactly. In science, say Physics for example,  if you're studying Electricity, you probably know everything about the underlying principles and the fundamental laws that govern electricity.
You know how charges interact, how current flows etc.

But in Computer Science, that's probably not what happens.In computer science you often learn things without knowing how it works under the hood. It's like driving a car. If you want to drive a car, you only need to know how to operate the Interface i.e. the steering wheel, accelerator, brake, gear etc. You don't need to know how an engine works, or how fuel flows from the fuel tank to the engine.

What is it ?

It is the study of problem solving. You might have seen a different definition somewhere else but, this is what it actually boils down to. Maybe at some other time when you guys learn a little more, I'll revisit this topic and give you a more comprehensive definition, but until then, this is it.

What is Programming ?

Programming is just telling the computer 'what to do' and 'how to do it'. A computer can only perform basic operations like moving bytes, some basic logical operations, and some basic arithmetic operations. but with these operations you can do a whole lotta things.


With this said, I will probably start with Python Programming