Fluent Essays

Review Chapter 2 regarding the hardware revolution and Chapter 3 regarding the software revolution from your course text. What is hardware? What is software?  How is hardware different from software?  150-200 Words ( Only reference from textbook and links below. If you reference anything from textbook please put what Chapter and Page ) Using the Timeline of Computer History (Links to an external site.), https://www.computerhistory.org/timeline/  identify and describe what you believe to be the two most important hardware innovations. Why are the two hardware examples you selected important? Using the Timeline of Computer History (Links to an external site.) https://www.computerhistory.org/timeline/ webpage, identify and describe what you believe to be the two most important software innovations.  Why are the two software examples you selected important? 9/1/2021 Print https://content.ashford.edu/print/Bowles.0854.13.1?sections=ch02introduction,sec2.1,sec2.2,sec2.3,sec2.4,ch03introduction,sec3.1,sec3.2,sec3.3,sec3.4,sec3.5&cont… 1/52 Introduction In the first chapter, you learned about the penetration of computers into society and the importance of digital literacy. The goal was to help you realize the social significance of the computer and understand its importance in our lives today. In this chapter, you will take the next step. Instead of observing computers from the outside, we will explore them from the inside to see what they are made of and to understand how they have evolved over the last century. We begin the chapter by discussing early computers, which were so large they were weighed by the ton, and we end the chapter by examining some of today's computers, which are so thin they can be easily carried in a pocket or a purse. Indeed, it has been a hardware revolution. 9/1/2021 Print https://content.ashford.edu/print/Bowles.0854.13.1?sections=ch02introduction,sec2.1,sec2.2,sec2.3,sec2.4,ch03introduction,sec3.1,sec3.2,sec3.3,sec3.4,sec3.5&cont… 2/52 Charles Babbage developed plans for an "Analytical Engine" in the mid- nineteenth century. Though he never completed the engine, he is 2.1 A Brief History of Computing Although many people think the computer is a very recent development, it actually has a long history that demonstrates how quickly the computer industry changes. History provides a context for how far we have come with computers in a relatively short period of time. Most importantly, by understanding computer history we can gain a better and deeper understanding of today's computing environment. Since you are reading these words on a computer right now, take a moment and look around you. If your computer is a desktop, the items you see— your mouse, keyboard, monitor, and even the icons on your screen—all have a history. If you are reading this on a tablet computer or an e-reader, it, too has a history, though with a much shorter timeline. This history shapes our lives and influences the way we interact with the world. In the Beginning. . . The concept of a calculating machine with gears first took physical shape during the 17th century. The use of mechanical devices as an aid in the calculation of numbers was an elusive and attractive dream for Blaise Pascal, a French mathematician (Coleman, 1986, p. 32). One of those who Pascal inspired was Charles Babbage. In 1812, at Cambridge University in England, Babbage worked with his friend, Ada Byron Lovelace, who also had high expectations for the future of a computing machine (Stein, 1985, p. xi). While they never attained these lofty ideals, what Babbage did accomplish was to develop designs for all the components of a programmable computer. Babbage and Lovelace defined the central functions of a computer and called them input, output, memory, logic, and processor. These are terms we still use today. Together, Charles Babbage and Ada Lovelace can be considered the "Father and Mother of the Computer." The Origin of the Computer The Origin of the Computer From Title: The History of Computers (https://fod.infobase.com/PortalPlaylists.aspx? wID=100753&xtid=29445) © Infobase. All Rights Reserved. Length: 03:21     0:000:00 / 3:21 / 3:21 1x1x https://fod.infobase.com/PortalPlaylists.aspx?wID=100753&xtid=29445 9/1/2021 Print https://content.ashford.edu/print/Bowles.0854.13.1?sections=ch02introduction,sec2.1,sec2.2,sec2.3,sec2.4,ch03introduction,sec3.1,sec3.2,sec3.3,sec3.4,sec3.5&cont… 3/52 considered the father of the computer for being the first to conceive of and diagram an automatic calculating machine. The IBM® Era By the late 19th century, the enthusiasm for computers moved to the United States (Bowles, 1996). Herman Hollerith had great success with his construction of a machine to tabulate the 1890 census. He came up with the idea of representing each person's data on a punch card with holes in it. In 1924, Hollerith's company changed its name to International