Chapter 4:Processing With Programs

Tools for Users
Consumer Applications

- Many software companies have replaced their printed documentation with:
>Tutorials
>Reference materials
>Help files
>Online help
- Upgrading: Users can upgrade a program to the new version by paying an upgrade fee to the software manufacturer
>Newer releases often have additional features and fewer bugs
- Compatibility
>Allows software to function properly with the hardware, operating system, and peripherals
>Programs written for one type of computer system may not work on another
- Disclaimers
>Software manufacturers limit their liability for software problems by selling software "as is"
- Licensing: Commercial software is copyrighted so it can't be legally duplicated for distribution to others
>Software licenses
>Volcume licenses
- Distribution: Software is distributed via:
>Direct sale
>Retail stores
>Mail-order catalogs
>Websites
>Not all software is copyrighted: Public domain software, shareware

Web Applications

- Web applications fall into several categories
>Some simple Web applications perform simple data-processing tasks that could also be performed by traditional programs running on stand-alone PCs
>Most Web applications take advantage of the Web's connectivity
>Many web applications leverage the Web's strength as a huge repository of information
>Some web applications support online business trnasactions
>News-oriented Web applications provide up-to-the-minute reports on a myriad of subjects
>Other Web applications support a more traditional form of information broadcasting

Chapter 3: Tomorrow's Technology and You: Part 2

Output: From Pulses to People
Screen Output
- A monitor or video display terminal (VDT) displays characters, graphics, photographic images, animation and video.
>Video adapter—connects the monitor to
the computer
>VRAM or video memory, a special portion of RAM to hold video images
- The more video memory, the more picture detail is displayed.
- Monitor size: Measured as a diagonal line across the screen
- Resolution: The number of pixels displayed on the screen
>Pixels (or picture elements): tiny dots that compose a picture
>The higher the resolution, the closer together the dots.
- Image quality is affected by resolution and color depth (or bit depth).
>Color depth refers to the number of different colors a monitor
displays at one time.

Monitor classes
- CRTs (cathode-ray tubes)
- LCDs (liquid crystal displays)
>Overhead projection panels
>Video projectors
>Portable computers

Paper Output
- Printers produce paper output or hard copy.
- Two basic groups of printers:
>Impact printers
>Line printers
>Dot-matrix printers

Output You Can Hear
- Sound card
>Enables the PC to:
>Accept microphone input
>Play music and other sound through speakers or headphones
>Process sound in a variety of ways
- Synthesizers
>Used to produce music, noise

Rules of Thumb: Ergonomics and Health

- Choose equipment that’s ergonomically designed.
- Create a healthy workspace.
- Build flexibility into your work environment.
- Rest your eyes.
- Stretch to loosen tight muscles.
- Listen to your body.
- Seek help when you need it.

Storage Devices: Input Meets Output
Magnetic Disks
- Random data access
- Floppy disks
>Provide inexpensive, portable storage
- Hard disks
>Non-removable, rigid disks that spin continuously and rapidly
>Provide much faster access than a floppy disk
- Removable media (Zip & Jaz disks)
>Provides high-capacity portable storage

Optical Disks
- Use laser beams to read and write bits of information on the disk surface
>Not as fast as magnetic hard disks
>Massive storage capacity
>Very reliable

CD-ROM
- Optical drives that read CD-ROMs
CD-R
- WORM media (write-once, read many)
CD-RW
- Can read CD-ROMs and write, erase and rewrite data onto CD-R & CD-RW

DVD (Digital Versatile Disks)
>Store and distribute all kinds of data
>Hold between 3.8 and 17 gigabytes of information
DVD-ROM drives
>Can play DVD movies, read DVD data disks
>Read standard CD-ROMs, and play audio CDs
>Read-only: can’t record data, music, or movies
DVD-RAM drives
>Can read, erase, and write data (but not DVD video) on multi-gigabyte DVD-R (but not CD-R or CD-RW) media

