Muhammad Adnan Talib

Lec#1
06th Feb,2012
Computer Science Department
COMSATS Institute of Information and Technology
Sahiwal

Text Book

Tentative Grading Policy

Assignments
Quizzes
Project
Sessional I
Sessional II
Final Exam

10%
10%
10%
10%
10%
50%

Projects/Assignments/Quizzes
Deadlines are always final
No credit for late submissions
Submission guidelines must be followed
Only latest version will be considered for assignments
If u miss any quiz due to any reason then there will be no

retake of any quiz

So Lets start the Course.

What is a Computer??
Computers are electronic devices that can follow

instructions to

Accept input
Process that input
Produce information

Alternatively, a computer is a device capable of

performing calculations and making logical decisions

at speeds millions, and even billions, of times faster
than human beings can.

What is a Computer??
For example

Many of todays Personal Computers can perform tens of

millions of additions per second.
A person operating a desk calculator might require decades to
complete the same number of calculations a powerful
personal computer can perform in one second.
Supercomputers can perform hundreds of billions of
additions per second.
And trillions-instructions per second computer are already
functioning in research laboratories.

What is Computer

Basics of Computer

A Typical Computer System

Monitor
(output)

Speaker
(output)
System unit
(processor,
memory)

Printer
(output)

Storage devices
(CD-RW, Floppy,
Hard disk, zip,
)
Scanner
(input)

Keyboar
d
(input)

Mouse
(input
)

What does a Computer Do?

Computers can perform four general operations,

which comprise the information processing cycle.

Input

Keyboard, Mouse, Scanner, Network/Internet, Cell phones etc

Process

Software

Output

Monitor, Printer etc

Storage

RAM, Hard disk, Floppy Disk, CD/DVD, Flash Disk etc

Data vs. Information

Data is a collection of raw facts, figures and symbols,

such as numbers, words, images, video and sound.

Information is data that is organized, meaningful,
and useful.
Computer takes data as input and process it to form
information

Software vs. Hardware

A computer is an electronic device, operating under

the control of instructions (software)

Instructions are stored in its computers own memory
unit
Hardware is Tangible

How Does a Computer Know what to do?

A detailed list of instructions called a Computer

Program or Software tells computer exactly what

to do.

Before processing a specific job, the computer

program corresponding to that job must be stored

in memory (RAM).

Once the program is stored in memory the

computer can start the operation by executing the

program instructions one after the other.

Storage Devices
RAM (Random Access Memory)
Memory also called Random Access Memory or RAM
(temporary memory) is the main memory of the computer.
Data in the RAM is lost when you turned off your computer.
ROM (Read Only Memory)

ROM can store information a much larger in size than

RAM.
Slower than RAM.

Other Storage Devices

Post Class Activity

Find the differences between

Hardware and Software

Data and Information
ROM and RAM