Harvard’s CS50 channel

CS50 is Harvard University’s introductory computer science course, taught by David J. Malan, and one of the best-known programming courses in the world. The university publishes its lectures in full and for free on its official YouTube channel, together with short lectures, reviews and courses that branch off from it; the channel also carries translated or re-presented versions in other languages. The lectures are lively and full of examples and on-stage demonstrations, so they explain deep ideas in an enjoyable way that a beginner can follow.

What you will find on the channel

• The core course’s lectures: computational thinking, algorithms, memory and data structures, then C, Python and SQL, and web basics with HTML, CSS and JavaScript.
• Branch courses, including a Python course (CS50P), an introduction to artificial intelligence with Python and a web programming course.
• Shorts that explain a single concept in a focused way, and weekly reviews.
• Extra seminars and sessions on subjects such as cybersecurity and developer tools, given by the course team and guests.

Who it suits

It suits strong secondary-school students who want a real understanding of computer science, university students in any subject, and graduates who want a solid academic base before they specialise. The lectures are in English, and YouTube’s automatic captions can be turned on. The course starts from zero, but it is demanding and needs a genuine commitment to solving the problems.

How to use it, step by step

1. Watch the lectures in order from week one, and do not skip a lecture because it looks easy.
2. After each lecture, solve the problem set published on the course’s official website – that is where the real learning happens.
3. Use the short lectures to revise any concept you did not fully understand.
4. If C feels hard at first, that is normal; keep going, because it builds your understanding of how a computer works inside.

Before you start

CS50’s materials are published under the Creative Commons licence CC BY-NC-SA 4.0, which means they may be shared for non-commercial use with credit to the source. Anyone who completes all the problem sets and the final project through the course’s official website can receive a free certificate of completion from it. The channel’s latest videos appear on this page and you can watch them directly. If you would like graded teaching in Arabic before you enter this course, start with the Python course at Badr Academy Education or with Elzero Web School in the library, then come back to CS50 with more confidence.