What Is Computer

A computer is a device that accepts information (in the form of digitalized data) and manipulates it for some result based on a program or sequence of instructions on how the data is to be processed. Complex computers also include the means for storing data (including the program, which is also a form of data) for some necessary duration. A program may be invariable and built into the computer (and called logic circuitry as it is on microprocessors) or different programs may be provided to the computer (loaded into its storage and then started by an administrator or user). Today's computers have both kinds of programming.

Most histories of the modern computer begin with the Analytical Engine envisioned by Charles Babbage following the mathematical ideas of George Boole, the mathematician who first stated the principles of logic inherent in today's digital computer. Babbage's assistant and collaborator, Ada Lovelace, is said to have introduced the ideas of program loops and subroutines and is sometimes considered the first programmer. Apart from mechanical calculators, the first really useable computers began with the vacuum tube, accelerated with the invention of the transistor, which then became embedded in large numbers in integrated circuits, ultimately making possible the relatively low-cost personal computer.

Modern computers inherently follow the ideas of the stored program laid out by John von Neumann in 1945. Essentially, the program is read by the computer one instruction at a time, an operation is performed, and the computer then reads in the next instruction, and so on. Recently, computers and programs have been devised that allow multiple programs (and computers) to work on the same problem at the same time in parallel. With the advent of the Internet and higher bandwidth data transmission, programs and data that are part of the same overall project can be distributed over a network and embody the Sun Microsystems slogan: "The network is the computer."

Peripheral Devices

In computer hardware, a peripheral device is any device attached to a computer in order to expand its functionality. Some of the more common peripheral devices are printers, scanners, disk drives, tape drives, microphones, speakers, and cameras. ... n computing, any item connected to a computer's central processing unit (CPU). Typical peripherals include keyboard, mouse, monitor, and printer. Users who enjoy playing games might add a joystick or a trackball; others might connect a modem, scanner, or integrated services digital network (ISDN) terminal to their machines.

- - 1 - Input devices

An input device is any peripheral (piece of computer hardware equipment) used to provide data and control signals to an information processing system (such as a computer). Input and output devices make up the hardware interface between a computer as a scanner or 6DOF controller.

Classification

Many input devices can be classified according to:

• The modality of input (e.g. mechanical motion, audio, visual, etc.)

• Whether the input is discrete (e.g. keypresses) or continuous (e.g. a mouse's position, though digitized into a discrete quantity, is fast enough to be considered continuous)

• The number of degrees of freedom involved (e.g. two-dimensional traditional mice, or three- dimensional navigators designed for CAD applications) Pointing devices, which are input devices used to specify a position in space, can further be classified according to:

• Whether the input is direct or indirect. With direct input, the input space coincides with the display space, i.e. pointing is done in the space where visual feedback or the cursor appears. Touchscreens and light pens involve direct input. Examples involving indirect input include the mouse and trackball.

- - 2 - Early devices

• Unit record equipment

• Punched card Keyboard

A keyboard is a human interface device which is represented as a layout of buttons. Each button, or key, can be used to either input a linguistic character to a computer, or to call upon a particular function of the computer. Traditional keyboards use spring-based buttons, though newer variations employ virtual keys, or even projected keyboards.

Examples of types of keyboards include:

• Computer keyboard • Keyer • Chorded keyboard

• LPFK

A computer mouse

- - 3 - Pointing device is any human interface device that allows a user to input spatial data to a computer. In the case of mice and touch screens, this is usually achieved by detecting movement across A a physical surface. Analog devices, such as 3D mice, joysticks, or pointing sticks, function by reporting their angle of deflection. Movements of the pointing device are echoed on the screen by movements of the cursor, creating a simple, intuitive way to navigate a computer's GUI.

Composite devices

Wii Remote with attached strap

Input devices, such as buttons and joysticks, can be combined on a single physical device that could be thought of as a composite device. Many gaming devices have controllers like this. Technically mice are composite devices, as they both track movement and provide buttons for clicking, but composite devices are generally considered to have more than two different forms of input.

Imaging and Video input devices

Video input devices are used to digitize images or video from the outside world into the computer. The information can be stored in a multitude of formats depending on the user's requirement.

• Webcam • Image scanner • Fingerprint scanner • Barcode reader • 3D scanner • Laser rangefinder Audio Input Devices

In the fashion of video devices, audio devices are used to either capture or create sound. In some cases, an audio output device can be used as an input device, in order to capture produced sound.

• Microphone • MIDI keyboard or other digital musical instrument

- - 4 - Output Devices

An output device is any piece of computer hardware equipment used to communicate the results of data processing carried out by an information processing system (such as a computer) to the outside world.

VDUs

Visual Display Units (VDU) or monitors are used to visually interface with the computer and are similar in appearance to a television.

A cathode ray monitor A plasma monitor

Visual Display Units display images and text which are made up of small blocks of coloured light called pixels. The resolution of the screen improves as the number of pixels is increased. Most monitors have a 4:3 width to height ratio. Ink Jet Printers

Characters are formed as a result of electrically charged or heated ink being sprayed in fine jets onto the paper. Individual nozzles in the printing head produce high resolution (up to 400 dots per inch or 400 dpi) dot matrix characters.

Colour cartridge showing inkjet nozzles

An inkjet printer

- - 5 - Inkjet printers use colour cartridges which combine magenta, yellow and cyan inks to create colour tones. A black cartridge is also used for crisp monochrome output.

This method of printing can generate up to 200 cps and allows for good quality, cheap colour printing.

Robots

Robots are able to perform a variety of tasks as a result of executing instructions contained within a program.

We are still a long way from the science fiction robots and androids portrayed by the film industry.

A robot arm

Robots in a business sense mean automated machines designed to perform mundane operations which require accuracy, such as assembling cars.

They are seldom manufactured to resemble the human form. Flatbed Plotter

This is a plotter where the paper is fixed on a flat surface and pens are moved to draw the image. This plotter can use several different colour pens to draw with.

The size of the plot is limited only by the size of the plotter's bed.

Top view of a flat bed plotter

- - 6 - What Is Hardware

The physical, touchable, material parts of a computer or other system. The term is used to distinguish these fixed parts of a system from the more changeable {software} or {data} components which it executes, stores, or carries. Computer hardware typically consists chiefly of electronic devices ({CPU}, {memory}, {display}) with some electromechanical parts (keyboard, {printer}, {disk drives}, {tape drives}, loudspeakers) for input, output, and storage, though completely non-electronic (mechanical, electromechanical, hydraulic, biological) computers have also been conceived of and built. Hardware is the physical aspect of computers, telecommunications, and other devices. The term arose as a way to distinguish the "box" and the electronic circuitry and components of a computer from the program you put in it to make it do things. The program came to be known as the software.

Hardware implies permanence and invariability. Software or programming can easily be varied. You can put an entirely new program in the hardware and make it create an entirely new experience for the user. You can, however, change the modular configurations that most computers come with by adding new adapters or cards that extend the computer's capabilities.

Like software, hardware is a collective term. Hardware includes not only the computer proper but also the cables, connectors, power supply units, and peripheral devices such as the keyboard, mouse, audio speakers, and printers.

Hardware is sometimes used as a term collectively describing the physical aspects of telephony and telecommunications network infrastructure.

