What are the focus areas of a Ph. D in Computer Science?

[GrantAPowell]

What do Ph. D student's learn after a bachelors? I mean, I understand that a Ph. D is research oriented, but what do you learn, what would you research? I'm curious about the field and was wondering if there were any Computer Science Grads who could help me out with this, from a first hand experience?

I know that artificial intelligence is a popular area.

 

[UltrafastPED]

The additional course work is about 36 hours; 2 or 3 semesters, focused mostly on computer science.

As with most MS/MSc degrees your coursework assumes that you already have a good foundation, and builds from there. Maybe your research will be in graphics algorithms, or design of compilers ... or how to implement large data systems.

You can visit any graduate program in computer science via the web and see how it is structured, including the standard graduate course requirements and options. Every program will be different.

 

[jesse73]

Analyzing twitter feeds. Thats my interpretation from all the CS research which actually gets press.

Sad people use words like sad,bored and sick of.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/business_insider/2013/10/02/study_most_popular_facebook_keywords_by_age_gender_and_personality.html

 

[UltrafastPED]

@jesse73 - if you follow the links to the researchers who did this (http://wwbp.org/about.html) you will find that they are mostly psychologists; this kind of work only requires a programmer, not a PhD computer scientist.

 

[jesse73]

@jesse73 - if you follow the links to the researchers who did this (http://wwbp.org/about.html) you will find that they are mostly psychologists; this kind of work only requires a programmer, not a PhD computer scientist.

Its not just psychologist.

Big data is hot. Look at Stanfords CS dept.

You don't always get a big insight from analyzing tons more data especially when you are working on phD project which has a timeline.