Applications of Computer

Business

A computer has high speed of calculation, diligence, accuracy, reliability, or versatility which has made it an integrated part in all business organizations.

Computer is used in business organizations for –

• Payroll calculations

• Budgeting

• Sales analysis

• Financial forecasting

• Managing employee database

• Maintenance of stocks, etc.

Banking

Today, banking is almost totally dependent on computers.

Banks provide the following facilities –

• Online accounting facility, which includes checking current balance, making deposits and overdrafts, checking interest charges, shares, and trustee records.

• ATM machines which are completely automated are making it even easier for customers to deal with banks.

Insurance

Insurance companies are keeping all records up-to-date with the help of computers. Insurance companies, finance houses, and stock broking firms are widely using computers for their concerns.

Insurance companies are maintaining a database of all clients with information showing –

• Procedure to continue with policies

• Starting date of the policies

• Next due installment of a policy

• Maturity date

• Interests due

• Survival benefits

• Bonus

Education

The computer helps in providing a lot of facilities in the education system.

·         The computer provides a tool in the education system known as CBE (Computer Based Education).

·         CBE involves control, delivery, and evaluation of learning.

·         Computer education is rapidly increasing the graph of number of computer students.

·         There are a number of methods in which educational institutions can use a computer to educate the students.

·         It is used to prepare a database about performance of a student and analysis is carried out on this basis.

Marketing

In marketing, uses of the computer are following −

·         Advertising − With computers, advertising professionals create art and graphics, write and revise copy, and print and disseminate ads with the goal of selling more products.

·         Home Shopping − Home shopping has been made possible through the use of computerized catalogues that provide access to product information and permit direct entry of orders to be filled by the customers.

Healthcare

Computers have become an important part in hospitals, labs, and dispensaries. They are being used in hospitals to keep the record of patients and medicines. It is also used in scanning and diagnosing different diseases. ECG, EEG, ultrasounds and CT scans, etc. are also done by computerized machines.

Following are some major fields of health care in which computers are used.

·         Diagnostic System − Computers are used to collect data and identify the cause of illness.

·         Lab-diagnostic System − All tests can be done and the reports are prepared by computer.

·         Patient Monitoring System − These are used to check the patient's signs for abnormality such as in Cardiac Arrest, ECG, etc.

·         Pharma Information System − Computer is used to check drug labels, expiry dates, harmful side effects, etc.

·         Surgery − Nowadays, computers are also used in performing surgery.

Engineering Design

Computers are widely used for Engineering purpose.One of the major areas is CAD (Computer Aided Design) that provides creation and modification of images. Some of the fields are −

·         Structural Engineering − Requires stress and strain analysis for design of ships, buildings, budgets, airplanes, etc.

·         Industrial Engineering − Computers deal with design, implementation, and improvement of integrated systems of people, materials, and equipment.

·         Architectural Engineering − Computers help in planning towns, designing buildings, determining a range of buildings on a site using both 2D and 3D drawings.

Military

Computers are largely used in defence. Modern tanks, missiles, weapons, etc. Military also employs computerized control systems. Some military areas where a computer has been used are –

• Missile Control

• Military Communication

• Military Operation and Planning

• Smart Weapons

Communication

Communication is a way to convey a message, an idea, a picture, or speech that is received and understood clearly and correctly by the person for whom it is meant. Some main areas in this category are −

• E-mail

• Chatting

• Usenet

• FTP

• Telnet

• Video-conferencing

Government

Computers play an important role in government services. Some major fields in this category are −

• Budgets

• Sales tax department

• Income tax department

• Computation of male/female ratio

• Computerization of voters lists

• Computerization of PAN card

• Weather forecasting

Architecture of Computer

The computer performs basically five major operations of functions irrespective of their size and make. These are 1) it accepts data or instruction by way of input, 2) it stores data, 3) it can process data as required by the user, 4) it gives results in the form of output, and 5) it controls all operations inside a computer. We discuss below each of these operations.        

1. Input: this is the process of entering data and programs into the computer system.

Input unit connects the external environment with internal computer system. It provides data and instructions to the computer system. Commonly used input devices are keyboard, mouse, magnetic tape etc.

Input unit performs following tasks:

• Accept the data and instructions from the outside environment.

