COMPUTER SCIENCE FOR CULTURAL HERITAGE

Academic year
2023/2024 Syllabus of previous years
Official course title
INFORMATICA PER I BENI CULTURALI
Course code
CT0612 (AF:441457 AR:249741)
Modality
On campus classes
ECTS credits
6
Degree level
Bachelor's Degree Programme
Educational sector code
INF/01
Period
1st Semester
Course year
1
Moodle
Go to Moodle page
The goal of the course is to introduce the basic notions of computer science, with particular focus on its applications to cultural heritage. There will be theoretical and practical (laboratory) lectures. The theoretical lectures will cover basic notions of computer science, as well as computational instruments for the digitalization, storage, organization, analysis, and fruition of cultural heritage resources. The laboratory lectures will cover the analysis and visualization of data with the Pandas and Seaborn libraries of the Python language, as well as the creation and interrogation of a simple SQL database for a museum.
At the end of the course the student will be able to:
- Understand the basic notions proper of computer science,
- Understand the role that computer science plays in the preservation of cultural heritage,
- Analyze big data and generate professional plots using the Pandas and Seaborn libraries of the Pyhton language,
- Design and interrogate a simple SQL database.
No particular prerequisite is required.
Theoretical lectures:

- history of computer science,
- Data representation,
- Algorithms, hardware, software,
- Networks and World Wide Web,
- Relational databases,
- Online museums,
- Images, audio, and video,
- 3D reconstruction.

Practical lectures:

Python - Pandas and Seaborn:
- Introduction to the Python language,
- Load, visualize and filter tables with Seaborn,
- Lineplots, barplots, histograms.

Database:
- Introduction to SQL,
- Defining the schema of a database,
- Inserting data,
- Simple queries: select, order by, pattern matching, aggregation,
- Creation of a simple database for a museum.
- Marco Lazzari, “Informatica umanistica - seconda edizione”, Mc Graw Hill
- Alfredo M. Ronchi, "ECulture: Cultural Content in the Digital Age", Dordrecht : Springer, 2009
- Z. Li, M. Drew and J. Liu. "Fundamentals of Multimedia", Pearson Educational, 2014
Open and multiple-choice questions.
For the laboratory part, the student will be asked to write very simple Python and SQL scripts as seen during the laboratory lectures.
Frontal lessons and laboratory sessions.
Italian
written
Definitive programme.
Last update of the programme: 29/04/2023