Sunday, March 30, 2008

What is computer?(2)



The Internet, sometimes called simply "the Net," is a worldwide system of computer networks - a network of networks in which users at any one computer can, if they have permission, get information from any other computer (and sometimes talk directly to users at other computers). It was conceived by the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) of the U.S. government in 1969 and was first known as the ARPANET. The original aim was to create a network that would allow users of a research computer at one university to be able to "talk to" research computers at other universities. A side benefit of ARPANet's design was that, because messages could be routed or rerouted in more than one direction, the network could continue to function even if parts of it were destroyed in the event of a military attack or other disaster.

Today, the Internet is a public, cooperative, and self-sustaining facility accessible to hundreds of millions of people worldwide. Physically, the Internet uses a portion of the total resources of the currently existing public telecommunication networks. Technically, what distinguishes the Internet is its use of a set of protocols called TCP/IP (for Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol). Two recent adaptations of Internet technology, the intranet and the extranet, also make use of the TCP/IP protocol.

For many Internet users, electronic mail (e-mail) has practically replaced the Postal Service for short written transactions. Electronic mail is the most widely used application on the Net. You can also carry on live "conversations" with other computer users, using Internet Relay Chat (IRC). More recently, Internet telephony hardware and software allows real-time voice conversations.

The most widely used part of the Internet is the World Wide Web (often abbreviated "WWW" or called "the Web"). Its outstanding feature is hypertext, a method of instant cross-referencing. In most Web sites, certain words or phrases appear in text of a different color than the rest; often this text is also underlined. When you select one of these words or phrases, you will be transferred to the site or page that is relevant to this word or phrase. Sometimes there are buttons, images, or portions of images that are "clickable." If you move the pointer over a spot on a Web site and the pointer changes into a hand, this indicates that you can click and be transferred to another site.

Using the Web, you have access to millions of pages of information. Web browsing is done with a Web browser, the most popular of which are Microsoft Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator. The appearance of a particular Web site may vary slightly depending on the browser you use. Also, later versions of a particular browser are able to render more "bells and whistles" such as animation, virtual reality, sound, and music files, than earlier versions.

What is intenet?

“Internet”

Glossary

From Juergen Haas,
Your Guide to Focus on Linux.
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Definition: Internet: A worldwide network of networks. It si also the network of networks that connects more than three million computers (called hosts). The Internet is the virtual space in which users send and receive email, login to remote computers (telnet), browse databases of information (gopher, World Wide Web, WAIS), and send and receive programs (ftp) contained on these computers. From Glossary of Distance Education and Internet Terminology

History of computing

History of computing

The Jacquard loom was one of the first programmable devices.
The Jacquard loom was one of the first programmable devices.

It is difficult to identify any one device as the earliest computer, partly because the term "computer" has been subject to varying interpretations over time. Originally, the term "computer" referred to a person who performed numerical calculations (a human computer), often with the aid of a mechanical calculating device.

The history of the modern computer begins with two separate technologies - that of automated calculation and that of programmability.

Examples of early mechanical calculating devices included the abacus, the slide rule and arguably the astrolabe and the Antikythera mechanism (which dates from about 150-100 BC). The end of the Middle Ages saw a re-invigoration of European mathematics and engineering, and Wilhelm Schickard's 1623 device was the first of a number of mechanical calculators constructed by European engineers. However, none of those devices fit the modern definition of a computer because they could not be programmed.

Hero of Alexandria (c. 10 – 70 AD) built a mechanical theater which performed a play lasting 10 minutes and was operated by a complex system of ropes and drums that might be considered to be a means of deciding which parts of the mechanism performed which actions - and when.[3] This is the essence of programmability. In 1801, Joseph Marie Jacquard made an improvement to the textile loom that used a series of punched paper cards as a template to allow his loom to weave intricate patterns automatically. The resulting Jacquard loom was an important step in the development of computers because the use of punched cards to define woven patterns can be viewed as an early, albeit limited, form of programmability.

It was the fusion of automatic calculation with programmability that produced the first recognisable computers. In 1837, Charles Babbage was the first to conceptualize and design a fully programmable mechanical computer that he called "The Analytical Engine".[4] Due to limited finances, and an inability to resist tinkering with the design, Babbage never actually built his Analytical Engine.

Large-scale automated data processing of punched cards was performed for the U.S. Census in 1890 by tabulating machines designed by Herman Hollerith and manufactured by the Computing Tabulating Recording Corporation, which later became IBM. By the end of the 19th century a number of technologies that would later prove useful in the realization of practical computers had begun to appear: the punched card, Boolean algebra, the vacuum tube (thermionic valve) and the teleprinter.

During the first half of the 20th century, many scientific computing needs were met by increasingly sophisticated analog computers, which used a direct mechanical or electrical model of the problem as a basis for computation. However, these were not programmable and generally lacked the versatility and accuracy of modern digital computers.