• Convert it into machine language.

• Supply the converted data to computer system.

2. Control Unit (CU): The process of input, output, processing and storage is performed under the supervision of a unit called 'Control Unit'. It decides when to start receiving data, when to stop it, where to store data, etc. It takes care of step -by-step processing of all operations inside the computer.
3. Memory Unit: Computer is used to store data and program. There are two classes of memory devices:- Primary and Secondary

Primary memory is used to store the data which is being currently executed. It is used for temporary storage of data. The data is lost, when the computer is switched off. RAM is used as primary storage memory.

The secondary memory is slower and cheaper than primary memory. It is used for permanent storage of data. Commonly used secondary memory devices are hard disk, CD, Floppy Disk, Magnetic Tapes etc.

4. Arithmetic Logic Unit (ALU): The major operations performed by the ALU are addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, logic and comparison.
5. Output: This is the process of producing results from the data for getting useful information.It connects the internal system of a computer to the external environment. It provides the results of any computation, or instructions to the outside world. Some output devices are printers, monitor etc.

The ALU and the CU of a computer system are jointly known as the central processing unit (CPU). The heart of the computer system is the Processor unit.

PERIPHERAL DEVICES:

Peripheral devices are connected to the computer externally. These devices are used for performing some specific functions. Peripheral devices are as follows:

1.         Input Devices

2.         Output Devices

3.         Other Peripherals

INPUT DEVICES:

Input devices accept data and instructions from the user. Following are the examples of various input devices, which are connected to the computer for this purpose.

1.                  Keyboard

2.                  Mouse

3.                  Light Pen

4.                  Optical/magnetic Scanner

5.                  Touch Screen

6.                  Microphone for voice as input

7.                  Track Ball

OUTPUT DEVICES:                                                                                                      

Output devices return processed data that is information, back to the  user. Some of the commonly used output devices are:

1.                  Monitor (Visual Display Unit)

2.                  Printers

3.                  Plotter

4.                  Speakers

Classification of Computers

A) Analog Computers

·         Analog computers are used to process continuous data

·         An analog computer measures continuously instead of counting.

·         Output is in the form of graph.

·         Limited memory.

·         Speed is low

·         Accuracy is poor

·          All the analog computers are special purpose computers.

B) Digital Computers

•      Digital computer represents physical quantities with the help of digits or numbers

•      These numbers are used to perform Arithmetic calculations and also make logical decision to reach a conclusion, depending on, the data they receive from the user.

•      Better Accuracy

•      Larger Memory Space

•      Processing Speed is Faster

•      Used for business, Industries, etc

C) Hybrid Computers

Various specifically designed computers are with both digital and analog characteristics combining the advantages of analog and digital computers when working as a system. Hybrid computers are being used extensively in process control system where it is necessary to have a close representation with the physical world.

The hybrid system provides the good precision that can be attained with analog computers and the greater control that is possible with digital computers, plus the ability to accept the input data in either form.

1. Super Computers

2. Main Frame Computers

3. Mini Computers

4. Micro Computers

1. Super Computers E.g.:- CRAY Research :- CRAY-1 & CRAY-2, Fujitsu (VP2000), Hitachi (S820), NEC (SX20), PARAM 10000 by C-DAC, Anupam by BARC, PACE Series by DRDO

􀂃 Most powerful Computer system - needs a large room

􀂃 Minimum world length is 64 bits

􀂃 CPU speed: 100 MIPS

􀂃 Equivalent to 4000 computers

􀂃 High cost: 4 – 5 millions

􀂃 Able to handle large amount of data

􀂃 High power consumption

􀂃 High precision

􀂃 Large and fast memory (Primary and Secondary)

􀂃 Uses multiprocessing and parallel processing

􀂃 Supports multi-programming

2. Main Frame Computers E.g.:- IBM 3000 series, Burroughs B7900, Univac 1180, DEC

􀂃 Able to process large amount of data at very high speed

􀂃 Supports multi-user facility

􀂃 Number of processors varies from one to six.

