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INPUT & OUTPUT!

© Ankan Brahmachari

INPUT AND OUTPUT

Such a diversity of application shows that the computer is both a to and a tool. The same computer can be used by one person to play a game, by another to solve a mathematical equation and yet another to solve a mathematical equations and yet another to create graphic for a T.V ad. The computer is a general purpose machine. Unlike all the other inventions of man, a computer has not been designed for a specific task. It is perhaps this feature that makes computers so useful and so mystifying at the same time.

Because it is so general purpose, a computer does nothing by itself when you switch it on. Contrast this with a TV or a VCR ot a VCD: you press a few buttons and sit back and watch, and watch . and watch... Using a TV is a passive activity, whereas a computers user has to interact with the machine. He has to "tell: it what to do. This is called input. Computer have a voracious appetite for input.

In response, they process the input and give out something useful - the output. Using these ideas, we can depict a computer in the form of a flow chart. as consisting of an input unit, an output unit and a central processor.

to be continued...

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