The first real-time digital computer (Project Whirlwind)…the first multiplayer video game, “SpaceWar!”…Arpanet, Ethernet, email, TCP/IP, the World Wide Web…and of course, OCW and edX.
These are among 50 ways that MIT has transformed computer science, a list compiled by MIT CSAIL (Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory).
On May 28-29, 2014, the MAC50 symposium at MIT celebrates the 50th anniversary of item #4 on this list: Project MAC. Project MAC (Multiple Access Computer and Machine Aided Cognition) set about developing a computing system that would allow individuals to access computational power much as we are able to access electricity for our homes. The result was time-sharing and a new paradigm of interactive computing, which laid the foundation for many of today’s basic design concepts for software systems.
OCW has several hundred courses on computer science topics. Here are a few notable courses by past directors of CSAIL and its predecessor AI Lab:
- 6.868J The Society of Mind by Marvin Minsky
- 6.034 Artificial Intelligence by Patrick Winston
- 6.345 Automatic Speech Recognition by Victor Zue
- 6.002 Circuits and Electronics by Anant Agarwal