􀂃 Cost: 3500 to many million dollars

􀂃 Kept in air conditioned room to keep them cool

􀂃 Supports many I/O and auxiliary storage devices

􀂃 Supports network of terminals 

3. Mini Computers E.g.:- Digital Equipment PDP 11/45 and VAX 11)

􀂃 Perform better than micros

􀂃 Large in size and costlier than micros

􀂃 Designed to support more than one user at a time

􀂃 Posses large storage capacities and operates at higher speed

􀂃 Support faster peripheral devices like high speed printers

􀂃 Can also communicate with main frames

4. Micro Computers E.g.:- IBM PC, PS/2 and Apple Macintosh

􀂃 A microcomputer uses a microprocessor as its central Processing Unit. Microcomputers are tiny computers that can vary in size from a single chip to the size of a desktop model

􀂃 They are designed to be used by only one person at a time

􀂃 Small to medium data storage capacities 500MB – 2GB

􀂃 The common examples of microcomputers are chips used in washing machines, TVs, Cars and Note book/Personal computers. 

Generation of Computers

The first electronic computer was designed and built at the University of Pennsylvania based on vacuum tube technology. Vacuum tubes were used to perform logic operations and to store data. Generations of computers has been divided into five according to the development of technologies used to fabricate the processors, memories and I/O units.

I Generation: 1945 – 55

II Generation: 1955 – 65

III Generation: 1965 – 75

IV Generation: 1975 – 89

V Generation: 1989 to present

First Generation

ENIAC - Electronic Numerical Integrator And Calculator, 1946

EDSAC – Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator, 1949

EDVAC – Electronic Discrete Variable Automatic Computer, 1949

UNIVAC – Universal Automatic Computer, 1951

·         The first large electronic computer was completed in 1946 by a team led by Eckert &Mauchly at the university of Pennsylvania in USA, this computer called as ENIAC

·         Vacuum tubes were used

·         ENIAC took about 200 microseconds to add two digits & about 2800 microseconds to multiply.

·         EDSAC was completed in 1949 & used mercury delay lines for storage.

·         Storage Device: Acoustic delay lines and later magnetic drum. Memory capacity of 1 Kb memory.

·         Switching Time: 0.1 to 1 mili sec

·         MTBF (Mean time between Failure): 30 min to 1 hr.

·         It stores machine instructions in the memory of the computer along with data

·         Designed at Cambridge University UK, under leadership of Prof. Maurice Wilkes.

·         UNIVAC I built by Univac division of Remington Rand & delivered in 1951.

Details of First Generation

·         Bulky

·         Consume more power with limited performance

·         High cost

·         Uses assembly language – to prepare programs. These were translated into machine level language for execution.

·         Mercury delay line memories and Electrostatic memories were used

·         Fixed point arithmetic was used

·         Punched cards and paper tape were invented to feed programs and data and to get results.

·         Magnetic tape / magnetic drum were used as secondary memory

·         Mainly used for scientific computations.

Second Generation (Manufacturers – IBM 7030, Digital Data Corporation’s PDP 1/5/8 Honeywell 400)

·         Transistors were used in place of vacuum tubes. (Inventedat AT&T Bell lab in 1947. By, Bardeen, Brattain & Shockley in 1947.)

·         Small in size

·         Lesser power consumption and better performance

·         Lower cost

·         Switching Time: 1 to 10 micro sec

·         MTBF (Mean time between Failure): about 10 hrs.

·         Memory capacity of 100 KB

·         Magnetic ferrite core memories were used as main memory which is a random-access nonvolatile memory

·         Magnetic tapes and magnetic disks were used as secondary memory

·         Hardware for floating point arithmetic operations was developed.

·         Index registers were introduced which increased flexibility of programming.

·         High level languages such as FORTRAN, COBOL (Common Business Oriented Language)etc were used - Compilers were developed to translate the high-level program into corresponding assembly language program which was then translated into machine language.

·         Separate input-output processors were developed that could operate in parallel with CPU.

·         Punched cards continued during this period also.

·         Increasingly used in business, industry and commercial organizations for preparation of payroll, inventory control, marketing, production planning, research, scientific & engineering analysis and design etc.

Third Generation (System 360 Mainframe from IBM, PDP-8 Mini Computer from Digital Equipment Corporation)

·         In 1965 with germanium transistors being replaced by Silicon transistors

·         ICs were used, IC’s are consist of transistors, resistors & capacitors on a single chip

·         Small Scale Integration (10 transistors per chip) and Medium Scale Integration (100 transistors per chip) technology were implemented in CPU, I/O processors etc.