It is quite well known that the working of the computer is pulled by hardware and software. One can define computer hardware as the electronic, magnetic, and electric devices that carry out the computing functions. Hardware is the physical components of the computer like microprocessor, hard disks, RAM, and motherboard. The peripheral devices such as monitor, mouse, keyboard, printer, and speakers can also be included in the list of hardware parts. The programs that run on the computers like Windows, C++, and Photoshop are the software parts of the computer. A good example for an easy understanding of hardware- software definition is music CDs. The actual compact disk is the hardware, while the songs and music in the CD are the software parts.

There is another way to define computer hardware. Hardware devices are the executors of the commands provided by software applications. For example, let us see what happens when you click the print button of the web browsing software. The software application provides a command to the processor, which is

- - 7 - the central part of all computer hardware. Processor in turn checks for an attached printer. If the printer is ready, the software will get a positive response from the processor. Then the software application provides instruction to the printer via the processor to print the web page. In that sense, hardware parts are the foot soldiers and software applications are the commanders in the digital operation that takes place within a computer.

What is Software?

Software is the general term for information that's recorded onto some kind of medium. For example, when you go to the video store and rent or buy a tape or DVD, what you're really getting is the software that's stored on that tape or disk. Your VCR or DVD player are hardware devices that are capable of reading the software from a tape or disk and projecting it onto your TV screen, in the form of a movie.

Your computer is a hardware device that reads software too. Most of the software on your computer comes in the form of programs. A program consists of "instructions" that tell the computer what to do, how to behave. Just as there are thousands of albums you can buy on CD for your stereo, and thousands of movies you can buy to play on your VCR or DVD player, there are thousands of programs that you can buy to run on your computer.

When you buy a computer, you don't automatically get every program produced by every software company in the world. You usually get some programs. For example, when you buy a computer it will probably have an operating system (like Windows XP) already installed on it.

For example, all graphics programs are designed to help you work with pictures. But there are many brands of graphics programs out there, including Adobe Photoshop, Jasc Paint Shop Pro. Adobe Illustrator, Arcsoft PhotoStudio, Corel Draw, ULead PhotoImpact, PrintShop Photo, and Macromedia Freehand, just to name a few. As to Web browsers, popular brands include Microsoft Internet Explorer, MSN Explorer, Netscape Navigator, America Online, and a few others.

- - 8 - What Programs Do I Have?

Perhaps you're wondering what programs are installed on your computer. Usually when you buy a computer, they tell you what programs you're getting with it. So if you were to go back to the original ad from which you bought your computer, you'd probably find the names of programs you already have listed there. Though there's no need to do that, because every program that's currently installed on your computer is listed in your All Programs menu (assuming you're using Windows XP).

Figure 1

When you first open the Start menu, the left column lists programs you've used the most recently (Figure 1). If your computer is brand new, then the programs listed there will just be some examples.

That little list of program icons and names on the left side of the menu doesn't represent all the programs that are currently installed on your computer. Not by a long shot. The All Programs option on the Start menu provides access to all your installed programs. When you first click on (or just point to) the All

- - 9 - Programs option, the All Programs menu that appears (Figure 2) will show icons and name of program groups, as well as some programs.

Figure 2

It's easy to tell the difference between a program and a program group. The program groups all have the same icon, and all have a right-pointing triangle () at their right side. When you click on, or point to, a program group, icons and names of programs within that group appear on a submenu. The submenu will contain programs within that group, and perhaps some more program groups. For example, Figure 3 shows the result of clicking on the Accessories program group in the All Programs menu. The submenu that opens contains more program groups, and specific programs you can run.

- - 10 - Running Programs

When you click on the icon for a program, the program opens. Which means the program appears on the

screen, so you can use it. Each program will appear in its own program window on the Windows desktop. For example, in Figure 4 the photograph in the background is the Windows desktop. Floating about on top of that desktop are four different program, each in its own separate program window.

Figure 4 - - 11 - Operating System

An Operating System is a software program or set of programs that mediate access between physical devices (such as a keyboard, mouse, monitor, disk drive or network connection) and application programs (such as a word processor, World-Wide Web browser or electronic mail client).

Some characteristics of an Operating System are:

• Whether multiple programs can run on it simultaneously: multi-tasking • Whether it can take advantage of multiple processors: multi-processing • Whether multiple users can run programs on it simultaneously: multi-user • Whether it can reliably prevent application programs from directly accessing hardware devices: protected • Whether it has built-in support for graphics. • Whether it has built-in support for networks.

Some popular Operating System's are:

• Unix : multi-tasking, multi-processing, multi-user, protected, with built-in support for networking but not graphics. • Windows NT : multi-tasking, multi-processing, single-user, protected, with built-in support for networking and graphics. • Windows 95/98: multi-tasking, multi-processing, single-user, unprotected, with built-in support for networking and graphics. • Windows 3.x: single-tasking, single-processing, single-user, unprotected, with built-in support for graphics but not networking. - - 12 - • DOS : single-tasking, single-processing, single-user, unprotected with no built-in support for graphics or networking. • NetWare : multi-tasking, multi-processing, single-user, unprotected, with built-in support for networking but not graphics.

The most important program that runs on a computer. Every general-purpose computer must have an operating system to run other programs. Operating systems perform basic tasks, such as recognizing input from the keyboard, sending output to the display screen, keeping track of files and directories on the disk, and controlling peripheral devices such as disk drives and printers.

For large systems, the operating system has even greater responsibilities and powers. It is like a traffic cop -- it makes sure that different programs and users running at the same time do not interfere with each other. The operating system is also responsible for security, ensuring that unauthorized users do not access the system.

Operating systems can be classified as follows:

 multi-user : Allows two or more users to run programs at the same time. Some operating systems permit hundreds or even thousands of concurrent users.  multiprocessing : Supports running a program on more than one CPU.  multitasking : Allows more than one program to run concurrently.  multithreading : Allows different parts of a single program to run concurrently.  real time: Responds to input instantly. General-purpose operating systems, such as DOS and UNIX, are not real-time.

Operating systems provide a software platform on top of which other programs, called application programs, can run. The application programs must be written to run on top of a particular operating system. Your choice of operating system, therefore, determines to a great extent the applications you can run. For PCs, the most popular operating systems are DOS, OS/2, and Windows, but others are available, such as Linux.

As a user, you normally interact with the operating system through a set of commands. For example, the DOS operating system contains commands such as COPY and RENAME for copying files and changing the names of files, respectively. The commands are accepted and executed by a part of the operating system called the command processor or command line interpreter. Graphical user interfaces allow you to enter commands by pointing and clicking at objects that appear on the screen.