Solid-State Storage Devices
-Flash memory is an erasable memory
chip:
>Sizes range from 16 MB to 1 GB
>Compact alternative to disk storage
>Contains no moving parts
>Designed for specific applications such as
storing pictures in digital cameras
>Likely to replace disk and tape storage

Chapter 3: Tomorrow's Technology and You: Part 1

Objectives:
- List several examples of input devices and explain how they can make it easier to get different types of information into the computer.
- List several examples of output devices and the explain how they make computers more useful.
- Explain why a typical computer has different types of storage devices.
Diagram how the components of a computer system fit together.

Input: From Person to Processor

- Keyboard
>The most familiar input device
- Used to enter letters, numbers and special characters

- Standard keyboard
- Ergonomic keyboards
>To address possible medical problems
- Wireless keyboard
- Folding keyboards
>Used with palm-sized computers
- One-handed keyboards
- Keyboards printed on membranes

Pointing Devices
>Mouse
>Touchpad
>Pointing stick
>Trackball
>Joystick
>Graphics tablet
>Touch screen
>Stylus

Reading Tools
- Read marks representing codes specifically designed for computer input
>Magnetic-ink character readers
>Optical-mark readers
>Bar-code readers
>Pen scanners
>Tablet PC
>Smart whiteboard
>Radio Frequency Identification Readers (RFID)

Scanners capture and digitize printed images.
- Flatbed
- Slide
- Drum
- Sheet-fed

Digital camera
- Snapshots captured as digital images
- Digital images stored as bit patterns on disks or other digital storage media

Video digitizer
- Capture input from a:
>Video camera
>Video cassette recorder or television
- Convert it to a digital signal
>Stored in memory and displayed on computer screens
- Videoconferencing
>People in diverse locations can see and hear each other
>Used to conduct long-distance meetings
>Video images transmitted through networks

Audio digitizers
- Digitize sounds from
>Microphones
>Other input devices
- Digital signals can be
>Stored
>Further processed with specialized software

A digital signal processing chip
compresses the stream of bits before
it is transmitted to the CPU

Speech recognition software
- Converts voice data into words that can be edited and printed

Sensors
- Designed to monitor physical conditions
>Temperature, humidity, pressure
- Provide data used in:
>Robotics
>Environmental climate control
>Weather forecasting
>Medical monitoring
>Biofeedback
>Scientific research

Chapter 2: Hardware Basics

Objectives
- Explain in general terms how computers store and manipulate
information.
- Describe the basic structure and organization of a computer.
- Discuss the functions and interactions of a computer system’s
principal internal components.
- Explain why a computer typically has different types of
memory and storage devices.

What Computers Do

- Receive input: Accept information from the outside world
- Process information: Perform arithmetic or logical (decision-making) operations on information
- Produce output: Communicate information to the outside world
Store information: Move and store information in memory

Basic Components of a Computer

Input devices :
Keyboards and pointing devices(mouse)

Output devices:
Display or video monitor
Printer
Speakers
Central Processing Unit (CPU)

Memory and storage devices
- Primary storage: RAM (Random Access Memory)
- Secondary storage: Storage devices that serve as long-term repositories for data:
>Hard disk drives
>Recordable CD and DVD drives
>Tape drives

A Bit About Bits
- Every track gives a specific function
- When you press a button it sends through tracks

Decimal Numbers:
- Decimal numbers are 0/1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8/9
- Using two symbols, all numbers can be represented on a calculator as well as performing arithmetic
- Calculator translates the touch on the numeric keypad into series of 0's and 1's

Binary Numbers:
- Represented in 0's (off) and 1's (on)
- Binary denotes all numbers with combination of 2 digits
- Decimals are automatically converted into binary's, vice-versa
- Binary number processing is completely hidden from the user
- Binary's go from right to left

