Lecture Concepts- Speed, Size, Computer Trend, Software Benefits

Sept 16, 2003 King Features Comics

Speed
Size
Trends
Components
Diagram
Why Purchase
Software Benefits
Most expensive
Definitions

Speed (see Webopedia and other online references)

	Millisecond 1/1000^th,a thousandth of a second (think milligram, millimeter) 10^-3,speed of disks
	Microsecond, one millionth of a second , 10^-6,speed of computers is discussed in milliseconds
	Nanosecond, a billionth of a second, speed of very fast, very expensive computers, 10^-9.(see Zits above), light travels about a foot in a nanosecond
	Picoseconds, 10^-12

Size (see facts from Roy Williams "Data Powers of Ten" page at Caltech)

	byte a unit of storage capable of holding a single character (a capital , a 4, a space, a w, a W) A typical sheet of paper has 80 characters across and 50 lines down for 4,000 character. So a 400 page book would have about 1,600,000 bytes, about one floppy's worth. Images run between 5,000 character and 500,000 characters.
	Kilobyte is 10³ or 1,000 bytes like a kilometer is 1,000 meters, kilogram is 1,000 grams
	Megabyte a million bytes, ,10^6, a floppy disk has 1 1/2 MB, RAM memory is measured in megabyte 128MB to 512MB. A Megaton bomb is a million tons of TNT and millionaires are worth Megabucks.
	Gigabyte 10^9,a billion bytes, most hard disks have 20 to 200 GB (hard disks are measured in gigabytes).
	Terabyte, 10^12, a trillion bytes (1000 billion) the size of large organizations disk capacity - see reference source whatis.com for more info
	Petabyte 10¹⁵ bytes
	Exabyte 10¹⁸ bytes

Trends in Computers

	Each month they get faster and more capable (more memory etc. (see Moore's Law)
	Small (getting smaller is how they get faster, so the electrons have less distance to travel)
	More reliable, you can depend they will work, MTBF (Mean Time Between Failure is reduced). Reliability is probably the most critical factor in organizations ability to rely on computers
	More Capable, they have more storage and more features
	Easier to use (more user friendly)

What the Future Holds: Pen Computers

And thus they are used by more people for more tasks.

A Killer App is a piece of software that is so useful that people will purchase hardware just to run it.

For example, VisiCalc was the first spreadsheet. It saved so much time and people wanted it so badly, it caused folk to purchase Apple computers.
Then came Lotus 1-2-3, also a spreadsheet, but it only ran on the new IBM PC. It was much better than Visicalc because it had Help screen and charts (graphs) so people bought IBM PCs.
Next is email. Many people who did not want a computer for any other reason went out in bought one so they would be able to send and receive email

Components of a Computer Information System --> Diagram

Formatting a Disk

Formatting Does

Formatting Does NOT

Create a new table of Contents so 100% of the disk can now be used for new files

Repair Bad track

(provided Quick is NOT selected) checks that each track is error-free and if not

	Isolates the bad track
	Reports the error
	Does not fix it

Erase the disk- this is critical because if you get rid of (sell, donate, etc.) your old computer with its old disk, unless you write over ALL the tracks of the disk, the information can be retrieved (identity theft issues)

Why do people and organizations purchase computers?

The only reason to purchase a computer is that the purchaser has a software application (spreadsheet, presentation, graphics, game) program they wish to run. The application will make them money, save them time/money or make their lives better in some way. The reason to abandon an old computer is NOT because it is too slow, but because it will not run the applications that you want.

Software Benefits

	Word Processing replaces the typewriter. It permits typing to be saved and reused. When a user modifies a portion of a document by adding to, deleting or moving text, the word processing software automatically adjusts the remain text. Word processing software provides many additional benefits like spellchecker, thesaurus, mail merge, and clip art. The main benefit of word processing is the ease of editing, which encourages people to do so, and thus the quality of the resulting document is improved, meaning the document communicates more effectively, which was the purpose of creating it - to get an idea from one person's head into another's.
	Spreadsheets replace calculators due to the ability to store formulas and thus recalculate them automatically, rapidly, precisely and accurately when any value changes. Spreadsheets provide many additional benefits like charting, advanced formulae, goal seeking, and the capability to format attractive output. The main benefit of spreadsheet is that by relieving humans of the boring and error prone work of mathematical computation, and so it so rapidly and accurately, spreadsheet give the analyst has both the time and the facts to evaluate various alternatives and arrive at a superior decision.
	Data Bases replace file cabinets and file clerks providing many additional benefits like ability to retrieve based on any value in a record, select records based on complex criteria, to sort and summarize, to mathematically manipulate values, and to chart. Their main value is keeping all records in a central palace so that the entire organization has complete access to all record at all times, and when a record is updated, that new value is visible to the entire organization.

What is is most expensive part of a computer system?

It is not the laptop or the disk or any piece of hardware or software. It is the time it takes for people to learn how to use the software properly (and the time they waste and/or the mistakes they make because they do not know.)

Definitions

Toggle is a switch that goes on and off with the same action. For example the Caps Lock and Num Lock keys on the keyboard and the B (bold) and I (Italics icons. Click them once and they are on and click a second time and they are off. On, OFF, On, OFF. That means you cannot do it again "just to make sure you did it". Each time you use a toggle, the state is reversed. Some computer switches are not toggles you can do them over and over and the same thing happens. The action to turn on a normal light switch is to move it up. You can do that over and over and the light stays on because the action to turn it off is down, thus a normal light switch is NOT a toggle.

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