Harvard University has announced several new free online courses for Computer Science students and aspiring programmers. The University has been a pioneer in offering best online courses in the computer programming domain to help students and beginners develop strong programming skills and build a successful career.
The recently opened courses can be obtained for free at the online learning platform, edX. Here are the details -
1. CS50's Understanding Technology
This newly-launched course is for students who don’t (yet) consider themselves computer persons. The CS50's Understanding Technology course is designed for people who are working with technology every day even without understanding how it all works. This course fills in the gaps, empowering beginners to use and troubleshoot technology more effectively. The 6-week long course includes lectures on hardware, the Internet, multimedia, security, programming, and web development.
Further details
Course duration: 6 Weeks
Pace: Self-paced
Difficulty: Introductory
Instructor: David J Malan, Gordon McKay Professor of the Practice of Computer Science, Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences
2. CS50's Introduction to Programming with Scratch
Scratch is a visual programming language, designed at MIT's Media Lab, to empower students with no prior programming experience to design their own animations, games, interactive art, and stories. Using Scratch, this course introduces students to fundamentals of programming, found not only in Scratch itself but in traditional text-based languages (like Java and Python) as well.
The course includes important elements of a programming language, including, but not limited to, functions, events, return values, conditions, loops, variables, and more. Ultimately, this course prepares students for subsequent courses in programming.
Further details
Course duration: 3 Weeks
Pace: Self-paced
Difficulty: Introductory
Instructor: David J Malan, Gordon McKay Professor of the Practice of Computer Science, Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences
3. CS50: Introduction to Computer Science
An entry-level course CS50x teaches students how to think algorithmically and solve problems efficiently. This is a basic course that every aspirant must enrol to, to understand the gimmicks of computer science. The course is specifically designed for freshers and includes concepts like abstraction, algorithms, data structures, encapsulation, resource management, security, software engineering, and web development. Languages include C, Python, SQL, and JavaScript plus CSS and HTML.
Further details
Course duration: 11 Weeks
Commitment: 10-20 hours per week
Pace: Self-paced
Difficulty: Introductory
Instructors:
David J Malan, Gordon McKay Professor of the Practice of Computer Science, Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences
Doug Lloyd - Senior Preceptor in Computer Science, Harvard University
Brian Yu - Senior Preceptor in Computer Science, Harvard University
4. CS50's Introduction to Game Development
This course is more like a hands-on experience for learners as they explore the design and development of 2D and 3D interactive games such as Super Mario Bros., Pong, Flappy Bird, Breakout, Match 3, Legend of Zelda, Angry Birds, Pokémon, 3D Helicopter Game, Dreadhalls, and Portal. Via lectures and hands-on projects, the course explores principles of 2D and 3D graphics, animation, sound, and collision detection using frameworks like Unity and LÖVE 2D, as well as languages like Lua and C#.
Further details
Course duration: 12 Weeks
Commitment: 6-9 hours per week
Pace: Self-paced
Difficulty: Intermediate
Instructors:
David J Malan, Gordon McKay Professor of the Practice of Computer Science, Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences
Colton Ogden - Technologist, Harvard University
5. CS50's Introduction to Artificial Intelligence with Python
This special course explores the concepts and algorithms at the foundation of modern artificial intelligence, diving into the ideas that give rise to technologies like game-playing engines, handwriting recognition, and machine translation. Through hands-on projects, students gain exposure to the theory behind graph search algorithms, classification, optimization, reinforcement learning, and other topics in artificial intelligence and machine learning as they incorporate them into their own Python programs.
Further details
Course duration: 7 Weeks
Commitment: 10-30 hours per week
Pace: Self-paced
Difficulty: Introductory
Instructor: David J Malan, Gordon McKay Professor of the Practice of Computer Science, Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences