Master's in Computer Science (joint degree UvA/VU)

The University of Amsterdam (abbreviated as UvA, Dutch: Universiteit van Amsterdam) is a public research university located in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Established in 1632 by municipal authorities and later renamed for the city of Amsterdam, the University of Amsterdam is the third-oldest university in the Netherlands, and one of the most prestigious academic institutions of the country, and in the world. The UvA is one of two large, publicly funded research universities in the city, the other being the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (VU). It is also part of the largest research universities in Europe with 31,186 students, 4,794 staff, 1,340 PhD students and an annual budget of €600 million. It is the largest university in the Netherlands by enrollment. The main campus is located in central Amsterdam, with a few faculties located in adjacent boroughs. The university is organised into seven faculties: Humanities, Social and Behavioural Sciences, Economics and Business, Science, Law, Medicine, Dentistry.

The Computer Science programme is a joint degree between VU Amsterdam and the University of Amsterdam (UvA). The curriculum takes place partly at the VU and partly at UvA. You have the opportunity to choose from a range of tracks according to your interest. Big Data Engineering Foundations of Computing and Concurrency Computer Systems and Infrastructure Systems for Large-Scale Applications Software Engineering and Green IT The tracks Computer Systems and Infrastructure and Systems for Large-Scale Applications will be offered starting from 2023-2024. The complete overview of the programme and the year schedule for these tracks will be published in June 2023 in the VU study guide. Notice that the tracks Parallel Computing Systems and Internet & Web Technology are being discontinued. It's no longer possible to enroll in these tracks. Big Data Engineering In the internet era, data plays centre stage. We all continuously communicate via social networks, we expect all information to be accessible online continuously, and the world economies thrive on data processing services where revenue is created by generating insights from raw data. These developments are enabled by a global data processing infrastructure, connecting the whole range from small company computer clusters to data centers run by the world-leading IT giants. In the Big Data Engineering track you study the technology from which these infrastructures are built, allowing you to design and operate solutions for processing, analysing and managing large quantities of data. This track is part of the joint Master in Computer Science, in which renowned researchers from both VU and UvA contribute their varied expertise in one of the strongest Computer Science programmes available in Europe. Contact track coordinator Adam Belloum Read more Foundations of Computing and Concurrency This track aims at Computer Science students with a general interest in Computing and Concurrency and the application of formal methods for system design. Computing is a fundamental phenomenon in computer science and we provide courses addressing this field in a wide range: from distributed algorithms to protocol validation, and from term rewriting to logical verification. In order to enhance background knowledge and to support the further study of foundational questions some general courses in logic and mathematics are provided as well. Concurrency naturally occurs in the specification of distributed systems, and their analysis, verification and implementation require a systematic approach, aided by formal methods. Contact track coordinator Femke van Raamsdonk Read more Software Engineering and Green IT Software engineering applies a systematic and quantifiable approach to the development, execution and maintenance of complex software. Green IT is the study and practice of environmentally sustainable computing. The combination of Software Engineering and Green IT in one track provides the students with the instruments necessary to gain a holistic understanding of large-scale and complex software systems, to manage their evolution, assess their quality and environmental impact, quantify their value and sustainability potential, and organise their development in different local and distributed contexts. Software engineering and Green IT is a broad and comprehensive field, in which engineering plays an important role, next to social, economic and environmental aspects. The field continually evolves, as the types of systems and the world at large do change as well. The field is being influenced by practices and development paradigms such as outsourcing, global software development, service orientation, smart and pervasive computing, and energy-aware software engineering.