List of recommended references
June J. Parsons and Dan Oja, New Perspectives on Computer Concepts 16th Edition - Comprehensive, Thomson Course Technology, a division of Thomson Learning, Inc Cambridge, MA, COPYRIGHT © 2014.
Lorenzo Cantoni (University of Lugano, Switzerland) James A. Danowski (University of Illinois at Chicago, IL, USA) Communication and Technology, 576 pages.
Craig Van Slyke Information Communication Technologies: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications (6 Volumes). ISBN13: 9781599049496, 2008, Pages: 4288
Brynjolfsson, E. and A. Saunders (2010). Wired for Innovation: How Information Technology Is Reshaping the Economy. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press
Kretschmer, T. (2012), "Information and Communication Technologies and Productivity Growth: A Survey of the Literature", OECD Digital Economy Papers, No. 195, OECD Publishing.
№2 LECTURE
Introduction to the computer system.
Architecture of computer systems.
Overview of computer systems.
The evolution of computer systems.
The architecture and components of computer systems.
The use of computer systems.
Presentation of data in computer systems.
Architecture of computer. A computer architecture is a detailed specification of the computational, communication, and data storage elements (hardware) of a computer system, how those components interact (machine organization), and how they are controlled (instruction set). Computer architecture includes the following areas:
• the fundamental physical components that constitute a computer system (the hardware)
• the kind of instructions/language the computer can understand
• the underlying computer technology that manipulates these instructions (sometimes referred to as micro architecture).
The architecture of the computer is a description of its organization and the principles of functioning of its structural elements (the computer main device, communication in between).
The principles formulated in 1945 by John von Neumann are the basis for creation of the majority of a computer.
Picture 1 The Von Neumann or Store Program architecture.
The illustration above shows the essential features of the Von Neumann or stored-program architecture. Computers based on the stored program concept or the Von Neumann architecture store both their program code (i.e. instructions) and the data that is required for (or may result from) the computation in the computer’s memory. During computation, program instructions are retrieved from the memory and executed one after the other. The component in a computer that controls this computation is known as the central processing unit (CPU, or nowadays often just referred to as the processor). The CPU consists of:
• the arithmetic logic unit, which performs operations. This part of the architecture is solely involved with carrying out calculations upon the data. All the usual Add, Multiply, Divide and Subtract calculations will be available but also data comparisons such as 'Greater Than', 'Less Than', 'Equal To' will be available.
• the control unit, which coordinates the computer’s activities. The control unit will manage the process of moving data and program into and out of memory and also deal with carrying out (executing) program instructions - one at a time. This includes the idea of a 'register' to hold intermediate values.
• the registers, which are data storage cells that are used for the temporary storage of data; for example, the data that is required in a calculation that is carried out.
The 'one-at-a-time' phrase means that the von neumann architecture is a sequential processing machine.