- - 13 - Memory Units

Computer memory unit - a unit for measuring computer memory unit, unit of measurement - any division of quantity accepted as a standard of measurement or exchange; "the dollar is the United States unit of currency"; "a unit of wheat is a bushel"; "change per unit volume" nibble, nybble - a small byte byte - a sequence of 8 bits (enough to represent one character of alphanumeric data) processed as a single unit of information sector - the minimum track length that can be assigned to store information; unless otherwise specified a sector of data consists of 512 bytes block - (computer science) a sector or group of sectors that function as the smallest data unit permitted; "since blocks are often defined as a single sector, the terms `block' and `sector' are sometimes used interchangeably" allocation unit - a group of sectors on a magnetic disk that can be reserved for the use of a particular file partition - (computer science) the part of a hard disk that is dedicated to a particular operating system or application and accessed as a single unit word - a word is a string of bits stored in computer memory; "large computers use words up to 64 bits long" KiB, kibibyte, kilobyte, kB, K - a unit of information equal to 1024 bytes kilobyte, kB, K - a unit of information equal to 1000 bytes kb, kbit, kilobit - a unit of information equal to 1000 bits kibibit, kibit - a unit of information equal to 1024 bits mebibyte, MiB, megabyte, MB, M - a unit of information equal to 1024 kibibytes or 2^20 (1,048,576) bytes megabyte, MB, M - a unit of information equal to 1000 kilobytes or 10^6 (1,000,000) bytes Mb, Mbit, megabit - a unit of information equal to 1000 kilobits or 10^6 (1,000,000) bits mebibit, Mibit - a unit of information equal to 1024 kibibits or 2^20 (1,048,576) bits GiB, gibibyte, gigabyte, GB, G - a unit of information equal to 1024 mebibytes or 2^30 (1,073,741,824) bytes gigabyte, GB, G - a unit of information equal to 1000 megabytes or 10^9 (1,000,000,000) bytes Gbit, gigabit, Gb - a unit of information equal to 1000 megabits or 10^9 (1,000,000,000) bits gibibit, Gibit - a unit of information equal to 1024 mebibits or 2^30 (1,073,741,824) bits tebibyte, TiB, terabyte, TB - a unit of information equal to 1024 gibibytes or 2^40 (1,099,511,627,776) bytes terabyte, TB - a unit of information equal to 1000 gigabytes or 10^12 (1,000,000,000,000) bytes Tbit, terabit, Tb - a unit of information equal to 1000 gigabits or 10^12 (1,000,000,000,000) bits tebibit, Tibit - a unit of information equal to 1024 gibibits or 2^40 (1,099,511,627,776) bits pebibyte, PiB, petabyte, PB - a unit of information equal to 1024 tebibytes or 2^50 bytes - - 14 - petabyte, PB - a unit of information equal to 1000 terabytes or 10^15 bytes Pbit, petabit, Pb - a unit of information equal to 1000 terabits or 10^15 bits

Booting Process

Booting a computer (out of the window) is something we're all tempted to do from time to time, but boot is just short for bootstrap. When a computer is powered on, it starts executing an application in its ROM.

This is called a Boot Program and usually you'll see lots of system messages before the Operating System starts loading. Nowadays the whole process from power on until being ready to use is called the Boot Process.

To boot (as a verb; also "to boot up") a computer is to load an operating system into the computer's main memory or random access memory (RAM). Once the operating system is loaded (and, for example, on a PC, you see the initial Windows or Mac desktop screen), it's ready for users to run applications. Sometimes you'll see an instruction to "reboot" the operating system. This simply means to reload the operating system (the most familiar way to do this on PCs is pressing the Ctrl, Alt, and Delete keys at the same time).

How Booting Works Note: This procedure may differ slightly for Mac, UNIX, OS/2, or other operating systems.

When you turn on your computer, chances are that the operating system has been set up to boot (load into RAM) automatically in this sequence:

Steps Involved In Booting Process

1. As soon as the computer is turned on, the basic input-output system (BIOS) on your system's read- only memory (ROM) chip is "woken up" and takes charge. BIOS is already loaded because it's built-in to the ROM chip and, unlike random access memory (RAM), ROM contents don't get erased when the computer is turned off. 2. BIOS first does a power-on self test (POST) to make sure all the computer's components are operational. Then the BIOS's boot program looks for the special boot programs that will actually load the operating system onto the hard disk. 3. First, it looks on drive A (unless you've set it up some other way or there is no diskette drive) at a specific place where operating system boot files are located. If there is a diskette in drive A but it's not a system disk, BIOS will send you a message that drive A doesn't contain a system disk. If there is no diskette in drive A (which is the most common case), BIOS looks for the system files at a specific place on your hard drive.

- - 15 - 4. Having identified the drive where boot files are located, BIOS next looks at the first sector (a 512-byte area) and copies information from it into specific locations in RAM. This information is known as the boot record or Master Boot Record. 5. It then loads the boot record into a specific place (hexadecimal address 7C00) in RAM. 6. The boot record contains a program that BIOS now branches to, giving the boot record control of the computer. 7. The boot record loads the initial system file (for example, for DOS systems, IO.SYS) into RAM from the diskette or hard disk. 8. The initial file (for example, IO.SYS, which includes a program called SYSINIT) then loads the rest of the operating system into RAM. (At this point, the boot record is no longer needed and can be overlaid by other data.) 9. The initial file (for example, SYSINIT) loads a system file (for example, MSDOS.SYS) that knows how to work with the BIOS. 10. One of the first operating system files that is loaded is a system configuration file (for DOS, it's called CONFIG.SYS). Information in the configuration file tells the loading program which specific operating system files need to be loaded (for example, specific device driver. 11. Another special file that is loaded is one that tells which specific applications or commands the user wants to have included or performed as part of the boot process. In DOS, this file is named AUTOEXEC.BAT. In Windows, it's called WIN.INI. 12. After all operating system files have been loaded, the operating system is given control of the computer and performs requested initial commands and then waits for the first interactive user input.

- - 16 - DOS (Disk Operating System)

An acronym for Disk Operating System, in a general sense, DOS refers to just about any operating system. More commonly, it describes the operating system Microsoft developed in 1981 for IBM's line of personal computers. Though syntactically distinct, DOS shares similarities with a Unix shell. It has a command-line interface and analogs to many common Unix commands. However, DOS is a 16-bit, single- user operating system that does not support multi-tasking. It is far easier to administer than Unix, but less powerful. Compared to graphical interfaces such as Windows and Mac OS X, it's also not particularly user- friendly.

Screen of MS- DOS Window

The following is a list of MS-DOS version 5.0 internal and external commands. The internal commands reside in COMMAND.COM, which loads into memory when the computer system is started; these commands do not reside on disk. The external commands are files that do reside on disk and have an extension of .COM, .EXE, or .BAT. Both command types are executed from the MS-DOS prompt.

- - 17 - MS-DOS Commands

A command is the name of a special program that makes your computer carry out a task. There are two types of MS- DOS commands - internal and external. We have already used the internal command DIR and the external command FORMAT. For this section, we will dig a bit deeper into several other commands.

Internal commands

Internal commands are built into the operating system as part of a file called COMMAND.COM (or, on a 2000 or XP machine CMD.EXE) . They are loaded into memory whenever you switch on your computer. When you type an internal command, MS-DOS performs it immediately. Many of the MS-DOS internal commands are listed below. The synonyms of some command names which you can use in place of their official names are shown in brackets.

BREAK DEL (ERASE) PATH TYPE CALL DIR PAUSE VER CHCP ECHO PROMPT VERIFY CHDIR (CD) EXIT REM VOL CLS FOR REN(RENAME) SET COPY GOTO RMDIR (RD) CTTY IF SHIFT DATE MKDIR(MD) TIME

External Commands

Files with extension COM or EXE are external commands. Because these commands are files, they are not built into the operating system ( these are the commands that alter between versions of MS-DOS) . The MS-DOS

external commands may contain SOME or all of the following:

APPEND EDLIN KEYB RESTORE ASSIGN EXE2BIN KEYBXX SETVER ATTRIB FASTOPEN LABEL SHARE BACKUP FC MODE SORT CHKDSK FDISK MORE SUBST COMMAND FIND NLSFUNC SYS

- - 18 - COMP FORMAT PRINT TREE DELTREE GRAFTABL RECOVER XCOPY DISKCOMP JOIN REPLACE DISKCOPY

Everyday MS-DOS Activities This section provides a brief introduction to the MS-DOS activities that you are likely to perform most often.

