Talking With Computers: Explorations in the Science and Technology of Computing

Preface page ix
Acknowledgments xiii

1 TALKING WITH COMPUTERS 1
1.1 Computers everywhere 2
1.2 Everyday magic 4
1.3 Hacking in mathematics 12
1.4 Programming in logic 13
1.5 Scheming in Lisp 17

2 THE SHELL GAME 22
2.1 Shell programming 24
2.2 Shell variables 29
2.3 Information passing 32
2.4 Asynchronous processes 37

3 KEEPING TRACK OF YOUR STUFF 41
3.1 Finding stuff 42
3.2 Organizing your stuff 47
3.3 Database management 51

4 DON'T SWEAT THE SYNTAX 57
4.1 Specifications and implementations 58
4.2 Syntactic variations across languages 63
4.3 Stylistic variations across implementations 67
4.4 Developing a facility for language 68

5 COMPUTATIONAL MUDDLES 70
5.1 Computational models 71
5.2 The substitution model 77
5.3 Syntax and style revisited 81

6 GETTING ORIENTED 85
6.1 Structuring large programs 86
6.2 Procedures that remember 87
6.3 Object-oriented programming 92
6.4 Programming with constraints 95

7 THANKS FOR SHARING 103
7.1 Code for the taking 105
7.2 Class conscious 109
7.3 It's just syntax 114

8 YOU'VE GOT (JUNK) EMAIL 121
8.1 Artificial intelligence 123
8.2 Machine learning 128
8.3 Learning with probabilities 133
8.4 Learning more about learning 138

9 MODERN ARCHITECTURE 140
9.1 Logic gates 141
9.2 The digital abstraction 144
9.3 Addition and multiplication 146
9.4 Computer memory 149
9.5 Machine language 152

10 DO ROBOTS SLEEP? 162
10.1 Stacks and subroutines 163
10.2 Managing tasks 168
10.3 Multithreaded robots 172
10.4 Allocating resources 178
10.5 Metaphorically speaking 184

11 UNDER THE HOOD 185
11.1 Client-server model 186
11.2 Acronym city 189
11.3 Alphabet soup 191
11.4 Smart milk cartons 193

12 ANALYZE THIS 196
12.1 Analyzing algorithms 197
12.2 Computational limitations 205
12.3 Theory that matters 210

13 FOREST FOR THE TREES 213
13.1 Graph theory 214
13.2 Graph algorithms 217
13.3 File systems as graphs 228
13.4 The web graph 230
13.5 Pianos and robots 232

14 SEARCHING THE WILD WEB 237
14.1 Spiders in the web 237
14.2 Measuring similarity 240
14.3 Measuring authority 248
14.4 Searching for exotic fruit 254

15 DARWIN'S DANGEROUS ALGORITHM 257
15.1 Competing hypotheses 258
15.2 Genetic algorithms 259
15.3 Survival of the fittest 263

16 AIN'T NOBODY HERE BUT US MACHINES 271
16.1 Machine intelligence 272
16.2 Other minds 277
16.3 Freedom to choose 281
16.4 Carrying on 285

Bibliography 289
Index 295