Computer Hardware and Software - Learning Java Through Games - page 3

Chapter 1

Computer Hardware and Software

1.1 Brief History of Computers ............................................................. 3

1.2 Hardware Components of a Computer ................................................. 3

1.3 Binary Representation of Numbers ..................................................... 6

1.4 Software Creation and Types of Software .............................................. 6

1.5 Type of Programming Languages ...................................................... 7

1.6 Brief History of Computer Games ...................................................... 8

1.7 Summary ................................................................................ 9

1.8 Important Points ....................................................................... 10

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1.9 Exercises 10

This chapter introduces the basic components of a computer: its hardware and software. Af-
ter all, this is a computer programming textbook and we need to have a basic understanding
of how the computer works before we can start developing software for it. For completeness,
some historical information about computers and computer games is also included in the
chapter.

1.1 Brief History of Computers
Computers are electronic devices that can perform calculations. The first electronic
digital computer was built by physics professor John Atanasoff and his graduate student
Clifford Berry in 1937. The computer could not be programmed and could be used only to
solve linear equations. Six years later, in 1943, the first programmable electronic computer
was built by Tommy Flowers; see Figure 1.1.
As you can see in the picture, the first computers took a lot of space. Different compo-
nents, such as secondary storage and main memory, were in separate racks. Early computers
could easily fill a present-day classroom. Colloquial expressions such as: “I will go to check
on the memory” were common in those days. Even the term “bug”, which is commonly
used to describe a software error, derives from the days when actual rodents were roaming
around the different components of a computer. As time progressed, computers became
smaller and cheaper. The personal computer was introduced in the late 1970s and early
1980s by the likes of Hewlett Packard, Apple, and IBM.

1.2 Hardware Components of a Computer
The brain of a computer is the Central Processing Unit (CPU) ; see Figure 1.2 . It is a
device that can perform simple calculations. These include addition, deletion, subtraction,

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