Activity Command needed Formatting a diskette FORMAT Copying a diskette DISKCOPY Copying a file COPY Deleting a file DEL (ERASE) Listing the files in a directory DIR Making a new directory MD Changing from one directory to another CD Setting a command search path PATH

Examples of DOS Commands

APPEND (External)

APPEND ; APPEND [d:]path[;][d:]path[...] APPEND [/X:on|off][/path:on|off] [/E]

Displays or sets the search path for data files. DOS will search the specified path(s) if the file is not found in the current path.

ASSIGN (External)

ASSIGN x=y [...] /sta

Redirects disk drive requests to a different drive.

ATTRIB (External)

ATTRIB [d:][path]filename [/S] ATTRIB [+R|-R] [+A|-A] [+S|-S] [+H|-H] [d:][path]filename [/S]

Sets or displays the read-only, archive, system, and hidden attributes of a file or

- - 19 - directory.

BREAK (Internal)

BREAK =on|off

Used from the DOS prompt or in a batch file or in the CONFIG.SYS file to set (or display) whether or not DOS should check for a Ctrl + Break key combination.

CHDIR (Internal)

CHDIR (CD) [d:]path CHDIR (CD)[..]

Displays working (current) directory and/or changes to a different directory.

CHKDSK (External)

CHKDSK [d:][path][filename] [/F][/V]

Checks a disk and provides a file and memory status report.

CLS (Clear Screen) (Internal)

CLS

Clears (erases) the screen.

COPY (Internal)

COPY [/Y|-Y] [/A][/B] [d:][path]filename [/A][/B] [d:][path][filename] [/V] or COPY [/Y|-Y][/A][/B] [d:][path]filename+[d:][path]filename[...][d:][path][filename]

- - 20 - [/V]

Copies and appends files.

DATE (Internal)

DATE mm-dd-yy

Displays and/or sets the system date.

DEL (ERASE) (Internal)

DEL (ERASE) [d:][path]filename [/P]

Deletes (erases) files from disk.

DELTREE (External)

DELTREE [/Y] [d:]path [d:]path[...]

Deletes (erases) a directory including all files and subdirectories that are in it.

DIR (Internal)

DIR [d:][path][filename] [/A:(attributes)] [/O:(order)] [/B][/C][/CH][/L][/S][/P][/W]

Displays directory of files and directories stored on disk.

DISKCOPY (External)

DISKCOPY [d:] [d:][/1][/V][/M]

Makes an exact copy of a diskette.

- - 21 - DOSKEY (External)

DOSKEY [reinstall] [/bufsize=size][/macros][/history][/insert|/overstrike] [macroname=[text]]

Loads the Doskey program into memory which can be used to recall DOS commands so that you can edit them.

EDIT (External)

EDIT [d:][path]filename [/B][/G][/H][/NOHI]

Starts the MS-DOS editor, a text editor used to create and edit ASCII text files.

EXIT (Internal)

EXIT

Exits a secondary command processor.

FDISK (External)

FDISK [/status]

Prepares a fixed disk to accept DOS files for storage.

FIND (External)

FIND [/V][/C][/I][/N] �string � [d:][path]filename[...]

Finds and reports the location of a specific string of text characters in one or more files.

- - 22 - FORMAT (External)

FORMAT d:[/1][/4][/8][/F:(size)] [/N:(sectors)] [/T:(tracks)][/B|/S][/C][/V:(label)] [/Q][/U][/V]

Formats a disk to accept DOS files.

HELP (External)

HELP [command] [/B][/G][/H][/NOHI]

Displays information about a DOS command.

MKDIR (MD) (Internal)

MKDIR (MD) [d:]path

Creates a new subdirectory.

MOVE (Internal)

MOVE [/Y|/-Y] [d:][path]filename[,[d:][path]filename[...]] destination

Moves one or more files to the location you specify. Can also be used to rename directories.

PATH (Internal)

PATH; PATH [d:]path[;][d:]path[...]

- - 23 - Sets or displays directories that will be searched for programs not in the current directory.

PRINT (External)

PRINT [/B:(buffersize)] [/D:(device)] [/M:(maxtick)] [/Q:(value] [/S:(timeslice)][/U: (busytick)] [/C][/P][/T] [d:][path][filename] [...]

Queues and prints data files.

REM (Internal)

REM [comment]

Used in batch files and in the CONFIG.SYS file to insert remarks (that will not be acted on).

RENAME (REN) (Internal)

RENAME (REN) [d:][path]filename [d:][path]filename

Changes the filename under which a file is stored.

SCANDISK (External)

SCANDISK [d: [d: . . .]|/all][/checkonly|/autofix[/nosave]|/custom][/surface][/mono] [/nosummay] SCANDISK volume-name[/checkonly|/autofix[/nosave]|/custom][/mono] [/nosummary] SCANDISK /fragment [d:][path]filename SCANDISK /undo [undo-d:][/mono]

Starts the Microsoft ScanDisk program which is a disk analysis and repair tool used to check a drive for errors and correct any problems that it finds.

- - 24 - SORT (External)

SORT [/R][/+n] < (filename) SORT [/R][/+n] > (filename2)

Sorts input and sends it to the screen or to a file.

TIME (Internal)

TIME hh:mm[:ss][.cc][A|P]

Displays current time setting of system clock and provides a way for you to reset the time.

TREE (External)

TREE [d:][path] [/A][/F]

Displays directory paths and (optionally) files in each subdirectory.

VER (Internal)

VER

Displays the DOS version number.

VOL (Internal)

VOL [d:]

Displays a disk's volume label.

- - 25 - Function key

A function key is a key on a computer or terminal keyboard which can be programmed so as to cause an operating system command interpreter or application program to perform certain actions. On some keyboards/computers, function keys may have default actions, accessible on power-on.

Function keys on a terminal may either generate short fixed sequences of characters, often beginning with the escape character (ASCII 27), or the characters they generate may be configured by sending special character sequences to the terminal. On a standard computer keyboard, the function keys may generate a fixed, single byte code, outside the normal ASCII range, which is translated into some other configurable sequence by the keyboard device driver or interpreted directly by the application program. Function keys may have (abbreviations of) default actions printed on/besides them, or they may have the more common "F- number" designations.

Function key schemes on various computer keyboards

• Apple Macintosh: Early Mac OS supported system extensions known generally as FKEYS which could be installed in the System file and could be accessed with a Command-Shift-(number) keystroke combination (Command-Shift-3 was the screen capture function included with the system, and was installed as an FKEY); however, early Macintosh keyboards did not support numbered function keys in the normal sense. Since the introduction of the Apple Extended Keyboard with the Macintosh II, however, keyboards with function keys have been available, though they did not become standard until the mid-1990s. They have not traditionally been a major part of the Mac user interface, however, and are generally only used on cross-platform programs. Current Mac keyboards include specialized