Business Machines, which is known today as IBM®. The von Neumann Architecture The next important computer was the EDVAC (Electronic Discrete Variable Automatic Computer), completed in 1949, and operational in 1951. It was significant because of John von Neumann's work on the logical operations of the machine (Macrae, 2000). These five "classic components" of a computer—memory, input, output, arithmetic logic unit, and control unit—are known as the von Neumann architecture and remain the basic structure for computers to this day. The EDVAC was also called the stored-program computer because it stored data internally on its memory. In addition to storing information, the memory could hold codes for operating the machine, also known as a stored program. In von Neumann's system, the computer had its own arithmetic calculator that could perform basic math. This arithmetic logic unit used only binary numbers. Binary means that the computer represents all information, including images and text, as combinations of ones and zeros. To understand what this means, think of a light bulb. When the light was on, the computer considered this to be the number 1. When the light was off, the computer considered this to be a 0. Every number and letter on the computer can be signified by a series of ones and zeros. Von Neumann referred to data coming into the computer as the input and data leaving the machine as its output. It traveled through a data path (later called a bus) from its memory, performed the operation in the arithmetic component, and then either stored the result for further computations or output the data (Davis, 2000, p. 182). The IBM® 360 At this point, IBM® staked the future of the company on the development of a new computer called the IBM® 360, first released in April 1964. The name 360 indicated that this computer targeted a "full circle" of customers to perform functions ranging from complex mathematics at scientific laboratories, to simpler and more repetitive calculations done in business. (You may also recognize the importance of this number today from the Xbox® 360, a game console system from Microsoft®, or Norton™ 360, a virus protection suite of software.) The IBM® 360 also came with a host of peripherals (external devices that can be connected to a computer to enhance its capability, such as printers or storage devices). More than 150 peripherals were offered the first day the IBM® 360 went to market, including disks, tapes, and punch cards designed to make the entire system more efficient and user-friendly. It also had an operating system known as OS/360 and used transistors, a Bell Labs innovation that quickly became the heart of the computing industry, to eliminate the need for vacuum tubes and enable computers to be smaller, faster, and more reliable. Transistors are small switches that can amplify a data signal to a computer, as shown in Figure 2.1. Some have called the transistor the most significant invention of the 20th century (Bunch & Hellemans, 2004, p. 546). 9/1/2021 Print https://content.ashford.edu/print/Bowles.0854.13.1?sections=ch02introduction,sec2.1,sec2.2,sec2.3,sec2.4,ch03introduction,sec3.1,sec3.2,sec3.3,sec3.4,sec3.5&cont… 4/52 This graph demonstrates the incredible increase in the number of transistors in processors over time. As the data shows, the number of transistors doubles every two years. Figure 2.1: Increase of transistor count over time Adapted from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Transistor_Count_and_Moore %27s_Law_-_2011.svg (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Transistor_Count_and_Moore%27s_Law_-_2011.svg) With the IBM® 360, the company gained an astonishing 70% of the market share (Ceruzzi, 2003, p. 145). By the mid-1970s, the computer industry had come of age. Information technology had taken its place as one of the most significant industries in the world, and it was beginning to rival the automobile industry in size. By 1975, of every $120 spent on goods in the United States, $1 went for the purchase of a computer (Campbell-Kelly & Aspray, 1996, p. 150). As so often happens in the computer industry, change was coming. The personal computer was on the horizon, and a revolution was around the corner. Innovation at Xerox® While today we think of Xerox® as a copier manufacturing company, it was the center of the universe as far as computer innovation during the 1970s (Hiltzik, 2007). At this time, there was a growing concern that businesses might become "paperless" because all data would be stored on computers. This was a concern to Xerox® executives because their income was based on businesses photocopying physical documents. Therefore, they began to explore how Xerox® might be able to survive in a digital era. Located near Stanford University in California, these bright engineers at Xerox® PARC (Palo Alto Research Center) prepared for a paperless