Networking and the Internet

Networking and the Internet

Main articles: Computer networking and Internet
Visualization of a portion of the routes on the Internet.
Visualization of a portion of the routes on the Internet.

Computers have been used to coordinate information in multiple locations since the 1950s. The U.S. military's SAGE system was the first large-scale example of such a system, which led to a number of special-purpose commercial systems like Sabre.

In the 1970s, computer engineers at research institutions throughout the United States began to link their computers together using telecommunications technology. This effort was funded by ARPA (now DARPA), and the computer network that it produced was called the ARPANET. The technologies that made the Arpanet possible spread and evolved. In time, the network spread beyond academic and military institutions and became known as the Internet. The emergence of networking involved a redefinition of the nature and boundaries of the computer. Computer operating systems and applications were modified to include the ability to define and access the resources of other computers on the network, such as peripheral devices, stored information, and the like, as extensions of the resources of an individual computer. Initially these facilities were available primarily to people working in high-tech environments, but in the 1990s the spread of applications like e-mail and the World Wide Web, combined with the development of cheap, fast networking technologies like Ethernet and ADSL saw computer networking become almost ubiquitous. In fact, the number of computers that are networked is growing phenomenally. A very large proportion of personal computers regularly connect to the Internet to communicate and receive information. "Wireless" networking, often utilizing mobile phone networks, has meant networking is becoming increasingly ubiquitous even in mobile computing environments.

Software Development

Software Development

Current and proposed courses

  • For majors:
    1. CPT 141 Internet Foundations, Technologies, and Development
    2. CPT 155 Introduction to Object-Oriented Programming
    3. CPT 255 Programming for the Internet
    4. CPT 295/350 Object-Oriented Programming
    5. CPT 355 Software Development for Mobile Computers
    6. CPT 405/581Y Software Development Methodologies
    7. CPT 450 Enterprise Application Development
    8. CPT 465 Senior Software Development Project
  • Service courses:
    1. CPT 105 Introduction to C Programming
    2. CPT 175 Visual Programming
    3. CPT 267 Introduction to C++ Language Programming

Contact: Prof. Kyle Lutes

List of objectives

  • Give students a solid foundation of computer programming fundamentals.
  • Where possible, require team projects to help students build team communication skills.
  • Give majors early exposure to Object-Oriented Programming principals.
  • Give majors early exposure to Internet technologies and Internet application development.
  • Give majors early exposure to relational databases and Structured Query Language (SQL).
  • In addition to teaching theories, give students programming exercises that require students to use these theories to solve real-world, business-oriented problems.
  • Expose students to heterogeneous architectures and development environments and tools (i.e. C#, Java, Unix, Windows, etc.)
  • Teach courses using technologies as how they are currently being used in industry.
  • Design required programming courses based on the concepts to be learned rather than based on how to use specific products.
  • Include selective (elective) software development courses to allow students to get experience using an even wider variety of technologies.
  • Teach introductory topics in introductory courses and advanced topics in advanced courses.
  • Teach the introductory courses in a manner that gives the students the opportunity to see that developing software can be rewarding and fun, and that most interested students have the ability to become professional software developers.
  • At the end of each course, students should have learned a skill that is immediately useful. Example:
    • At the end of the Internet literacy course (CPT 141), students should be able to develop web sites consisting of static HTML pages.
    • At the end of the first programming course (CPT 155), students should be able to develop simple, but useful Windows applications.
    • At the end of the second programming course (CPT 255), students should be able to develop dynamic, data-driven web applications.
    • At the end of the third programming course (CPT 350) students should be able to develop data-driven, dynamic web applications using medium to advance object-oriented techniques.
    • At the end of the fourth programming course (CPT 450) students should be able to develop large, data-driven, multi-user, multi-tiered, component based, dynamic web applications using an object-oriented programming language.

Network Engineering Technology

Network Engineering Technology

Current and proposed courses

Contact: Prof. P.T. Rawles

Description
Sensing the need for IT professionals fluent in networking and system administration the CIT department in 1996 added a second degree option in computer networking. Starting with a single lecture-only elective course in Data Communications, the Network Engineering Technology program has grown in popularity and now makes up over half of the department's graduates.

Students enrolled in NET learn the theory and practice of creating highly available and secure voice and data networks. In lecture/laboratory based courses students focus on the design, implementation, maintenance and security of networks and networked computers. Areas of emphasis include routing and switching, system and network administration, and system management. Throughout their coursework emphasis is placed on building and maintaining reliability and security as key components of any network. This emphasis has developed into a department signature area in information security.

Through strategic faculty hires and the development of unique learning laboratories made possible by the support of dedicated industrial partners including many of the companies who attended the Computer Roundtable, the CIT department has been able to establish a national leadership position in the Network Engineering Technology education domain.