- - 26 - function keys for controlling sound volume. The most recent Mac keyboards include 19 function keys, but keys F1-F4 and F7-F12 by default control features such as volume, media control, and Exposé. • Apple Macintosh notebooks: Function keys were not standard on Apple notebook hardware until the introduction of the PowerBook 5300 and the PowerBook 190. For the most part, Mac laptops have keys F1 through F12, with pre-defined actions for some, including controlling sound volume and screen brightness. • BBC Micro : red/orange keys F0 to F9 in a horizontal row above the number keys on top of the computer/keyboard. The break, arrow, and copy keys could function as F10-F15. • Coleco Adam : six dark brown keys in a horizontal row above the number keys, labeled with Roman numerals I-VI. • Commodore Amiga : ten keys arranged in a row of two 5-key groups across the top of the keyboard (flush with the ordinary keyboard top row); function keys are 1½ times the width of ordinary keys. Like the Commodore 128, this also had a Help key. • Graphing calculators , particularly those from Texas Instruments, Hewlett-Packard and Casio, usually include a row of function keys with various preassigned functions (on a standard hand-held calculator, these would be the top row of buttons under the screen). On low-end models such as the TI-83-series, these function mainly as an extension of the main keyboard, but on high-end calculators the functions change with the mode, sometimes acting as menu navigation keys as well. • HP 2640 series terminals: first known instance—late 1970s—of screen labeled function keys (where keys are placed in proximity or mapped to labels on CRT or LCD screen). • HP 9830 : f1–f8 on two rows of four in upper left with paper template label. Also on HP 2640 terminals. An early use of function keys (1972). • IBM 3270 : early models had 12 function keys in a 3×4 matrix at the right of the keyboard, later 24 in two rows on top of the keyboard. • IBM 5250 : early models frequently had a "cmd" modifier key, by which the numeric row keys emulate function keys; later models have either 12 function keys in groups of 4 (with shifted keys acting as F13-F24), or 24 in two rows. These keys, along with "Enter," "Help," and several others, generate "AID codes," informing the host computer that user-entered data is ready to be read. • IBM PC AT and PS/2 keyboard : F1 to F12 usually in three 4-key groups across the top of the keyboard (the original IBM PC and PC XT keyboards had function keys F1 through F10, in two adjacent vertical rows on the left hand side; F1|F2, F3|F4, ..., F9|F10, ascending downwards). Many modern PC keyboards also include specialized keys for multimedia and operating system functions. • MCK-142 Pro : two sets of F1–F12 function keys, 1 above QWERTY and one to the left. Also, 24 additional user programmable PF keys located above QWERTY keys.

- - 27 - Shortcut Keys

Shortcut Keys for Menu Choices

Menu Choice Key Bindings Menu Bold CtrlB Application specific Close AltF4 Window Copy Copy, CtrlC, CtrlInsert Edit Cut Cut, CtrlX, ShiftDelete Edit Delete Backspace (in text), Delete Edit or Selected (to Trash) Deselect All Ctrl\ Edit Italics CtrlI Application specific New CtrlN File or Selected On Item [Help] ShiftHelp, ShiftF1 Help Open CtrlO File or Selected Paste CtrlV, ShiftInsert Edit Print CtrlP File Properties CtrlI Selected Redo ShiftUndo, CtrlY, Edit AltShiftBackspace Repeat ShiftUndo, CtrlY, Edit AltShiftBackspace Save CtrlS File

Select All CtrlA, Ctrl/ Edit Underline CtrlU Application specific Undo Undo, CtrlZ, AltBackspace Edit

Table B-2 “Navigation and Activation Key Bindings” shows navigation and activation key bindings and their function.

Table B-2 Navigation and Activation Key Bindings

Operation Key Bindings Function Activate Choice Select, CtrlSpace Activates an action or dialog choice. Adjust Begin Data CtrlShiftHome Adjusts a selection to the beginning of the - - 28 - Operation Key Bindings Function data. Adjust Begin Line ShiftHome Adjusts a selection to the beginning of a line. Adjust Down Shift↓ Adjusts a selection down a line. Adjust End Data CtrlShiftEnd Adjusts a selection to the end of the data. Adjust End Line ShiftEnd Adjusts a selection to the end of a line. Adjust Left Shift← Adjusts a selection to the left. Adjust Page Down ShiftPageDown Adjusts a selection down a page. Adjust Page Left ShiftPageLeft, CtrlShiftPageUp Adjusts a selection a page to the left. Adjust Page Right ShiftPageRight, CtrlShiftPageDown Adjusts a selection a page to the right. Adjust Page Up ShiftPageUp Adjusts a selection up a page. Adjust Paragraph CtrlShift↓ Adjusts a selection down a paragraph. Down Adjust Paragraph CtrlShift↑ Adjusts a selection up a paragraph. Up Adjust Right Shift→ Adjusts a selection to the right. Adjust Selection ShiftSelect, ShiftSpace (not in text), Adjusts a selection to the cursor position. CtrlShiftSpace Adjust Up Shift↑ Adjusts a selection up a line. Adjust Word Left CtrlShift← Adjusts a selection by a word to the left. Adjust Word Right CtrlShift→ Adjusts a selection by a word to the right. Begin Data CtrlHome Navigates to the beginning of the data. Begin Line Home Navigates to the beginning of a line. Cancel Cancel, Escape Removes a menu or dialog or cancels a direct manipulation operation. Default Activate KeypadEnter, Enter (not in text), Performs a default action; activates a menu CtrlEnter control. Delete End Line CtrlDelete Deletes to the end of the line (optional). Delete Next Delete Deletes the next character. Character Delete Previous Backspace Deletes the previous character. Character Drop Down Alt↓ Drops down a drop-down list or combination box. End Data CtrlEnd Navigates to the end of the data. End Line End Navigates to the end of a line. Help Help, F1 Obtains help on the cursored item. Navigate Down ↓, Ctrl↓ Navigates down between elements. Navigate Left ←, Ctrl← Navigates left between elements. Navigate Menu Bar ShiftMenu, F10 Navigates to the menu bar.

- - 29 - Operation Key Bindings Function Navigate Right →, Ctrl→ Navigates right between elements. Navigate Up ↑, Ctrl↑ Navigates up between elements. Next Family AltF6 Navigates to the next window in the window Window family. Next Tab Group Tab (where possible), CtrlTab Navigates to the next tab group. Next Window AltTab, AltEscape Navigates to the next window family or root icon. New Line Enter Inserts a new line in text. Page Down PageDown Navigates downwards by a page. Page Left PageLeft, CtrlPageUp Navigates a page to the left. Page Right PageRight, CtrlPageDown Navigates a page to the right. Page Up PageUp Navigates up by a page. Paragraph Down Ctrl↓ Navigates down a paragraph. Paragraph Up Ctrl↑ Navigates up a paragraph. Pop-Up Menu Menu, ShiftF10 Invokes a pop-up menu. Pop-Up Workspace AltMenu, AltF10 Invokes a pop-up menu for the workspace. Menu Previous Family AltShiftF6 Navigates to the previous window in a window Window family. Previous Tab ShiftTab (where possible), Navigates to the previous tab group. Group CtrlShiftTab Previous Window AltShiftTab, AltShiftEscape Navigates to the previous window family or root icon. Primary Move AltCut, AltCtrlX, AltShiftDelete Moves a primary selection to the cursor position. Primary Copy AltCopy, AltCtrlC, AltCtrlInsert Copies a primary selection to the cursor position. Select Select, Space (not in text), CtrlSpace Makes a selection (selects or toggles, depending on mode). Show Tasks CtrlEsc Raises and normalizes the icon window. Space Space, ShiftSpace Inserts a space in text. Stop Cancel, Escape Ends a task and removes an in-progress message window. Tab Tab Inserts a tab or navigates to the next tab stop. Toggle Choice Select, Space, CtrlSpace Toggles a value choice. Toggle Add Mode ShiftF8 In editing controls, switches between normal mode and add mode. Toggle Insert Mode Insert In text, toggles between replace mode and insert mode (optional). Window Menu AltSelect, AltSpace, ShiftEscape Pulls down the window menu.

- - 30 - Operation Key Bindings Function Word Left Ctrl← Navigates a word to the left. Word Right Ctrl→ Navigates a word to the right.

