Comparison of the following majors: computer science, computer science and engineering, computer engineering (new Fall 2017) and electrical engineering with the computer engineering track

 All these four majors familiarize students with how computing, information and communication systems are built and used. The difference is in where the emphasis lies. Focus of Electrical Engineering with the computer engineering track (ECE) is a lot more on physical and mathematical underpinnings of these systems. For instance you would learn about physics of electronic devices, how to build circuits using them as well as mathematics behind modeling and control of these devices, circuits and systems. In computer science (CS), focus is much less on physics of the underlying phenomena and much more on software running on these systems, including the theory behind algorithms, networks of computers and software engineering. Computer Science and Engineering (CSE) is a blend of CS and ECE which introduces students to both hardware and software engineering with increased emphasis on practical systems and reduced emphasis on theoretical basis (physical or mathematical) behind them. Computer Engineering (CE) takes a similar approach but with further increased emphasis on building “systems” which have hardware, software and physical components. CE, therefore is going to have more ECE coursework to understand hardware design as well as information processing. Furthermore, since systems in CE are intended to be hardware-software-physical, building and testing them in a capstone class is more involved necessitating a two quarter capstone class. CE in general will have more hardware design emphasis as opposed to software design emphasis in CSE.