Introduction to computer science  

Course introduction. Hardware e software. Short history of computing.

2 h

Information coding  

Binary system, base N representation, ASCII and Unicode. Compression.

4 h

Computer architecture  

Boolean logic and logical circuits. Computers operational principles, fetch/execute cycle. Von Neumann's model, memories, devices.

4 h

Operating systems  

The notion of virtual machine, O.S. components, compilers and interpreters.

4 h

Computer networks and WWW  

Introduction to computer networks, internet and the WWW.

4 h

Algorithms  

Algorithm properties, linear vs dichotomic search. Hints on complexity and computability.

4 h

Introduction to MATLAB programming

MATLAB fundamentals, variables, data types, scripts, integrated development environment

4 h

Array and Vectors

Collections of homogeneous objects in MATLAB

4 h

Control structures

Control structures for selection (if-then-else) and iteration (for, while)

4 h

Functions and recursion

MATLAB functions, parameter passing, local variables, encapsulation. Activation stack and recursion.

4 h

Strings

Functions for string manipulation in MATLAB.

2 h

Structures and Cell Arrays

Collections of dissimilar objects in MATLAB.

2 h

File I/O

Functions for reading and writing from and to a file.

2 h

Matrices

Introduction to matrix computing in MATLAB.

4 h

Images and sounds

Images formats, simple processing. Sound processing in the time and frequency domain, FFT (hints).

4 h

Numerical methods

Nonlinear equations (one variable), interpolation, linear regression, numerical integration.

4 h

Sorting

Insertion Sort, Bubble sort, Quick Sort, Merge Sort.

4 h