Drag-and-Drop Method

A faster way to cut and paste is to use the drag-and-drop method. This means a user points to a selected piece of text and drags it to the location where they want it to go. The process is the same for copying and pasting the text with one crucial addition: the use of the [CTRL] key.

To cut and paste using the drag-and-drop method:

• Highlight the piece of text you wish to move • Place your pointer directly on the selected piece of text • Begin clicking-and-dragging your mouse. Watch for an insertion point. The insertion point will move as you drag the mouse • When the INSERTION POINT (not the mouse arrow) is in the spot where you want the text to be located, let go of the mouse button

To copy and paste using the drag-and-drop method:

• Highlight the piece of text you wish to copy • Hold down the [CTRL] key on your keyboard. IT MUST STAY DOWN during the entire process. • Place your pointer directly on the selected piece of text • Begin clicking-and-dragging your mouse. Watch for an insertion point. The insertion point will move as you drag the mouse. • When the INSERTION POINT (not the mouse arrow) is in the spot where you want the text to be located, let go of the mouse button • ONLY AFTER you see the copied text in its new location, let go of the [CTRL] key

WARNING: if you let go of the [CTRL] key before letting go of the mouse, it will turn the drag-and-drop into a move instead of a copy

- - 31 - Create A Folder And Rename It

Steps: Open Explorer-> Right Click-> Select New Option ->Select Folder Figure –1 shows all steps A new Folder will be created then select rename option by the right click and then type a meaning full name to that folder and then hit enter key. Figure-2 shows all steps.

Figure-1

- - 32 - Figure-2 Desktop

Desktop is the first screen after loading the operating system into the main memory. This is the screen where we kept those application software that we used too much. Here we kept the shortcuts of application software. Figure –1 shows the desktop screen.

- - 33 - Figure -1

Microsoft Office

Microsoft Office is a set of interrelated desktop applications, servers and services, collectively referred to as an office suite, for the Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X operating systems. Office was introduced by Microsoft in 1989 on Mac OS,[1] with a version for Windows in 1990.[2] Initially a marketing term for a bundled set of applications, the first version of Office contained Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, and Microsoft PowerPoint. Additionally, a "Pro" version of Office included Microsoft Access and Schedule Plus. Over the years, Office applications have grown substantially closer with shared features such as a common spell checker, OLE data integration and Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications scripting language. Microsoft also positions Office as a development platform for line-of-business software under the Office Business Applications (OBA) brand.

The current versions are Office 2007 for Windows, launched on January 30, 2007,[3] and Office 2008 for Mac OS X, released January 15, 2008. Office 2007/Office 2008 features a new user interface and a new OOXML- based primary file format (docx, xlsx, pptx). Microsoft has made available a free add-on known as the "Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack" that lets Office 2000-2003 editions open, edit, and save documents created under the new Office 2007 formats.

Microsoft Office is one of the most widely-used and commercially successful software applications of all time.

History

The very first version of Microsoft Office was released in 1989, not for Windows, but for the Apple Macintosh. Microsoft Office has long been the dominant player when it comes to software that offers word- processing, spreadsheet, and presentation tools.

History of Microsoft Office for Microsoft Windows

• Microsoft Office 3.0 was the first version of Office to be released for the Microsoft Windows operating system family. • Microsoft Office 4.0 was released in 1994, containing Word 6.0, Excel 5.0, PowerPoint 4.0, Mail, and Access. Word was called Word 6.0 at this point despite the fact the previous version number was 2.0. The purpose was to use common version numbering with the Mac OS version.

- - 34 - • Microsoft Office 95 was done as a fully 32-bit version to match Windows 95. Office 95 was available in two versions, Office 95 Standard and Office 95 Professional. The standard version consists of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Schedule+. The professional edition contains all of the items in the standard version plus Access. If the professional version is purchased in CD-ROM form, it also includes Bookshelf. • Microsoft Office 97 , a major milestone release which included hundreds of new features and improvements, introduced "Command Bars", a paradigm in which menus and toolbars were made more similar in capability and visual design. Office 97 also featured natural language systems and sophisticated grammar checking. • Microsoft Office 2000 introduced adaptive menus, where little-used options were hidden from the user. It also introduced a new security feature, built around digital signatures, to diminish the threat of macro viruses. Office 2000 automatically trusts macros (written in VBA6) that were digitally signed from authors who have been previously designated as trusted. Office 2000 is the last version to support Windows 95. 2000 is also the last Office release devoid of Microsoft Product Activation. • Microsoft Office XP , released in conjunction with Windows XP, is a major upgrade with numerous enhancements and changes. Office XP introduced the Safe Mode feature. It allows applications such as Outlook to boot when it might otherwise fail. Safe Mode enables Office to detect and either repair or bypass the source of the problem, such as a corrupted registry or a misbehaving add-in. Smart tag is a technology delivered with Office XP. Some smart tags operate based on user activity, such as helping with typing errors. These smart tags are supplied with the products, and are not programmable. For developers, though, there is the ability to create custom smart tags Office). • Microsoft Office 2003 was released in 2003. Two new applications made their debut in Office 2003: Microsoft InfoPath and OneNote. It is the first version to use Windows XP style icons. Outlook 2003 provides improved functionality in many areas, including Kerberos authentication, RPC over HTTP, and Cached Exchange Mode. The key benefit of Outlook 2003 is the improved junk mail filter. 2003 is the last Office version to support Windows 2000. • Microsoft Office 2007 was released in 2007. Office 2007 contains a number of new features, the most notable of which is the entirely new graphical user interface called the Fluent User Interface (initially referred to as the Ribbon UI), replacing the menus and toolbars that have been the cornerstone of Office since its inception with a tabbed toolbar, known as the Ribbon. Office 2007 requires Windows XP with Service Pack 2 or 3, Windows Server 2003 with Service Pack 1 or higher, or Windows Vista. On May 21, 2008 Microsoft announced that Office 2007 Service Pack 2 will add native support for the OpenDocument Format. The EU announced it is going to investigate Microsoft Office OpenDocument Format support.

- - 35 - Microsoft Word

Microsoft Word is Microsoft's flagship word processing software. It was first released in 1983 under the name Multi-Tool Word for Xenix systems.[1][2][3] Versions were later written for several other platforms including IBM PCs running DOS (1983), the Apple Macintosh (1984), SCO UNIX, OS/2 and Microsoft Windows(1989). It is a component of the Microsoft Office system; however, it is also sold as a standalone product and included in Microsoft Works Suite. Beginning with the 2003 version, the branding was revised to emphasize Word's identity as a component within the Office suite; Microsoft began calling it Microsoft Office Word instead of merely Microsoft Word. The latest releases are Word 2007 for Windows and Word 2008 for Mac OS X.

History

Word 1981 to 1989

- - 36 - Concepts and ideas of Word were brought from Bravo, the original GUI word processor developed at Xerox PARC. Bravo's creator Charles Simonyi left PARC to work for Microsoft in 1981. Simonyi hired Richard Brodie, who had worked with him on Bravo, away from PARC that summer.[4][5] On February 1, 1983, development on what was originally named Multi-Tool Word began.

