<p>One hears about the reputation of UIUC in 'computers'. Then when you drill deeper in the curriculum you see that there is a degree in computer engineering and one in computer science and each are in separate depts within the college of engineering. Let's forget for teh moment that there is a CS degree in the college of LAS.</p>
<p>WHat are the differences and similarities? </p>
<p>Why would a prospective freshman at UIUC choose one or the other? What woul;d be some considerations for that prospective frosh? </p>
<p>What degrees are yielded by each ?</p>
<p>What are the differences in post grad jobs / careers?</p>
<p>If one is in the ECE dept, can one take any CS course (and vice versa)? or is enrollment in the CS classes limited to CS dept dwellers (and vice versa with ECE courses)?</p>
<p>Computer science and computer engineering are two different fields, and UIUC happens to be well known for both of them (not that it’s odd to be good at both - I’m just underlining the fact that they’re two different fields). I’m a CS guy, but not really a CompE guy, so I can’t provide too enlightening of an explanation as to how the two are different, but a bit of a crude explanation might be that CS is about software and CE is about hardware. As a CE major I’d imagine you’d have to take a lot of electrical engineering courses too (in fact I thought the name of the major was ECE, electrical and computer engineering, though maybe that’s something else). CS will be more grounded in math, you’d learn about how to design software, theory of computation, that kind of stuff.</p>
<p>A comic that attempts to (jokingly) explain the difference: [Saturday</a> Morning Breakfast Cereal](<a href=“Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal - The Universe”>Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal - The Universe)</p>
<p>You would get a degree in whichever one you major in - I’m not sure what you mean by that question.</p>
<p>There might be an exception for ECE/CS I’m not aware of, but in general, I don’t think the university prohibits you from taking courses outside of your major (in fact I think it’s just ECE people that take CS 101, since CS 125 is the intro course for CS majors).</p>
<p>Materials Science engineers take CS 101 as well.
Chances are, if you don’t know what computer engineering is, you probably don’t want to major in it.</p>
<p>When most people think of computers, they think of programming, and not how the computer ACTUALLY works. Hey, it might be for you, but it might not.</p>
<p>“When most people think of computers, they think of programming, and not how the computer ACTUALLY works.”</p>
<p>Might be worth noting that computer science is different than programming, although most computer scientists will spend a lot of their time programming.</p>
<p>Computer engineering is more interested with how physical computers work at a more basic, hard-ware related level, while computer science is interested in studying more general, turning-machine type computers, not necessarily the ones sitting around you right now. That’s not really to say we don’t study how computers “actually” work, though.</p>
<p>also, I was interested in the OP’s question…</p>
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<p>^Yeah, would appreciate information on that.</p>
<p>still curious on the question
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<p>still curious on the question
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<p>I would think that UIUC, the university that brought us HAL , would have a nuance discussion of this and other such questions - more than ’ if you don’t know what the difference is, then you should not be asking the question’. in college , especially in a college forum where such questions are de rigeur, we ask questions.</p>
<p>What are the differences in post grad jobs / careers?</p>
<p>both the computer science and computer engineering degrees are highly versatile. a degree from these majors at uiuc prepares you well for high profile/stressful jobs even outside the major. the computational methods you acquire can be applied to business, medicine, law, and of course, any engineering discipline. contrary to popular belief, a college major does not prepare you for a job. it broadens your horizons and teaches you to think outside the box. it makes you a more educated and well rounded person. with that being said, there are some trends in the types of employment that compsci and compE majors obtain. compE majors usually work closer with hardware and compsci majors usually work more with higher level programming. an example of working with hardware might be writing the firmware for a piece of computer hardware in assembly language. an example of working with higher level programming might be writing an iPhone app in objective C. this is a really big generalization though. both of these majors have many areas of specialty and it really depends on what you are interested in. As far as working for top computer companies (hardware or software, ie: microsoft, intel, etc), both of these majors will more than prepare you for work there.</p>
<p>Thanks, Illini, for a great answer. My son is a rising freshman who chose compE as a major of study. During his college selection process, I asked him why he wanted to go to college - what did he want out of college? He said , to get a well rounded education and be prepared for a job. He clarified quickly that he thought the former would lead to the latter.</p>
<p>One reason he picked UIUC is the breadth of course offerings as well as the variety of students , two assets he might not have seen at more STEM oriented placed such as Rose Hulman , RIT and the like. He also liked how the engineering dean in the presentation emphasized that UIUC engineering seeks to cultivate critical thinking in its students.</p>
<p>Illini, would you say in your knowledge / experience with UIUC engineering that statement is pretty accurate vs a sales pitch?</p>