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Sane · Apr 14th, 2008, 10:02 PM

I was talking to a friend the other day, someone who knows little about computers, when she asked me "So what exactly do you do?" in response to the topic of programming.

And it occured to me that not so many people actually know what computer science encompasses, either as a hobby, or as a job. Many seem to think it's all about making games. And it's even harder to explain why it isn't, to someone who doesn't live on a computer.

My response was somewhat ambiguous, along the lines of "Interpreting, solving, and representing data through computational analysis and problem solving".

I've been asked this question a number of times now, and frankly don't have a good response. How would you respond to that same question, in as few words as possible, to someone who's not so computer savvy?

Apr 14th, 2008, 10:02 PM	#1
Sane Programming Guru Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: Waterloo, Ontario Posts: 1,869 Rep Power: 5	And... so what exactly do you do? I was talking to a friend the other day, someone who knows little about computers, when she asked me "So what exactly do you do?" in response to the topic of programming. And it occured to me that not so many people actually know what computer science encompasses, either as a hobby, or as a job. Many seem to think it's all about making games. And it's even harder to explain why it isn't, to someone who doesn't live on a computer. My response was somewhat ambiguous, along the lines of "Interpreting, solving, and representing data through computational analysis and problem solving". I've been asked this question a number of times now, and frankly don't have a good response. How would you respond to that same question, in as few words as possible, to someone who's not so computer savvy? __________________ Waterloo's Canadian Computing Competition (CCC) - Stage 2 Problems, Solutions, and Test Data