Having renamed it Microsoft Word, Microsoft released the program October 25, 1983, for the IBM PC. Free demonstration copies of the application were bundled with the November 1983 issue of PC World, making it the first program to be distributed on-disk with a magazine.[6][1] However, it was not well received, and sales lagged behind those of rival products such as WordPerfect.[citation needed]

Word featured a concept of "What You See Is What You Get", or WYSIWYG, and was the first application with such features as the ability to display bold and italics text on an IBM PC.[1] Word made full use of the mouse, which was so unusual at the time that Microsoft offered a bundled Word-with-Mouse package. Although MS-DOS was a character-based system, Microsoft Word was the first word processor for the IBM PC that showed actual line breaks and typeface markups such as bold and italics directly on the screen while editing, although this was not a true WYSIWYG system because available displays did not have the resolution to show actual typefaces. Other DOS word processors, such as WordStar and WordPerfect, used simple text only display with markup codes on the screen or sometimes, at the most, alternative colors.[7]

Word 1990 to 1995

The first version of Word for Windows was released in 1989 at a price of 500 US dollars[citation needed]. With the release of Windows 3.0 the following year, sales began to pick up (Word for Windows 1.0 was designed for use with Windows 3.0, and its performance was poorer with the versions of Windows available when it was first released). The failure of WordPerfect to produce a Windows version proved a fatal mistake. It was version 2.0 of Word, however, that firmly established Microsoft Word as the market leader.

- - 37 - Word 5.1 for the Macintosh, released in 1992, was a very popular word processor due to its elegance, relative ease of use, and feature set. However, version 6.0 for the Macintosh, released in 1994, was widely derided, unlike the Windows version. It was the first version of Word based on a common codebase between the Windows and Mac versions; many accused it of being slow, clumsy and memory intensive. In response to user requests, Microsoft offered a free "downgrade" to Word 5.1 for dissatisfied Word 6.0 purchasers.

When Microsoft became aware of the Year 2000 problem, it released the entire version of DOS port of Microsoft Word 5.5 instead of getting people to pay for the update. As of October 2008, it is still available for download from Microsoft's web site.[8]

Word 97

Word 95 & 97 icon

Word 97 had the same general operating performance as later versions such as Word 2000. This was the first copy of Word featuring the Office Assistant, "Clippy," which was an animated helper used in all Office programs. This was a take over from the earlier launched concept in Microsoft Bob.

Word 98

Word 98 for the Macintosh gained many features of Word 97, and was bundled with the Macintosh Office 98 package. Document compatibility reached parity with Office 97 and Word on the Mac became a viable business alternative to its Windows counterpart. Unfortunately, Word on the Mac in this and later releases also became vulnerable to future Macro viruses that could compromise Word (and Excel) documents, leading to the only situation where viruses could be cross-platform. A Windows version of this was only bundled with the Korean/Japanese Microsoft Office 97 Powered By Word 98 and could not be purchased separately.

Word 2000

For most users, one of the most obvious changes introduced with Word 2000 (and the rest of the Office 2000 suite) was a clipboard that could hold multiple objects at once. Another noticeable change was that the Office Assistant, whose frequent unsolicited appearance in Word 97 had annoyed many users, was changed to be less intrusive.

Word 2001/Word X

Word 2001 was bundled with the Macintosh Office for that platform, acquiring most, if not all, of the feature set of Word 2000. Released in October 2000. Word 2001 was also sold individually apart from the Office suite. The Macintosh version, Word X, released in 2001, was the first version to run natively on (and require) Mac OS X.

Word 2002/XP

- - 38 - Word 2002 was bundled with Office XP and was released in 2001. It had many of the same features as Word 2000 but had a major new feature called the 'Task Panes', which gave quicker information and control to a lot of features that were only available in modal dialog boxes before. One of the key advertising strategies for the software was the removal of the Office Assistant in favor of a new help system, although it was simply disabled by default.

Word 2003

Office Word 2003

For the 2003 version, the Office programs, including Word, were rebranded to emphasize the unity of the Office suite, so that Microsoft Word officially became Microsoft Office Word.

Word 2004

A new Macintosh version of Office was released in May 2004. Substantial cleanup of the various applications (Word, Excel, PowerPoint) and feature parity with Office 2003 (for Microsoft Windows) created a very usable release. Microsoft released patches through the years to eliminate most known Macro vulnerabilities from this version. While Apple released Pages and the open source community created NeoOffice, Word remains the most widely used word processor on the Macintosh.

Word 2007

The release includes numerous changes, including a new XML-based file format, a redesigned interface, an integrated equation editor and bibliographic management. Additionally, an XML data bag was introduced, accessible via the object model and file format, called Custom XML - this can be used in conjunction with a new feature called Content Controls implement structured documents. It also has contextual tabs, which are functionality specific only to the object with focus, and many other features like Live Preview (which enables you to view the document without making any permanent changes), Mini Toolbar, Super-tooltips, Quick Access toolbar, SmartArt, etc. - - 39 - Word 2007 uses a new file format called docx. Word 2000-2003 users on Windows systems can install a free add-on called the "Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack" to be able to open, edit, and save the new Word 2007 files.[10] Alternatively, Word 2007 can save to the old doc format of Word 97-2003.

Word 2008

Word 2008 is the most recent version of Microsoft Word for the Mac, released on January 15, 2008. It includes some new features from Word 2007, such as a ribbon-like feature that can be used to select page layouts and insert custom diagrams and images. Word 2008 also features native support for the new Office Open XML format, although the old .doc format can be set as a default. File formats

File extension

Microsoft Word's native file formats are denoted either by a .doc or .docx file extension.

Although the ".doc" extension has been used in many different versions of Word, it actually encompasses four distinct file formats:

1. Word for DOS 2. Word for Windows 1 and 2; Word 4 and 5 for Mac 3. Word 6 and Word 95; Word 6 for Mac 4. Word 97, 2000, 2002, 2003 and 2007; Word 98, 2001, X, and 2004 for Mac

The newer ".docx" extension signifies Office Open XML and is used by Word 2007 for Windows and Word 2008 for the Macintosh.

Microsoft does not guarantee the correct display of the document on different workstations, even if the two workstations use the same version of Microsoft Word.[14] This means it is possible the document the recipient sees might not be exactly the same as the document the sender sees. Features and flaws

Word has a built-in spell checker, thesaurus, dictionary and Office Assistant.

Normal.dot

Normal.dot is the master template from which all Word documents are created. It is one of the most important files in Microsoft Word. It determines the margin defaults as well as the layout of the text and font defaults. Although normal.dot is already set with certain defaults, the user can change normal.dot to new defaults. This will change other documents that were created using the template and saved with the option to automatically update the formatting styles.

Macros

Like other Microsoft Office documents, Word files can include advanced macros and even embedded programs. The language was originally WordBasic, but changed to Visual Basic for Applications as of Word 97.

This extensive functionality can also be used to run and propagate viruses in documents. The tendency for people to exchange Word documents via email, USB key, and floppy makes this an especially attractive

- - 40 - vector. A prominent example is the Melissa worm, but countless others have existed in the wild. Some anti- virus software can detect and clean common macro viruses, and firewalls may prevent worms from transmitting themselves to other systems.

These Macro viruses are the only known cross-platform threats between Windows and Macintosh computers and they were the only infection vectors to affect any Mac OS X system up until the advent of video codec trojans in 2007. Microsoft's released patches for Word X and Word 2004 effectively eliminated the Macro problem on the Mac by 2006.

Word's macro security setting, which regulates when macros may execute, can be adjusted by the user, but in the most recent versions of Word, is set to HIGH by default, generally reducing the risk from macro-based viruses, which have become uncommon.