http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Transistor_Count_and_Moore%27s_Law_-_2011.svg 9/1/2021 Print https://content.ashford.edu/print/Bowles.0854.13.1?sections=ch02introduction,sec2.1,sec2.2,sec2.3,sec2.4,ch03introduction,sec3.1,sec3.2,sec3.3,sec3.4,sec3.5&cont… 5/52 doomsday that they believed would occur in 1990 (although it did not happen, we are still moving in this direction). Fear spurred them to create peripheral devices that changed the shape of computing, including the cursor, mouse, pointer, Graphical User Interface (GUI), WYSIWYG, laser printers, and word processors. Although we will be discussing what some of these terms mean later, it is important to remember that while the initial innovations occurred at Xerox®, it was other companies that brought these devices to market. This is a valuable lesson; innovation does not guarantee commercial success. What happened to all of this peripheral innovation? The Xerox® executives were interested in what these engineers accomplished, but they never gave the go-ahead to fund the devices beyond the research stage. They did, however, invite guests to tour their facilities. Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple®, visited Xerox® in 1979 and gathered ideas that became the central features of the Macintosh®, which he released in 1984. Bill Gates would later incorporate these same design elements into Microsoft® Windows® (Cringely, 1991, pp. 73–92). The personal computer was on the horizon. Inventing the Processor The development of the processor enabled the computer to become personal. Ted Hoff, working at a widely unknown company called Intel® during the 1960s, came up with an interesting idea to solve a problem for a customer. Hoff's idea was to develop a general-purpose integrated circuit, instead of a specific logic chip that would work only in this calculator. In other words, multiple electronic circuits were placed on one chip. What is an integrated circuit? Often, you will find that it is difficult to understand the definitions of technical terms because the explanations can be as complex (or more so) than the original terms themselves. An integrated circuit is an example. Basically, it is a small silicon wafer in which circuits consisting of millions of transistors, resistors, and capacitors can be embedded. The transistor is a switch that can amplify current (think of a radio amplifier in your car stereo) or turn electricity on or off. A resistor can control the current and limit it (think of a volume control on a TV). A capacitor can collect and hold energy for a short burst (just like the flash on a camera). Hoff's integrated circuit was a revolutionary development because it was more than just a chip for a calculator. Instead, it could be used in a variety of devices ranging from music synthesizers to missile guidance systems. To make these machines perform different functions, each chip needed only a different set of instructions, or a program. This was revolutionary because now one piece of hardware (the processor) could be used in any type of computer as long as the software changed. It was much easier to change a software program than to redesign a processor. Hoff was elated with his development, but no one else seemed to care or realize its significance. Hoff was able to convince Intel® to develop his project, and by 1970, they had a prototype called the "processor" (Palfreman & Swade, 1991, pp. 106–118). One of the main benefits of the processor was its small size. Remember, the mainframe computers of the 1950s weighed several tons and filled an entire room. The silicon processor, developed in a California region soon to be called Silicon Valley, could be held in the palm of your hand. Smaller, faster, and cheaper, the processor seemed to have unlimited potential. But Intel® remained ahead of the curve. IBM® and Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) evaluated the idea and concluded that there would be no market for such a device. After all, what possible reason would an average person have for a computer, especially at home? IBM® thought that if someone really wanted to use a computer, he or she could rent time-sharing from a local business mainframe during off hours (Campbell-Kelly & Aspray, 1996, pp. 236–258). 