MIT Press eBooks

With this book you can learn to write good programs that do interesting things right off the bat, writes software developer Julie Sussman. This is the introductory [programming] text that I wish I had had Scheme - a simple, learnable dialect of LISP has emerged as a popular educational language as well as a serious tool for producing applications and system software. Programming in Scheme provides an accessible introduction to Scheme that assumes no previous programming experience and covers all the basics of the language and many advanced topics as well. It gets readers on the machine early, teaches language structure and programming technique through extended examples an exercises, and emphasizes debugging throughout. Chapters are organized as a ...

Have you ever wondered how your GPS can find the fastest way to your destination, selecting one route from seemingly countless possibilities in mere seconds? How your credit card account number is protected when you make a purchase over the Internet? The answer is algorithms. And how do these mathematical formulations translate themselves into your GPS, your laptop, or your smart phone? This book offers an engagingly written guide to the basics of computer algorithms. In Algorithms Unlocked, Thomas Cormen -- coauthor of the leading college textbook on the subject -- provides a general explanation, with limited mathematics, of how algorithms enable computers to solve problems. Readers will learn what computer algorithms are, how to describe them, and ...

This is a book about the computer revolution of the mid-20th century and the people who made it possible. Unlike most histories of computing, it is not a book about machines, inventors, or entrepreneurs. Instead, it tells the story of the vast but largely anonymous legions of computer specialists-programmers, systems analysts, and other software developers-who transformed the electronic computer from a scientific curiosity into the defining technology of the modern era. Known alternatively as whiz kids, hackers, and gurus, this new breed of technical specialists were alternately admired for their technical prowess and despised for their eccentric mannerisms and the disruptive potential of the technologies they developed. As the systems that they buil...

This book introduces students with little or no prior programming experience to the art of computational problem solving using Python and various Python libraries, including PyLab. It provides students with skills that will enable them to make productive use of computational techniques, including some of the tools and techniques of "data science" for using computation to model and interpret data. The book is based on an MIT course (which became the most popular course offered through MIT's OpenCourseWare) and was developed for use not only in a conventional classroom but in a massive open online course (or MOOC) offered by the pioneering MIT-Harvard collaboration edX.Students are introduced to Python and the basics of programming in the con...

Since the 1970s the cognitive sciences have offered multidisciplinary ways of understanding the mind and cognition. The MIT Encyclopedia of the Cognitive Sciences (MITECS) is a landmark, comprehensive reference work that represents the methodological and theoretical diversity of this changing field.At the core of the encyclopedia are 471 concise entries, from Acquisition and Adaptationism to Wundt and X-bar Theory. Each article, written by a leading researcher in the field, provides an accessible introduction to an important concept in the cognitive sciences, as well as references or further readings. Six extended essays, which collectively serve as a roadmap to the articles, provide overviews of each of six major areas of cognitive science: Philosop...