Computer software

Computer software
Operating system Unix/BSD UNIX System V, AIX, HP-UX, Solaris (SunOS), IRIX, List of BSD operating systems
GNU/Linux List of Linux distributions, Comparison of Linux distributions
Microsoft Windows Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows NT, Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows CE
DOS 86-DOS (QDOS), PC-DOS, MS-DOS, FreeDOS
Mac OS Mac OS classic, Mac OS X
Embedded and real-time List of embedded operating systems
Experimental Amoeba, Oberon/Bluebottle, Plan 9 from Bell Labs
Library Multimedia DirectX, OpenGL, OpenAL
Programming library C standard library, Standard template library
Data Protocol TCP/IP, Kermit, FTP, HTTP, SMTP
File format HTML, XML, JPEG, MPEG, PNG
User interface Graphical user interface (WIMP) Microsoft Windows, GNOME, KDE, QNX Photon, CDE, GEM
Text user interface Command line interface, shells
Application Office suite Word processing, Desktop publishing, Presentation program, Database management system, Scheduling & Time management, Spreadsheet, Accounting software
Internet Access Browser, E-mail client, Web server, Mail transfer agent, Instant messaging
Design and manufacturing Computer-aided design, Computer-aided manufacturing, Plant management, Robotic manufacturing, Supply chain management
Graphics Raster graphics editor, Vector graphics editor, 3D modeler, Animation editor, 3D computer graphics, Video editing, Image processing
Audio Digital audio editor, Audio playback, Mixing, Audio synthesis, Computer music
Software Engineering Compiler, Assembler, Interpreter, Debugger, Text Editor, Integrated development environment, Performance analysis, Revision control, Software configuration management
Educational Edutainment, Educational game, Serious game, Flight simulator
Games Strategy, Arcade, Puzzle, Simulation, First-person shooter, Platform, Massively multiplayer, Interactive fiction
Misc Artificial intelligence, Antivirus software, Malware scanner, Installer/Package management systems, File manager

What is computer?


Computer!
This article is about the machine. For other uses, see Computer (disambiguation).
"Computer technology" redirects here. For the company, see Computer Technology Limited.
Look up computer in
Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
The NASA Columbia Supercomputer.
The NASA Columbia Supercomputer.

A computer is a machine that manipulates data according to a list of instructions.

The first devices that resemble modern computers date to the mid-20th century (around 1940 - 1945), although the computer concept and various machines similar to computers existed earlier. Early electronic computers were the size of a large room, consuming as much power as several hundred modern personal computers.[1] Modern computers are based on tiny integrated circuits and are millions to billions of times more capable while occupying a fraction of the space.[2] Today, simple computers may be made small enough to fit into a wristwatch and be powered from a watch battery. Personal computers in various forms are icons of the Information Age and are what most people think of as "a computer"; however, the most common form of computer in use today is the embedded computer. Embedded computers are small, simple devices that are used to control other devices — for example, they may be found in machines ranging from fighter aircraft to industrial robots, digital cameras, and children's toys.

The ability to store and execute lists of instructions called programs makes computers extremely versatile and distinguishes them from calculators. The Church–Turing thesis is a mathematical statement of this versatility: any computer with a certain minimum capability is, in principle, capable of performing the same tasks that any other computer can perform. Therefore, computers with capability and complexity ranging from that of a personal digital assistant to a supercomputer are all able to perform the same computational tasks given enough time and storage capacity.

what is computer and information technology?

Computer and Information Technology

Computer and Information Technology (formerly Computer Technology - CPT) prepares students for existing and emerging jobs and careers in the application of information systems and technology to plan, analyze, design, construct, maintain, and manage

amazing technology

Today's modern world has extended the family of experts needed to keep a competitive business running to include a technology expert. As much as an accountant, electrician or plumber is needed to maintain the books, the electrical grid and the water system, an expert is now required to oversee all advanced technological operations of even the smallest business.
Computer technology has become so affordable that small business can take full advantage of technology previously available only to the largest corporations. Computer systems can coordinate sales, inventory and accounting into one easy to use, fully integrated business system. Computer automation can free up valuable time for the small business owner to focus more on the big picture.

Based on a life long love of computers and technology and backed by a bachelor’s degree in computer science, Carmen Branje’s extensive technical knowledge will provide the best technological solution possible. Whether it be custom business accounting software, e-commerce, network design or multimedia, it can all be provided to you in a cheap and efficient manner, getting the results that are needed to run a successful business in any competitive marketplace.

In this site you will find many things, including a resume and cover letter, examples of past and current work, some examples of my interests and hobbies and a blog containing many things I want to be made public. Please take a moment to browse this site and feel free to drop me an e-mail.