9/1/2021 Print https://content.ashford.edu/print/Bowles.0854.13.1?sections=ch02introduction,sec2.1,sec2.2,sec2.3,sec2.4,ch03introduction,sec3.1,sec3.2,sec3.3,sec3.4,sec3.5&cont… 6/52 Altair, the First PC The large computer makers failed to realize there was a home market for computers. Instead, those who were most excited about the development of the processor were the hobbyists. They wanted a computer in their home and were willing and knowledgeable enough to build it themselves. They were finally able to do this in January 1975, when Popular Electronics hit the newsstands with a cover depicting a computer called the Altair that could be purchased in pieces and assembled at home. By 1976, 5,000 to 15,000 Americans had an Altair (Berger, 1976, p. 112). At one large meeting for the Altair in Atlantic City, two men named Stephen Wozniak and Steve Jobs began selling circuit boards. Apple® Jobs and Wozniak were an interesting, idealistic pair who had been tinkering with a computer in Jobs's garage. In 1976, they released their computer, called the Apple® I, which soon evolved into the more popular Apple® II. This was a personal computer designed for everyone to use out-of-the box, not just the skilled hobbyist geeks who assembled it with their own soldering guns. The Apple® II met with a resounding success upon its release in March 1977. The company had $700,000 in sales the first year, and $7 million the next. Suddenly, a personal computer industry began to flourish, and along with Apple®, other computers hit the market, including the RadioShack TRS-80, the Commodore PET, and later, the Atari™ 400/800 computers. These new computers came with a monitor (or could be plugged into a television) and a keyboard, but the biggest frustration for users was how data and other programs were stored. The device used to store a program or load one into the computer was a simple audiotape cassette deck that plugged into the computer through a special port. The sound carried the data, but it was a slow and often inexact process to enter or save data. Sometimes, the entire tape played in, only to display a data entry error at the end, requiring the entire process to be repeated: Rewind. Advance the leader of the cassette tape. And try again. Rewind. Advance the leader of the cassette tape. And try again. Wozniak eventually came to the rescue by developing a disk drive that stored data on 5.25-inch floppy disks. This was a faster and much more reliable method of transmitting and storing data to and from the computer. By 1980, Apple®'s sales were $96 million. But where was IBM®? This question was on the minds of many. When would this sleeping giant awake? And, when it did, how would its entry change the face of the computer industry that was firmly under Apple®'s control? IBM® Gets Personal Some have considered IBM®'s entry into the market as the most important development in the history of personal computers. While the homebrew clubs (these were clubs of computer hobbyists) and the early Apple® advocates would take exception to this statement, the IBM® PC was a significant moment in the history of computing. The original release took place in August 1981, and for $1,565, the first IBM® PC came with several nice features, including 64 KB of RAM memory and an external hard drive that could store 160 KB of data on a single-sided disk. The monitor—which had a green-and-white monochrome display—cost extra. The result was a huge 9/1/2021 Print https://content.ashford.edu/print/Bowles.0854.13.1?sections=ch02introduction,sec2.1,sec2.2,sec2.3,sec2.4,ch03introduction,sec3.1,sec3.2,sec3.3,sec3.4,sec3.5&cont… 7/52 The invention of the floppy disk in the late 1970s made personal computers more convenient to use, and therefore, more popular. What methods of data storage have replaced the floppy disk today? Jupiterimages/Photos.com/Thinkstock/©Getty Images commercial success. IBM® had hoped to sell 240,000 computers over a period of five years. Instead, they received that many orders in the first month alone. The first IBM® PC was not revolutionary in itself because Apple® and Altair had been there first, but what made it so important was that it came from IBM®. In a sense, what IBM® did was legitimize the personal computer and demonstrate that a personal PC had a role to play in a company long known for developing massive mainframes (New York Times, 2007, p. 449). The IBM® PC How did the IBM® PC come to be? The company had considered manufacturing the PC for years, but nothing transpired until July 1980, when John R. Opel and Frank T. Carey, the IBM® president and chairman, respectively, asked their managers for a report on how the company could enter the personal computer market within a year (Campbell-Kelly & Aspray, 1996, p. 232). Just one month later, a plan was in place, and IBM® began working on the PC. Launching the first PC within a year was an ambitious plan for a large, slow-moving company that typically took up to four years to develop a new computer. One way it accomplished this ambitious goal was to delegate the development of some parts of the computer to third-party vendors. One of these requirements was a software system, and instead of developing one internally, IBM® found a vendor that impressed them: Microsoft® (Wise, 1982, p. 23). For the central processor, IBM® selected the Intel® 8088 and 8086 chips. Although this strategy enabled IBM® to put the PC on the market in record time, partnering so closely with its vendors meant that IBM® lost a significant portion of its profit margin. The