At the junction of mathematics and programming

Some time ago, the Institute of Mathematics, Mechanics and Computer Science of the SFedU conducted an informal survey of the heads of research and production organizations and entrepreneurs working in the IT sphere. More than forty people answered two simple questions: What sections of mathematics do programmers need now, and what sections of mathematics may be needed in 5-10 years?

Most of the respondents noted fundamental mathematical disciplines such as: mathematical and functional analysis, algebra, discrete mathematics, mathematical physics, probability theory and mathematical statistics, numerical methods in the list of subjects that shape the thinking style and outlook of a modern programmer. The degree of their relevance in further work depends on the specific subject area. Many problems at the forefront of the competitive struggle of IT technologies rest on the solution of purely mathematical problems: image processing, neural networks, analysis of genomic sequences, weather forecast, information security, understanding the meaning of text documents.

From the point of view of predictions for the future, the importance of knowing parallel algorithms with the efficient use of tens of thousands of processors was noted. In the opinion of a number of respondents, in the future, numerical methods, as well as ideas and concepts from functional analysis, will be more needed. The mathematical foundations of machine learning, fuzzy logic, etc., may also become more popular. Despite the growth in the number of technical problems solved by modern programmers, related, for example, to Internet sites, workflow automation, etc., the role of serious mathematics will increase.

“The educational programs of the Southern Federal University, one way or another connected with applied and fundamental informatics, necessarily include a mathematical block. This allows graduates to feel confident in the labor market (for example, in companies such as Intel, Synopsys, Yandex, Google, JetBrains, etc.), and continuing their studies in postgraduate studies at European universities. There is such a block in the new Master's program Computer Mathematics: Theory and Applications, developed at SFedU together with the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology and industrial partner JSC Scientific and Design Bureau of Computing Systems and focused, in particular, on the market for software development for unmanned vehicles. Among the teachers of the program is Mikhail Yurushkin, a graduate of the Faculty of Mechanics and Mathematics of the Southern Federal University, who defended his Ph.D. thesis in 2016, and is currently heading an enterprise that develops software in the field of artificial intelligence, ”said the director of the Institute of Mathematics, Mechanics and Computer Science named after I.I. Vorovich SFedU Mikhail Karjakin.

Happiness code

Many surveys conducted by Russian and foreign companies (SuperJob.ru, hh.ru, CareerBliss.com) show that IT specialists are among the happiest, since they can solve complex creative problems and get good money for it. Therefore, programmers, happy, doing what they love, are one of the most passionate people. Taking this into account, as well as understanding the high efficiency of education with the maximum practical component, the Institute of Computer Technologies and Information Security - another largest structural unit of the Southern Federal University - forms a unique design and educational environment outside the educational programs.

Every year, non-stop for 48 hours, teams of programmers, designers, marketers and analysts from all over the South of Russia develop their own IT projects (from an idea to a working prototype) in the Winter Garden of the Southern Federal University's Engineering and Technology Academy at the Cyber Garden hackathon. Teams receive mentoring support from leading employees of the country's largest IT companies, which allows them to take their developments to a qualitatively new level. Support and development of one of the main communication languages in the field of IT - programming languages - is the SFedU Open Olympiad in Programming "ContestsSFedU", held on the basis of ICTIB. The Olympiad is the largest championship in programming and modern information technologies in the South of Russia, in which more than 500 people from different countries take part annually, representing educational organizations and industry enterprises.

The national and global scale of manifestation of their professional competencies is demonstrated by the students of ICTIB within the framework of the championship movement according to WorldSkills standards. In 2017, IKTIB students took 4 gold medals in the I Industry Championship in the field of information technology DigitalSkills. In 2018, SFedU hosted one of the largest university championships in Russia and the largest among federal universities. Of the 13 competencies in which the competition was held, 7 were presented by IKTIB. At the 2018 National Interuniversity Championship, IKTIB students took gold in two competencies, and also repeated their success at the DigitalSkills championship, having won 1 gold and 5 bronze medals. In August 2019, two students of IKTIB (Oksana Shamilyan and Vyacheslav Salmanov) became silver medalists in the competence "Development of solutions using blockchain technologies" of the 45th World Championship in professional skills according to Worldskills standards.

Since 2018, on the basis of ICTIB, with the support of the Endowment Fund of the SFedU, the Association of SFedU Alumni, the Federal Agency for Youth Affairs and the V. Potanin Charitable Foundation, a series of races "IT-Run" have been held.

“This project also has a charitable component - the starting fees from the race participants are transferred to the SFedU Endowment Fund for the establishment of personal scholarships. At the moment, three scholarships have been established - a scholarship to them. L. S. Bershtein in the field of artificial intelligence, scholarship to them. A. N. Melikhova in the development and application of modern IT technologies and a scholarship to them. VG Zakharevich for achievements in the development of engineering and entrepreneurial projects ", - said Anton Kumov, assistant of the Department of Synergetics and Management Processes of the Institute of Computer Technologies and Information Security of the SFedU.

Pascal of the new generation

In 2005, on the basis of the Children's Computer School of the Institute of Mathematics, Mechanics and Computer Sciences named after I. I. Vorovich, SFedU, it became necessary to choose a modern programming language - both simple and modern. This is how the project "PascalABC.NET Programming System" appeared, which over 15 years has turned into a programming system widely used in Russian schools.

The team that created the first version of PascalABC.NET consisted of the project leader, associate professor of the Department of Algebra and Discrete Mathematics Stanislav Mikhalkovich and four students who were fond of compiler design. The ideological inspirer was Alexander Tkachuk, who won the first place at the student scientific conference of Mechanics and Mathematics in the section “Programming” with his report “PascalABC.NET programming system”.

“Today the PascalABC.NET programming language is a new generation Pascal that combines the simplicity of the classical language and a number of modern extensions. Tuples, slices, lambda

expressions, sequences and chain queries are the gold standard for teaching schoolchildren at the Children's Computer School of Mechanics and Mathematics of the SFedU. The language is an ideal choice for teaching modern programming and allows you to write programs in different styles: procedural, object, object-oriented and functional. In terms of efficiency and power, PascalABC.NET is almost in no way inferior to the industrial programming language C #, "- said Associate Professor at the Institute of Mathematics, Mechanics and Computer Science named after A. I.I. Vorovich SFedU Stanislav Mikhalkovich.

PascalABC.NET in numbers

For 15 years, more than 35 students and graduate students of the Faculty of Mechanics and Mathematics have participated in the development of the project.

PascalABC.NET is the third most frequently used at school Olympiads in programming at various levels - after the C ++ and Python languages.

The solution of the USE problems on PascalABC.NET is two times shorter than the solutions offered by FIPI in the demo version.

The number of PascalABC.NET downloads from the official site is 2500 per day.

During the period of self-isolation (March-May 2020), the number of downloads increased to 10,000 per day, and the PascalABC.NET website took third place in the Yandex ranking in the prestigious Programming section.

The site elibrary.ru contains more than 300 scientific and methodological articles about the PascalABC.NET programming language.

Dozens of books wrote about PascalABC.NET, including an official guide written by a third-party author A.V. Osipov. "PascalABC.NET: An Introduction to Modern Programming".

And in conclusion - for the Day of the Programmer - a program written in PascalABC.NET that calculates the sum of numbers from 1 to 256:

## (1..256) .Sum.Print