News
Registering for Exam + Follow-Up on Session 4Written on 07.11.26 by Till Koebe Dear all, as a follow-up to the past session, here the link to Facebook's key choice Ingmar briefly mentioned: https://www.niemanlab.org/2021/10/more-internal-documents-show-how-facebooks-algorithm-prioritized-anger-and-posts-that-triggered-it/ Also, a reminder: Please register by December 18th,… Read more Dear all, as a follow-up to the past session, here the link to Facebook's key choice Ingmar briefly mentioned: https://www.niemanlab.org/2021/10/more-internal-documents-show-how-facebooks-algorithm-prioritized-anger-and-posts-that-triggered-it/ Also, a reminder: Please register by December 18th, end of day, for the exam via our CMS page: https://cms.sic.saarland/idi_26/registration_items. In addition, please check with your study programme coordinator for programme-specific registration requirements. For those of you from Rechtsinformatik, your coordinators will reach out to you around the end of November to register also with them for your courses. Please reach out to us in case you have any questions. |
A spooky way to calculate prime numbersWritten on 31.10.26 by Ingmar Weber == This is *not* relevant for the exam == In case you liked the bits about Turing machines, registers, and all that, you might appreciate FRACTRAN: You can actually design a computer that uses nothing but fractions, such as 35/11 for… Read more == This is *not* relevant for the exam == In case you liked the bits about Turing machines, registers, and all that, you might appreciate FRACTRAN: You can actually design a computer that uses nothing but fractions, such as 35/11 for calculations. == This is *not* relevant for the exam == |
Addendum to Session 2, Oct 23th, 2026Written on 26.10.26 by Till Koebe Dear all, just two quick follow-up points on last week's session: Dear all, just two quick follow-up points on last week's session:
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Exam dates fixed!Written on 23.10.26 (last change on 23.10.26) by Till Koebe Dear all, the exam dates are now fixed: Both dates are also noted in the Timetable. Online option will be available and details will be shared shortly. Let me know, if you… Read more Dear all, the exam dates are now fixed: Both dates are also noted in the Timetable. Online option will be available and details will be shared shortly. Let me know, if you have questions (till.koebe@uni-saarland.de) Best, |
First lecture tomorrowWritten on 15.10.26 (last change on 15.10.26) by Till Koebe Dear all, we are very much looking forward to welcoming you to the first session of this year's "Ideen der Informatik" lecture tomorrow! Just a brief reminder: It takes place from 8-10am c.t. (so start at 8:15h), in E1.7 R.301. In-person attendance is preferred. If this is not possible, here the… Read more Dear all, we are very much looking forward to welcoming you to the first session of this year's "Ideen der Informatik" lecture tomorrow! Just a brief reminder: It takes place from 8-10am c.t. (so start at 8:15h), in E1.7 R.301. In-person attendance is preferred. If this is not possible, here the link to the MS Teams meeting again: https://teams.microsoft.com/meet/37878900442303?p=aJFWX6AkSePfBDX8AN |
Ideen der Informatik
Organisational:
- Successful completion of the course will give you 5 ECTS. The course consists of a weekly 90-min lecture, a weekly voluntary assignment and a final written exam. We are open for all students not enrolled in a study program at the Computer Science department.
- It takes place on Fridays, 8-10am c.t., in E1.7 R.301, starting on October 16th, 2026, ending February 5th, 2027. We encourage in-person participation, however, we will both stream and record the lectures, if you cannot attend physically.
- Here the Microsoft Teams link for the lecture.
- Recordings and all other content will be made available via CMS.
- Course language is English.
- Lectures consists of two parts: First 30-min discussion of last week's assignment. The remaining 60-min new input. A week's assignment builds on previous weeks input.
- The assignments are voluntary, thus not graded. We offer students to provide individual feedback on their assignments. We expect students who use this offer not to hand in LLM-generated answers.
- The final exam is in-person, date tbd. However, we also offer remote exams on request. More on remote exams below.
Contents and goals:
Three goals:
- Familiarize the audience with basic concepts in Computer Science: What is an algorithm? What is a computer? What is data?
- Understand the interplay between information systems and society: How does technology transform society? How can technology be used to measure societal changes?
- Gain enough knowledge to critically discuss various impacts of information systems on the society.
We address following topics: history of computer science, algorithms, programming languages, technical concepts of data centres, search engines, large language models, cryptography, networks, block chains, security and privacy and societal impacts. A detailed curriculum will be added soon.
We do not expect any prior knowledge about these topics. However, we highly welcome critical thinking and active involvement in the discussions.
Key deadlines (all end of day, German local time):
- CMS registration deadline: 23.10.2026
- LSF registration (if applicable): 13.11.2026
Please check with your study coordinator, if other deadlines specific to your program apply.
We are very much looking forward to meeting you,
Ingmar & Till