company achieved short-term success, but jeopardized its long-term strength. Another Apple®—Macintosh® Apple® Computer, still headed by Jobs and Wozniak, continued to push its brand of computer while IBM® worked on entering the market. However, Apple® began to encounter less consumer enthusiasm for its newer products. The first was the Apple® III, released in 1980. The main reason people did not rush out to purchase an Apple® III was its retail price, which ranged from $4,000 to nearly $8,000. These numbers have not been adjusted for inflation. Computers sold in 1980 cost a great deal more and were significantly less powerful than computers today. The high price compensated for the low demand and kept Apple® alive as it continued to push the limits of computer technology by offering a product that was unique and innovative. Apple® maintained this philosophy with its next major computer release, the LISA (Largely Integrated Systems Architecture), in 1983. The most significant feature of this computer was that it was the first personal computer to have a GUI (Graphical User Interface). This meant that users could manipulate the computer by clicking on icons instead of typing characters on a screen. When users turned on an IBM® PC, they saw a black screen with three lonely characters, C:\ (called the C prompt), and a blinking cursor. When a LISA was turned on, its screen showed icons representing applications and tasks the computer could perform. The LISA incorporated a mouse to let users navigate the menus and icons quickly and easily. 9/1/2021 Print https://content.ashford.edu/print/Bowles.0854.13.1?sections=ch02introduction,sec2.1,sec2.2,sec2.3,sec2.4,ch03introduction,sec3.1,sec3.2,sec3.3,sec3.4,sec3.5&cont… 8/52 Despite the glamour of LISA, there were problems, including its price (initially $12,000), which was even more expensive than the Apple® III (Freiberger, 1983, p. 1). Apple® eventually lowered LISA's cost by $2,000, but sales were still slow. The company learned its lesson, but did not want to give up on the LISA features. In 1984, Apple® launched a new computer called the Macintosh® that maintained the GUI interface and mouse. This release, which included a remarkably futuristic Super Bowl commercial, established the major divisions in the personal computer wars. On one side was the IBM® PC; on the other was the Apple® Macintosh®. This division continues to this day, even though IBM® itself is no longer a major player. Early sales of the Macintosh® were slow. Although it was the fastest-selling $10,000 computer of all time, only 25,000 people bought it the year it was introduced (Mace, 1983, p. 65). It had no hard drive and had only limited memory, which made the computer operate slowly. IBM® remained the safer choice in the personal computer and small business environment (Wise & Steemers, 2000, pp. 49–50), while Apple® maintained and cultivated a small and loyal following. One of the remarkable features of computers is that they decrease in price over time, while also getting more powerful. Table 2.1 shows the decrease in price, and increase in speed and capability. Table 2.1: Macintosh® and iMac® comparison from 1984 and 2009 Computer Macintosh® iMac® Year sold 1984 2009 Price in 2009 dollars $5,186.17 $3,849.00 CPU Motorola 68000 2.8 GHz quad-core Intel® Core™ i7 Total CPU MHz 7.83 11,200 RAM (KB) 128 16,000,000 Fixed Disk (MB) 0 2,000,000 Removable Drive 3.5" floppy 8x double-layer SuperDrive Removable Capacity (KB/media) 400 8,500,000 Operating System Apple® Macintosh® System Software 1.0 Apple® Mac® OS X® 10.6 Snow Leopard Adapted from http://www.britannica.com/blogs/2010/04/computers-just-keep-getting-cheaper-and-better-and-we-should-eagerly- await-the-days-ahead/ Enter the Clones IBM® continued its domination of the market by introducing three new personal computers during the 1980s: the 80286 (in 1982), the 80386 (in 1985), and the 80486 (in 1989). These were the names that computer users called them, but in reality they were the names of the Intel® processor inside the machine. Higher numbers indicated a faster machine with more computing power, which was needed as applications became more graphically intensive and required greater amounts of memory. But IBM® was not the only company selling machines. A variety of 9/1/2021 Print https://content.ashford.edu/print/Bowles.0854.13.1?sections=ch02introduction,sec2.1,sec2.2,sec2.3,sec2.4,ch03introduction,sec3.1,sec3.2,sec3.3,sec3.4,sec3.5&cont… 9/52 clones hit the market almost as soon as the original IBM® PC did. This became a highly competitive field very quickly. Other companies duplicated the IBM® product and marketed their computers as being "100% compatible with IBM®." A host of IBM® compatibles flooded the market, and some of these companies have survived to this day, including Gateway® and Dell™ Computers (Compaq merged into Hewlett-Packard). Today, there are even