eugene@ames.UUCP (Eugene Miya) (01/02/85)
I have been following the discussions on net.college and net.cse, the
first on high school computer literacy requirements and the latter on
the quality of hackers as good programmers. I especially like the
postings by Brian Reid and the professor from back East.
I went on a short vacation before having a chance to respond.
From the receiving end after college, I would again like to stress the
importance of communication skills for anyone entering college. My
verbal skills were hardly the best when entering college, but when I
entered the working world, most of the people writing memos and papers
around me gave me complements for my 'good writing.' Without question,
at the different industrial and research establishments, the average
person needs better communication skills.
My main reason for posting this note is to tie these two common discussions.
Many readers have pointed out the need for skills in refining logic and
problem solving. There is an excellent book for both those entering
college and those hacking. It's written by a professor of Mechanical
Engineering at Stanford (know him Brian?). The book in entitled
"Conceptual Blockbusting"
It's published by W.H. Freeman (The people who reprint Scientific American
papers). I don't quite remember the man's name (Perhaps Martin?).
It's in it's second edition and the author has been requested to write a
follow on text. I highly recommend it. It's quite readable; thin, and
it poses some interesting problems for the reader.
--eugene miya
NASA Ames Research Center
{hplabs,ihnp4,dual,hao,vortex}!ames!aurora!eugene
emiya@ames-vmsb.ARPApaloma@sdcc12.UUCP ({zz1cp) (01/05/85)
> Many readers have pointed out the need for skills in refining logic and > problem solving. There is an excellent book for both those entering > college and those hacking. It's written by a professor of Mechanical > Engineering at Stanford (know him Brian?). The book in entitled > > "Conceptual Blockbusting" > It's published by W.H. Freeman (The people who reprint Scientific American > papers). I don't quite remember the man's name (Perhaps Martin?). > --eugene miya > NASA Ames Research Center I haven't read the book mentioned, but W.H. Freeman has a number of books by Martin Gardner. I have "aha!Insight" which presents combinatorics, geometry, number theory, logic, heuristics, and word games in the form of puzzles. I wish that I had read his books back in high school, or as a supplement to my Combinatorics class. Books like these make learning the subject matter fun. Cindy Paloma -- Cindy Paloma UCSD Academic Computing Center, C-010 La Jolla, CA 92093 [...]!sdcsvax!sdcc3!paloma paloma@ucsd.arpa
al@mot.UUCP (Al Filipski) (01/05/85)
eugene miya writes > From the receiving end after college, I would again like to stress the > importance of communication skills for anyone entering college. My > verbal skills were hardly the best when entering college, but when I > entered the working world, most of the people writing memos and papers > around me gave me complements for my 'good writing.' Without question, > at the different industrial and research establishments, the average > person needs better communication skills. The need for better verbal skills can't be emphasized strongly enough. When I was a professor, more than one undergraduate told me that he decided to go into engineering because he "didn't like to write". It's hard to imagine a worse misconception of what an engineer/scientist does and what skills he needs. This is probably due in part to assembly line engineering courses which require only short answers to problems; an engineering student can graduate with negligible writing skills. He is in for a rude shock in his first job, though. -------------------------------- Alan Filipski, UNIX group, Motorola Microsystems, Tempe, AZ U.S.A {allegra | ihnp4 } ! sftig ! mot ! al {seismo | ihnp4 } ! ut-sally ! oakhill ! mot ! al -------------------------------- Yes, but can you program the Towers of Hanoi in it?
riks@athena.UUCP (Rik Smoody) (01/08/85)
.... > Many readers have pointed out the need for skills in refining logic and > problem solving. There is an excellent book for both those entering > college and those hacking. It's written by a professor of Mechanical > Engineering at Stanford (know him Brian?). The book in entitled > > "Conceptual Blockbusting" > It's published by W.H. Freeman (The people who reprint Scientific American > papers). I don't quite remember the man's name (Perhaps Martin?). > It's in it's second edition and the author has been requested to write a > follow on text. I highly recommend it. It's quite readable; thin, and > it poses some interesting problems for the reader. > > > --eugene miya > NASA Ames Research Center > {hplabs,ihnp4,dual,hao,vortex}!ames!aurora!eugene > emiya@ames-vmsb.ARPA The author is James L Adams. I further the recommendation. Rik Smoody