What skills are essential for a student to be a good programmer?

Technology is always evolving and the skills and abilities a programmer has today will likely be outdated in a few years. It’s important for a student to be very logical and be of a mathematical bent of mind. A programmer must follow the latest trends and be eager to participate in any continuing education opportunities that are available.

What do you think of ethical hacking?

Hacking  is ethical if the hacker does it with the permission of the owner to show him or her the risk of being attacked by cyber criminals. But this practice becomes unethical when the hacker possessing the permission of the owner starts misusing the information and loopholes in future for material gains or with malicious intent.

Hackers are required but there should be another set of Hackers who need to monitor the activities of the hackers as a check to to avoid any potential threat of the owner or the system. Metahackers, perhaps.

How can we improve computer science education in India

Computer Science has both educational benefits and economic benefits. It can and should be part of every student’s education, just as other core subjects like physics, maths, chemistry. It should be made a compulsory subject at school from an early age. Computing education is not yet mandatory in schools in India. It is an elective subject from the 9th grade (age 14) on wards, for which the various boards have prescribed syllabi. It is often left to the school to decide when they want to start this subject, or what to teach until 8th grade. If the teachers are given proper training and an infrastructure is improved then computer science education will automatically improve in India.

-Anjana Virmani