more companies manufacturing desktop and portable computers and it remains a very competitive market. Open the Windows By 1991, the PC entered a new phase. Using Microsoft®'s new graphical operating system called 3.1 (to be covered in a later chapter), the PC was now "borrowing" the appearance and features of the Macintosh®. But ultimately, it was not IBM® that saw the lion's share of the profits. Companies that sold clones, such as Dell™ and Compaq, made more money than IBM® did. Microsoft® was the biggest winner during this period because it was able to sell its software for both the clones and IBM® (Ceruzzi, 2003, p. 272). Thus, much of the personal computer environment was established with the IBM® PC and clones on one side, the Apple® Macintosh® on the other, and Microsoft® in the enviable software position in the middle. Questions to Consider 1. Are computers a recent development? 2. Who are considered "the Father and Mother of the Computer"? 3. What are the five main components of the von Neumann computer architecture? 4. What was the first computer to use a binary operating system? 5. What did the number "360" represent in the name of the IBM® 360 computer? 6. Who invented the processor, and what company did he work for? 7. What was the name of the first personal computer? 8. Who founded Apple®, and when did the company release its first computer? 9. What were some of Apple®'s early competitors? 10. When did IBM® first sell its PC? Who were some of the key vendors that created parts for the PC? 11. What does GUI stand for, and what were the first personal computers to use GUI? 12. Which was a faster processor: the 80286 or the 80386? 13. What were two of the companies that manufactured IBM® clones? 9/1/2021 Print https://content.ashford.edu/print/Bowles.0854.13.1?sections=ch02introduction,sec2.1,sec2.2,sec2.3,sec2.4,ch03introduction,sec3.1,sec3.2,sec3.3,sec3.4,sec3.5&co… 10/52 2.2 Looking Inside the Computer One of the ironies in writing a book about digital literacy for online students is that you clearly have some level of familiarity with the computer; otherwise, you would not be reading these electronic words. You know how to turn on a computer, identify a monitor, and how to use a keyboard and mouse to perform tasks online. With this in mind, let's skip over some of the most basic information and branch off into a discussion of how a computer works. The focus here will be on a standard desktop computer. Everything discussed also applies to a tablet, although the components are smaller and condensed into a single portable case. Both tablets and desktops work the same way though interaction with a tablet is with touch and with a desktop computer it is with a mouse (Miller, 2007). However, now with the new Windows® 8 operating system, Microsoft® is integrating touch into the desktop environment. The Main Computer Box Let's start with the large box to which the monitor, keyboard, printer, speakers, and mouse are connected. This is the computer itself. It can come in different shapes and sizes, including large (tower) and smaller (mini tower) options. In the early days, these boxes were either white or beige, but now they can be any color, although many are black. On the front is the on/off button, a blinking light that indicates when the hard drive is in operation, and options for external storage such as a DVD drive (more on this topic later). The back of the computer (or the front on many tower computer cases) is where you will find ports to connect other devices, such as stereo mini jacks for speakers or microphones, Ethernet for your Internet connection, and USB (Universal Serial Bus) ports for peripherals such as cameras or printers (again, more information on these topics will be provided later). The major components of a computer are shown in Figure 2.2. All the computer magic happens inside the box, but our goal in the next few paragraphs will be to dispel the notion that magic is involved. Instead, computers work by means of a relatively simple and direct process (Parsons & Oja, 2010). Figure 2.2: Computer parts 9/1/2021 Print https://content.ashford.edu/print/Bowles.0854.13.1?sections=ch02introduction,sec2.1,sec2.2,sec2.3,sec2.4,ch03introduction,sec3.1,sec3.2,sec3.3,sec3.4,sec3.5&co… 11/52 This interactive figure reviews the major parts of a computer, including typical peripheral devices such as a printer and scanner. Before you pull off your computer case, be sure to take the following precautions. First, unplug the power and press and hold the start button for 10 seconds. This drains power from the capacitors (a device similar to a battery in that it stores electrical energy). Second, eliminate any static electricity in your body that might have built up. We have all experienced what happens when we shuffle our feet on carpet when wearing socks and then touch someone. A small spark of static electricity is produced. This …