Computer Science: An Overview truly lives up to its title, providing a timely introduction to the entire computer science discipline. Broad coverage, combined with clear explanations, has made it the leading textbook for the breadth-first course. This book provides a balanced, realistic picture that communicates the dynamics of computer science by presenting topics in a historical perspective in which past developments, the current state of the art, and directions of research are discussed. The coverage of topics such as programming languages, operating systems, algorithms, software engineering, networking, database design, artificial intelligence, and machine architecture result in a complete overview of the field of computer science.