·         Storage Device: High speed magnetic cores. 100 Mb memory. 1 Mb main memory (hard disk)

·         Switching Time: 0.1 to 1 micro sec

·         MTBF (Mean time between Failure): 100 hrs.

·         Smaller & better performance

·         Comparatively lesser cost

·         Faster processors

·         In the beginning magnetic core memories were used. Later they were replaced by semiconductor memories (RAM & ROM)

·         Introduced microprogramming

·         Microprogramming, parallel processing (pipelining, multiprocessor system etc), multiprogramming, multi-user system (time shared system) etc were introduced.

·         Operating system software were introduced (efficient sharing of a computer system by several user programs)

·         Cache and virtual memories were introduced (Cache memory makes the main memory appear faster than it really is. Virtual memory makes it appear larger)

·         High level languages were improved & standardized by ANSI (American National Standards Institute)eg. FORTRAN IV, COBOL 68etc

·         Database management, multi-user application, online systems like closed loop process control, airline reservation, interactive query systems, automatic industrial control etc emerged during this period.

Fourth Generation (Intel’s 8088,80286,80386,80486 .., Motorola’s 68000, 68030, 68040, Apple II, CRAY I/2/X/MP etc)

·         Microprocessors were introduced as CPU– Complete processors and large section of main memory could be implemented in a single chip

·         Tens of thousands of transistors can be placed in a single chip (VLSI design implemented)

·         Storage Device: Semiconductor memory. 10 Mb-512 Mb main memory. Hard disk 2-16gb

·         Switching Time: 10 to 100 nano sec

·         MTBF (Mean time between Failure): 1000 hrs.

·         CRT screen, laser & ink jet printers, scanners etc were developed.

·         Semiconductor memory chips were used as the main memory.

·         Secondary memory was composed of hard disks – Floppy disks & magnetic tapes were used for backup memory

·         Parallelism, pipelining cache memory and virtual memory were applied in a better way

·         LAN and WANS were developed (where desktop work stations interconnected)

·         Introduced C language and Unix OS

·         Introduced Graphical User Interface

·         Less power consumption

·         High performance, lower cost and very compact

·         Much increase in the speed of operation

Fifth Generation (IBM notebooks, Pentium PCs-Pentium 1/2/3/4/Dual core/Quad core. SUN work stations, Origin 2000, PARAM 10000, IBM SP/2)

·         Generation number beyond IV, have been used occasionally to describe some current computer system that have a dominant organizational or application driven feature.

·         Storage Device: Semiconductor memory. 1 Gb-4 Gb main memory. Hard disk is 40 Gb-1 Tb

·         Switching Time: 1 to 10 nano sec

·         MTBF (Mean time between Failure): 10000 hrs.

·         Computers based on artificial intelligence are available

·         Computers use extensive parallel processing, multiple pipelines, multiple processors etc.

·         Massive parallel machines and extensively distributed system connected by communication networks fall in this category.

·         Introduced ULSI (Ultra Large Scale Integration) technology – Intel’s Pentium 4 microprocessor contains 55 million transistors millions of components on a single IC chip.

·         Superscalar processors, Vector processors, SIMD processors, 32 bit micro controllers and embedded processors, Digital Signal Processors (DSP) etc have been developed.

·         Memory chips up to 1 GB, hard disk drives up to 180 GB and optical disks up to 27 GB are available (still the capacity is increasing)

·         Object oriented language like JAVA suitable for internet programming has been developed.

·         Portable note book computers introduced

·         Storage technology advanced – large main memory and disk storage available

·         Introduced World Wide Web. (and other existing applications like e-mail, e Commerce, Virtual libraries/Classrooms, multimedia applications etc.)

·         New operating systems developed – Windows 95/98/XP/…, LINUX, etc.

·         Got hot pluggable features – which enable a failed component to be replaced with a new one without the need to shutdown the system, allowing the uptime of the system to be very high.

·         The recent development in the application of internet is the Grid technology which is still in its upcoming stage.

·         Quantum mechanism and nanotechnology will radically change the phase of computers.