Computer Fundamentals Questions and Answers

Answer: D

The brain of a computer is the CPU.

The Central Processing Unit carries out instructions and controls the working of all other parts of the computer, which is why it is called the brain of the system.

The ALU (arithmetic logic unit) and the control unit are parts of the CPU, not the whole of it, and memory only stores data and instructions; it does not process them.

Within the CPU, the control unit directs the flow of data and instructions, while the ALU carries out the arithmetic and logical operations.

Answer: D

The time during which a job is processed is the execution time.

Execution time is the time the CPU actually spends running a job or program, from the start of processing to its completion.

Down time is the period when a system is not working or available. Real time describes processing done immediately as data arrives, and delay time is time spent waiting, not processing.

Execution time is one part of the turnaround time of a job, which also includes the time spent waiting in queues.

Answer: B

Correct answer: Non impact printing

A laser printer draws the page as a pattern of charge on a photosensitive drum, which picks up toner and transfers it to the paper, where heat fuses it. Nothing ever strikes the sheet, so it is a non-impact printer - unlike dot-matrix, daisy-wheel and line printers, where hammers or pins hit a ribbon against the paper.

Answer: D

Correct answer: PASCAL

Pascal was designed by Niklaus Wirth expressly to teach structured programming: it provides block structure, strong typing, procedures and functions with proper parameter passing, and the control constructs (if…then…else, while, repeat, for, case) that make GOTO unnecessary. FORTRAN, BASIC and PL/1 of that era all leaned on line numbers and jumps.

Answer: B

Correct answer: Data flow

A data flow diagram records a system as processes, data stores and the flows between them, so an existing or a proposed system can be drawn and analysed before any code is written. Data capture, transmission and processing name individual operations on data, not a method of describing a whole system.

Answer: C

Correct answer: CPU

The central processing unit fetches each instruction, decodes it, performs the arithmetic and logic, and directs every other unit - so it is the part that does the thinking, and is called the brain of the machine. The ALU and the control unit are components within the CPU, and memory only holds what the CPU works on.

Answer: A

Correct answer: Technological advancement

The first four generations are each marked by a change of switching technology, and the fifth is marked in the same way - by very large scale integration and parallel processing put to the service of artificial intelligence. Object-oriented programming is a software development and belongs to no generation of hardware.

Answer: B

Correct answer: PROLOG

PROLOG - PROgramming in LOGic - states facts and rules and lets the system infer answers by resolution and backtracking, which suits the knowledge representation and inference that artificial intelligence work needs. FORTRAN is for numerical work, COBOL for business data processing, and C for systems programming.

Answer: B

Correct answer: Cylinder

A disk pack has one head per surface, all mounted on the same arm. At any position of that arm the heads sit over one track on every surface, and those tracks together form a cylinder - all of it readable without moving the heads again. A surface is one side of one platter, and a cluster is an allocation unit of the file system.

Answer: A

Correct answer: 01

The 1’s complement is formed by inverting every bit. Taking 10 as a two-bit number, the 1 becomes 0 and the 0 becomes 1, giving 01. The result always has the same number of bits as the original, which rules out the three- and four-bit answers.