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I recently asked how to express dictionaries in pseudocode in the question Dictionaries in pseudocode and was in doubt whether it belongs here (and so were others). I thought it's not about actual programming (which would bring it to Stack Overflow) but only about how to present it, which is certainly related to computational science.

I think Computational Science needs a more detailed description of what's on-topic here (the FAQ mainly talks about what is not) and also a better differentiation to Stack Overflow. From what I see, most questions asked here could have also been asked identically on Stack Overflow.

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  • $\begingroup$ Jan, thank you for the comment about our FAQ needing a more detailed description of what's on topic for the site. I've added a Meta question to address that issue, and I'll add an answer over the next couple days also. $\endgroup$
    – Geoff Oxberry
    Feb 26, 2012 at 20:13
  • $\begingroup$ Are you by any chance confusing computational science (scientific computing) with computer science? To put it simply, this site is mostly about the kind of science where computers/programs/algorithms are used as tools (e.g. physics, numerical methods), not where they're the subject being studied (computer science). $\endgroup$
    – Szabolcs
    Feb 27, 2012 at 11:44
  • $\begingroup$ Thanks for the clarification – I am aware of the difference, and I would probably consider myself more a computer scientist than a computational scientist. However, I thought discussing algorithms (and therefore the presentation of them) could still be part of computational science. cstheory.stackexchange.com has a strict research-level-only policy (at least according to their FAQ), so I thought this question might better fit here. $\endgroup$
    – Jan Pöschko
    Feb 27, 2012 at 12:18

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There is always overlap between the various SE sites, we try to categorize and migrate questions based on where we feel the questioner will gain the most benefit, as well as the best 'fit'. The primary thrust of scicomp is this: "questions and answers about computational methods used in technical disciplines." Are we the best fit for presentation of a dictionary? Well, maybe. Is the dictionary part of some larger computational algorithm? In that case, it might be a fit here.

I don't think this question belongs on StackOverflow, but I think it would probably be a good fit for https://cstheory.stackexchange.com/ I am going to ask the moderators there if they are interested in migrating this one, otherwise, I will leave it up here.

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    $\begingroup$ Not sure if this is good for cstheory in its current form. A general writing pseudo-code question is not a research related question and is probably better suited for SO or Software Engineering. But if it is writing pseudo-code in papers then it might be, for example check this question. $\endgroup$
    – Kaveh
    Feb 26, 2012 at 18:44
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    $\begingroup$ Yeah, I also agree with Kaveh here. Based on what I've seen on cstheory, it's not...research-oriented enough in its current form, but it could be on topic at Programmers. It could also be on topic here, if it's geared towards computational science problems. $\endgroup$
    – Geoff Oxberry
    Feb 26, 2012 at 20:11

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