Looking Back Looking Forward Curt Hill Valley City

Looking Back Looking Forward Curt Hill Valley City State University

A Different Presentation • This is usually the time when I explain something new and different that I have tried • Not this time • No answers, musings and questions • What can the past tell us about the future? • How will we get ready for that future? Copyright © 2007 Curt Hill

Contradiction • It is impossible to accurately predict the future • There are certain recognizable trends that will dramatically influence the future • This crystal ball will not paint a detailed picture, but will give us some indication as to what to look for Copyright © 2007 Curt Hill

Advancement • The rate of change will continue to increase • Change is predicated on economic vigor • Economic health will provide incentive for change • As long as a product improvement translates into sales, change will occur Copyright © 2007 Curt Hill

Example • How many of you drive a five year old car? • How many regularly use a five year old computer? • What kind of computers will we have in five years? • Will our programming paradigm have changed in five years? Copyright © 2007 Curt Hill

Silicon • The law of diminishing returns must eventually overpower Moore’s law • We cannot shrink transistors forever at the rate we have been • The multi-cores are a sign • They confirm that we cannot continue to shrink the transistor • They also confirm that our technology will advance without that shrinking Copyright © 2007 Curt Hill

Another principle • Our technology constrains our vision • We can often see what could be possible within the current constraints • When these constraints change it is hard to enlarge our vision • Was it not Bill Gates who said “Who would want more than 64 K? ” Copyright © 2007 Curt Hill

Some Examples • Luggables – Who could tell this is the Wright flyer? •

Another Example • Exploitation of multiple cores • The hardware designers have defamed the software designers • The multiple cores increase our power, but software has not caught up • Most users cannot utilize the power they have already • When will our paradigm catch up? – Compilers Copyright © 2007 Curt Hill

Specialization and Differentiation • As the field matures our hardware has specialized • First was the CPU • Now we have a whole variety of processors that perform specialized tasks • Is there any reason to believe that neither our programming languages or operating systems will not do the same? Copyright © 2007 Curt Hill

Programming Languages • The most recent introductions have been interpretive or scripting languages • In days gone by this would have been a sore point • If this opens the field to more people can it be anything other than a good thing? Copyright © 2007 Curt Hill

Mathematics Department • Many, if not most, are service departments – They offer courses that are required all over campus – Relatively few majors • Should the Computer Science department be headed in the same direction? – Everyone needs computing, but very few need the major – Will specialized languages do this? Copyright © 2007 Curt Hill

Operating Systems • The OS continues to grow • The services offered today would be unheard of not that many years ago • Is this good or bad? • Good if two conditions are met – The hardware can support it – Is it well designed Copyright © 2007 Curt Hill

Interface • How much longer will the WIMP interface last? • This is the successor to the batch / control language and then the timesharing / command line interface • Both of those were thought adequate for some time • Why do we think the current will last forever? Copyright © 2007 Curt Hill

One last crazy idea • The one laptop per child initiative did away with the disk drive – Too expensive, too much power • Replaced it with a 4 M flash drive • What could we do with a 60 G flash drive with quick access? • Do away with main memory as we know it Copyright © 2007 Curt Hill

Finally • We know change is inevitable • We know the constraints that we know will be loosened • We know that there will be increased specialization of hardware and software • How will we prepare ourselves? • How will we prepare the students of the future? Copyright © 2007 Curt Hill