A comparison of the core aspects of the ACM/IEEE Computer Science Curriculum 2013 Strawman report with the specified core of CC2001 and CS2008 review

Abstract

With the changes in the structure of the proposed volume for Computer Science of the ACM/IEEE curricula series for 2013 it is difficult to conceptualise what the extent of these changes are when reading the Strawman report. This paper is an attempt to quantify these changes. It discusses the core curricula as defined in the ACM/IEEE curricula volumes for Computer Science of 2001, 2008 Review and the 2013 Strawman report and shows how a real-world curriculum can be compared to the volumes. Both a visual comparison for the curricula volumes and an algorithmic comparison are presented. The visual comparison provides a quick indication that there are differences, while the algorithmic comparison provides a mechanism to quantify the differences and as a side effect the similarities. These comparisons are restricted to the core aspects of the curricula being evaluated and further to this subsections of the core curricula will be used for illustrative purposes in order to contain the complexity of curricula specifications.