Simply Scheme: Introducing Computer Science

“Simply Scheme: Introducing Computer Science 2nd Edition” by Brian Harvey and Matthew Wright. Read it online or download in pdf format. This lively introduction to computer science and computer programming in Scheme is for non-computer science majors with a strong interest in the subject and for computer science majors who lack prior programming experience.

Book Description

The text allows the student to experience the computer as a tool for expressing ideas, not as a frustrating set of mathematical obstacles. This goal is supported by the use of Scheme, a modern dialect of Lisp, designed to emphasize symbolic programming.

This book is intended as an introduction to computer programming and to computer science for two kinds of students.

For those whose main interest is in some other field, we provide a self-contained, one-semester experience with computer programming in a language with a minimum of complicated notation, so that students can quickly come in contact with high-level ideas about algorithms, functions, and recursion. The book ends with the implementation of a spreadsheet program and a database program, so it complements a computer application course in which the commercial versions of such programs are used.

For those who intend to continue the study of computer science but who have no prior programming experience, we offer a preparatory course, less intense than a traditional CS 1 but not limited to programming technique; we give the flavor of computer science ideas that will be studied in more depth later in the curriculum. We also include an extensive discussion of recursion, which is a stumbling block for many beginning students.

Table of Contents

• Introduction: Functions
• Composition of Functions
• Functions as Data
• Recursion
• Abstraction
• Sequential Programming
• Conclusion: Computer Science

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