Abstract
It is a fundamental idea of computer science to search for, define, analyze, and operate with construction kits consisting of small sets of basic building blocks and a small number of operations to combine the building blocks to larger objects. While the construction kit is mostly simple, it often defines a vast, complex field that consists of all possible objects that can be built from the building blocks by using any (finite) sequence of combinations of operators. This idea affects and structures many areas of computer science. We present examples from several fields, including imperative and functional programming languages, computable functions, Turing and register machines, Boolean functions, data types, object-oriented programming, characterisations of formal languages along with examples from other disciplines. How can informatics lessons profit? If lessons are oriented towards a fundamental idea, the idea may explain, structure, and integrate many different informatics subjects and phenomena by a single recurring scheme. On the other hand, the construction kit principle belongs to the sphere of everyday thinking so students already have a basic intuition of the concept which may enhance their understanding when entering any field where the idea applies.
The original version of this chapter was revised: The copyright line was incorrect. This has been corrected. The Erratum to this chapter is available at DOI: 10.1007/978-0-387-35663-1_34
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© 2003 IFIP International Federation for Information Processing
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Schwill, A. (2003). Informatics — The Science of Minimal Systems with Maximal Complexity. In: van Weert, T.J., Munro, R.K. (eds) Informatics and the Digital Society. IFIP — The International Federation for Information Processing, vol 116. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-35663-1_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-35663-1_2
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