CS Concepts

Named storage for values. Binding, mutation, scope, and lifetime — and why Rust's variables behave differently from Python's.

Integers, floats, booleans, strings, and how the choice of type determines what operations are valid and how values are stored in memory.

Arithmetic, comparison, logical, bitwise, and assignment operators. Operator precedence and why 2 + 3 * 4 is 14, not 20.

If/else, switch/match, and the conditional expressions that let programs make decisions based on data.

For, while, do-while, and range-based iteration. How different languages express repetition and when each form is appropriate.

Named, reusable blocks of code. Parameters, return values, first-class functions, and the difference between a function definition and a function call.

Where names are visible. Local, global, and block scope. Lexical vs. dynamic scoping. Why the same variable name can mean different things in different parts of a program.

Functions that call themselves. The base case, the recursive case, and the call stack. When recursion is the right tool and when it isn't.

Exceptions, Result types, and error codes. How Python, Java, Rust, and Go each handle the problem of things going wrong at runtime.

Organising code into separate files and namespaces. Import systems, packages, and how dependency management works.

Ordered collections of values. Indexing, slicing, and the difference between a static array and a dynamic list.

Key-value structures. How dictionaries, maps, and records work across languages.

Blueprints for objects. Constructors, instances, methods, and how different languages implement the class concept.

Subclasses and superclasses. Method overriding, super(), and the risks of deep inheritance hierarchies.

Threads, async/await, goroutines, and the challenges of doing multiple things at once.