Bits as Codes:
-> ASCII
- Most widely used
- Stands for American Standard code for information interchange
-> Unicode
- Coding scheme that supports 65,000 unique characters

Bits as Instructions in Programs
- Programs are stored as collection of bits
- Program instructions are represented in binary notation through use of codes

Bits, Bytes, & Buzzwords
- Byte = 8 bytes
- Kilobyte (KB) = One thousand bytes
- Megabyte (MB) = One million bytes
- Gigabytes (GB) = One billion bytes
- Terabytes (TB) = One trillion bytes

Green Computing

*The manufacture of hardware and software can have an impact on the environment
- Buy green equipment (energy star)
- Use a notebook & solar battery
- Use energy-saving features
- Turn off the computer when you're away
- Screen savers don't save energy
- Print only once
- Recycle waste products
- Energy costs already exceeds hardware cause
- 20bn kWh a year is wasted die to PCs being left overnight in US & UK
- Power can be saved through server virtualization
-> 2900 servers, 30 mainframes, 80% saving
- Energy efficient coding could cut energy use by up to 30%
- Computers can be both the problem and solution to the problem of being green

- Computers can:
-> Increase business efficiency
-> Enable dematerealization (buying things digitally)
- Intel says computing has saved more resources then it has consumed

Make A Checklist

Plan
-> Buy laptops instead of PC, or thing clients
-> Don't over-specify
-> High-efficiency power unit supply
-> Only green

Maintenance
-> Set monitors off when you leave house
-> Turn off your PC when you leave house
-> Replace CRT monitors with LCDs

Data Centres
-> Highly efficient servers
-> Virtual Servers if possible
-> Review cooling strategies

The computer: The real computer

-> CPU (Microprocessor)

-> Interprets and executes the instructions in each program

-> Supervises arithmetic and logical data manipulations

-> Communicates with all the other parts of the computer system indirectly through memory

-> An extraordinarily complex collection of electronic circuits

-> Houses along with other chips and electronic components on the motherboard

Compatibility

- All software is not necessarily compatible with every computer

- Software written for the powerPC family of processors used in Macintosh computers wont run on Intel processors

- Programs written for Linux cant run on Windows

- CPU's from the same family are generally designed to be backwards compatible

Performance

- Applications require faster machines to produce satisfactory results

- A computer's overall performance is determined by: its internal clock speed and architecture and word size of processor

- Techniques to speed up a computer's performance: parallel processing, server clusters

Social & Ethical Issues

Reliability
Reliability refers to the operation of hardware, the design of software, the accuracy of data or the correspondence of data with the real world. Data may be unreliable if it is entered incorrectly or if it becomes outdated.
-> For example, a medical record that becomes dissociated from the patient it refers to becomes unreliable

Integrity
Integrity refers to correspondence of data with itself, at its creation. Data lacks integrity when it has been changed accidentally or tampered with.
-> For example, a hacker might change driver license data resulting in arrests of innocent people

Application to Specific Scenarios

Education and Training
- Use of IT in teaching and Learning: Educational software, online research and forums, virtual learning, environments (VLE), e-books, Web 2.0 educational networks, use of mobile devices, game-based learning, fully immersive environments, filtering and monitoring of studens' internet use, 1-to-1, m-learning
- Hardware and network technologies in the classroom: Laptop computers, handheld devices, interactive whiteboards
- Teachers these days need to use technology to teach

Science Vs. Projects, Critical Thinking

Science Projects Vs. Projects
-> 4 Steps
1) Question is identified
2) Hypothesis is formulated
3) Relevant data is sought and gathered
4) Hypothesis is tested and evaluated
5) Reliable conclusion is drawn

Critical Thinking: Correct thinking in the pursuit of relevant and reliable knowledge about the world

Critical Thinkers
- Asks appropriate questions
- Gather relevant information
- Efficiently and creatively sort through information
- Reason from said info
- Come to reliable and trustworthy conclusion
-> Scientists and critical thinkers want us to do this