Computational thinking and Computational Methods

Computational thinking and Computational Methods

1. Thinking abstractly

   • To think abstractly you need to remove unnecessary details and only think about the relevant details.
     • To do this you need to identify what does and does not matter when solving the problem.
     • You can do this by thinking about different parts or 'levels' of a problem and what variables or objects are needed.
   • Thinking abstractly will allow you to make predictions about what is needed or what users may want to do with it.

2. Thinking ahead

   • Thinking ahead means thinking about what the conditions of use could be before the creation of something.
     • You could think of the inputs, outputs and reusable components as well as what could be cached.
   • This can help a program as caching can speed up a process, as well as saving time in the creation of a program as you already know what you need.
   • This can be hard however as caching can be hard to implement.

3. Thinking procedurally

   • Thinking procedurally is very simple, it means to break a problem down into smaller, easier to solve/make tasks.
     • You should also determine the order of events.
   • This process of breaking down into smaller tasks may not always be possible.
     • For example, if you are working with an event driven approach rather than procedural then it may not be possible.

4. Thinking logically

   • Thinking logically means identifying decision points for branching or iteration.
   • To think logically you need to identify the points at which a decision is needed. E.g. an if statement or a for loop or while loop.
     • You should then determine the conditions of the decision. E.g. i < 20 or x == True
       • You should then determine what the program should do afterwards.
   • Through this, you can determine the complexity of an algorithm.

5. Thinking concurrently

   • Thinking concurrently is when you program to have more than one thing happening at the same time.
   • To do this, you should think if parts of the problem can be tackled at the same time.
   • This however can increase the speed of the solution though can be difficult to program.
     • Certain problems may also not suit concurrency.