And a side question to the group: is Linear Algebra part of modern CS courses? I think it should be, but I've been wondering if it still is taught outside Electronics courses.
Frédéric Hannes Good to know! Recently used the above linear algebra tricks and was surprised to see some devs discover there were laws that could be applied "mechanically" to Boolean expressions. Hopefully most students won't think it's something they can forget about after leaving university ;-)
Well, I was actually using this before I learned about it there, so I certainly won't forget it. I'm not entirely sure, but I think I picked up this practice from "Code Complete" by "Steve McConnell", a book I'd recommend to every beginner and expert programmer.
I don't think these things were covered in my linear algebra class though. I'm certain it was in my Formal Logic class and maybe Artificial Intelligence.
For those of us who cut our teeth on DTL and TTL, as the standard gates were mostly inverting, the mental calisthenics of logic conversions became second nature. CMOS changed that, as the logic gates were all offered with or without inversion.
Peter Müller-Mannhardt Yes, this can and should be used both ways. Especially since the compiler knows ho the perform the transformations as well, so there is typically performance penalty.
And a side question to the group: is Linear Algebra part of modern CS courses? I think it should be, but I've been wondering if it still is taught outside Electronics courses.
ReplyDeleteAlready doing this =)
ReplyDeleteEric Grange I'm a computer science major at the KULeuven university in Belgium, I have an exam on Linear Algebra in 2 days
Frédéric Hannes Good to know! Recently used the above linear algebra tricks and was surprised to see some devs discover there were laws that could be applied "mechanically" to Boolean expressions. Hopefully most students won't think it's something they can forget about after leaving university ;-)
ReplyDeleteWell, I was actually using this before I learned about it there, so I certainly won't forget it. I'm not entirely sure, but I think I picked up this practice from "Code Complete" by "Steve McConnell", a book I'd recommend to every beginner and expert programmer.
ReplyDeleteI don't think these things were covered in my linear algebra class though. I'm certain it was in my Formal Logic class and maybe Artificial Intelligence.
I learned this many years ago, as a hardware designer. It's also taught in Discrete Mathematics.
ReplyDeleteI learned this many years ago as a hardware designer too.
ReplyDeleteFor those of us who cut our teeth on DTL and TTL, as the standard gates were mostly inverting, the mental calisthenics of logic conversions became second nature. CMOS changed that, as the logic gates were all offered with or without inversion.
ReplyDeletePeter Müller-Mannhardt Program that realizes McCluskey algorithm was my course project :)
ReplyDeletePeter Müller-Mannhardt Yes, this can and should be used both ways. Especially since the compiler knows ho the perform the transformations as well, so there is typically performance penalty.
ReplyDelete