An alternative approach to applications programming

With the labor needs of the robot and computer-aided manufacturing industry cutting across all areas of labor, we have seen a recent outbreak of educational programs at various levels to meet these requirements. These programs are aimed at fulfilling the industrial needs for designers, engineers, maintenance technicians, on-floor supervisors and operators. The traditional liberal arts computer science major generally has been well prepared to go out into the business world to write and maintain COBOL programs. The trend since ACM's "'CURRICULUM '78" has been toward more mathematical Tiger in the computer science curriculum. This trend undoubtedly made current graduates much better 'pencil and paper' problem solvers. Additionally, the computer science rigor of many programs has prepared many excellent, fledgling, systems programmers. However, these graduates often lack the kind of training that helps them bridge the enormous chasm between classroom projects and 'real-world' applications programs. The author has found that introductory robotics is also an excellent area to introduce the undergraduate , liberal arts, computer science student to solution of 'real world' physical tasks. The course,entitled "AN INTRODUCTION TO ROBOTICS" was designed to aid students to comprehend that in their careers as computer scientists, in addition to mainframes, minis, and pc's, they may encounter the computer in a variety of engineering systems whose outputs are not always on hardcopy,card,tape, or CRT screen. Course prerequisites, design, problems encoutered, midcourse corrections, results, conclusions, and course redesign will be described.