So we ended last episode with programming at the hardware level with things like plugboards and huge panels of switches, but what was really needed was a more versatile way to program computers - ...

As an undergraduate, Rob Pike first read Brian Kernighan's book on the C programming language while home sick from classes at the University of Toronto. "I lay in bed and I read it cover to cover," ...

For decades, fierce debates have raged over the benefits of different programming languages over others: Java vs. C++; Python vs. Ruby; Flask vs. Django. While often waged with fervor by computer ...

Knowing how to program a computer is good for you, and it’s a shame more people don’t learn to do it. For years now, that’s been a hugely popular stance. It’s led to educational initiatives as ...

Computer scientists are building mathematical models to represent the safest and most effective ways to perform surgery, including tasks such as suturing, dissecting and joining tissue. Borrowing ...

Bradley Beach Elementary School students Kasey Minsky, far left, and Thomas Sexsmith work on a program in their technology class. Microsoft founder Bill Gates got his first exposure at age 13.

You say puh-tay-tow, I say puh-tah-tow, but how did our ancestors use language millennia ago? Typically you’d ask a linguist, but manually reconstructing protolanguages — hypothetical early languages ...

Computer-mediated communication (CMC), which began in proprietary companies two decades ago, has developed into a worldwide medium of communication that ESOL learners encounter inside and outside the ...

If you are a very large, rich technology company today, it seems it is no longer enough to have your own humongous data centers, luxurious buses, and organic lunch bars. You need your very own ...

The best class I took in college was on the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein. Until that point, I had avoided philosophy of language as simply being too esoteric and hermetic to be of use. David Pears, ...

Scientists at the Carnegie Mellon University's Robotics Institute (CMU RI) are working on a computer system that can read body language right down to the position of fingers. The new process works in ...