En intressant artikel ”Why Doesn’t ACM Have a SIG for Theoretical Computer Science?” speglar hur behovet av en teoretisk och en praktisk inriktning på CS har vuxit fram.
Speciellt kommentaren av Tansley:
”How did such a sharp division arise between TCS in North America and Europe? This division did not exist prior to the 1980s.
Oh yes it did. I am old enough to remember CS in the late 1960’s 1970’s at Edinburgh. We had an international reputation in theory (CCS etc) and later in practical things like OS, silicon compilers and AI. Being versed in the latter resulted in many trips to the US and Europe but not just to Academic departments but industry as well. My overwhelming impression was that CS in Europe grew out of maths departments while in the US engineering departments were lot more prominent and in closer touch with industry. In those days practical computing cost a lot of money. It was still new and a lot easier for Boards and Councils to say it was just maths (and therefore cheap). Edinburgh along with Manchester and Cambridge was one of the few schools in Europe to have CS classified as a Science/Engineering subject and able to get appropriate funds. Now of course theory and practice are slightly more integrated but I suggest if you trawled through the commercial pre-eminence of the US and correlated this with relevant theory you will find your explanation. The cynic in me says in the US theory was useful whereas in Europe it was interesting. ”
A Framework for K-12 Computer Science Education (http://k12cs.org/resources/)