Layout issues

As of Word 2007 for Windows (and Word 2004 for Macintosh), the program has been unable to handle ligatures defined in TrueType fonts: those ligature glyphs with Unicode codepoints may be inserted manually, but are not recognized by Word for what they are, breaking spellchecking, while custom ligatures present in the font are not accessible at all. Other layout deficiencies of Word include the inability to set crop marks or thin spaces. Various third-party workaround utilities have been developed.[18] Similarly, combining diacritics are handled poorly: Word 2003 has "improved support", but many diacritics are still misplaced, even if a precomposed glyph is present in the font. Additionally, as of Word 2002, Word does automatic font substitution when it finds a character in a document that does not exist in the font specified. It is impossible to deactivate this, making it very difficult to spot when a glyph used is missing from the font in use.

In Word 2004 for Macintosh, complex scripts support was inferior even to Word 97, and Word does not support Apple Advanced Typography features like ligatures or glyph variants. [19]

Bullets and numbering

Users report that Word's bulleting and numbering system is highly problematic. Particularly troublesome is Word's system for restarting numbering.[20] However, the Bullets and Numbering system has been significantly overhauled for Office 2007, which is intended to reduce the severity of these problems. For example, Office 2007 cannot align tabs for multi-leveled numbered lists, although this is a basic functionality in OpenOffice.org. Often, items in a list will be inexplicably separated from their list number by one to three tabs, rendering outlines unreadable. These problems cannot be resolved even by expert users. Even basic dragging and dropping words is usually impossible. Bullet and numbering problems in Word include: bullet characters are often changed and altered, indentation is changed within the same list, and bullet point or number sequence can belong to an entirely different nests within the same sequence.

Creating tables

Users can also create tables in MS Word. Depending on the version, Word can perform simple calculations. Formulae are supported as well.

AutoSummarize

AutoSummarize highlights passages or phrases that it considers valuable. The amount of text to be retained can be specified by the user as a percentage of the current amount of text.

According to Ron Fein of the Word 97 team, Auto Summarize cuts wordy copy to the bone by counting words and ranking sentences. First, AutoSummarize identifies the most common words in the document (barring "a" and "the" and the like) and assigns a "score" to each word--the more frequently a word is used,

- - 41 - the higher the score. Then, it "averages" each sentence by adding the scores of its words and dividing the sum by the number of words in the sentence--the higher the average, the higher the rank of the sentence. "It's like the ratio of wheat to chaff," explains Fein. [21]

AutoCorrect

In Microsoft Office 2003, AutoCorrect items added by the user cease working when text from sources outside the document is pasted in.

Sub and superscript issues

In any of the Microsoft word package, it is impossible to display superscript exactly lying above subscript. It can only be done using equation editor. Versions

Microsoft Word 5.5 for DOS

- - 42 - Microsoft Excel

In computing, Microsoft Excel (full name Microsoft Office Excel) consists of a proprietary spreadsheet-application written and distributed by Microsoft for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X. It features calculation, graphing tools, pivot tables and, except for Excel 2008 for Mac OS X, a macro programming language called VBA (Visual Basic for Applications). It is overwhelmingly the dominant spreadsheet application available for these platforms and has been so since version 5 in 1993[citation needed], and is bundled as part of Microsoft Office.

History

Microsoft originally marketed a spreadsheet program called Multiplan in 1982, which became very popular on CP/M systems, but on MS-DOS systems it lost popularity to Lotus 1-2-3. Redmond released the first version of Excel for the Mac in 1985, and the first Windows version (numbered 2.05 to line up with the Mac and bundled with a run-time Windows environment) in November 1987. Lotus was slow to bring 1-2-3 to Windows and by 1988 Excel had started to outsell 1-2-3 and helped Microsoft achieve the position of leading PC software developer. This accomplishment, dethroning the king of the software world, solidified Microsoft as a valid competitor and showed its future of developing GUI software. Microsoft pushed its advantage with regular new releases, every two years or so. The current version for the Windows platform is Excel 12, also called Microsoft Office Excel 2007. The current version for the Mac OS X platform is Microsoft Excel 2008. - - 43 - Early in 1993, Excel became the target of a trademark lawsuit by another company already selling a software package named "Excel" in the finance industry. As the result of the dispute Microsoft was required to refer to the program as "Microsoft Excel" in all of its formal press releases and legal documents. However, over time this practice has been ignored, and Microsoft cleared up the issue permanently when they purchased the trademark of the other program.[citation needed] Microsoft also encouraged the use of the letters XL as shorthand for the program; while this is no longer common, the program's icon on Windows still consists of a stylized combination of the two letters, and the file extension of the default Excel format is .xls.

Excel offers many user interface tweaks over the earliest electronic spreadsheets; however, the essence remains the same as in the original spreadsheet, VisiCalc: the program displays cells are organized in rows and columns, and each cell contains data or a formula, with relative or absolute references to other cells.

Excel was the first spreadsheet that allowed the user to define the appearance of spreadsheets (fonts, character attributes and cell appearance). It also introduced intelligent cell recomputation, where only cells dependent on the cell being modified are updated (previous spreadsheet programs recomputed everything all the time or waited for a specific user command). Excel has extensive graphing capabilities, and enables users to perform mail merge.

When Microsoft first bundled Microsoft Word and Microsoft PowerPoint into Microsoft Office in 1993, those applications had their GUIs redesigned for consistency with Excel,[citation needed] the killer app on the PC at the time.

Since 1993, Excel has included Visual Basic for Applications (VBA), a programming language based on Visual Basic which adds the ability to automate tasks in Excel and to provide user defined functions (UDF) for use in worksheets. VBA is a powerful addition to the application which, in later versions, includes a fully featured integrated development environment (IDE). Macro recording can produce VBA code replicating user actions, thus allowing simple automation of regular tasks. VBA allows the creation of forms and in-worksheet controls to communicate with the user. The language supports use (but not creation) of ActiveX (COM) DLL's; later versions add support for class modules allowing the use of basic object-oriented programming techniques.

The automation functionality provided by VBA has caused Excel to become a target for macro viruses. This was a serious problem in the corporate world until antivirus products began to detect these viruses. Microsoft belatedly took steps to prevent the misuse by adding the ability to disable macros completely, to enable macros when opening a workbook or to trust all macros signed using a trusted certificate. - - 44 - Versions 5.0 to 9.0 of Excel contain various Easter eggs, although since version 10 Microsoft has taken measures to eliminate such undocumented features from their products.[1]

Versions

'Excel 97' (8.0) being run on Windows XP

Office Excel 2003

Excel 2003 icon File formats

Excel Spreadsheet Filename extension .xls Internet media type application/vnd.ms-excel Uniform Type Identifier com.microsoft.excel.xls[3] Developed by Microsoft Type of format Spreadsheet

Microsoft Excel up until 2007 version used a proprietary binary file format called Binary Interchange File Format (BIFF) as its primary format.[4] Excel 2007 uses Office Open XML as its primary file format, an XML-based format that followed after a previous XML-based format called "XML Spreadsheet" ("XMLSS"), first introduced in Excel 2002.[5] The latter format is not able to encode VBA macros.

Standard file-extensions

- - 45 - • spreadsheet: .xls • add-in macro sheet: .xla • toolbar: .xlb • chart: .xlc • dialog: .xld • archive: .xlk • dynamic link library: .xll • macro: .xlm • template: .xlt • module; .xlv • workbook: .xlw Export and migration of spreadsheets

Programmers have produced APIs to open Excel spreadsheets in a variety of applications and environments other than Microsoft Excel. These include opening excel documents on the web using either ActiveX controls, or plugins like the Adobe Flash Player. The Apache POI opensource project provides Java libraries for reading and writing excel spreadsheet files. Attempts have also been made to be able to copy excel spreadsheets to web applications using comma-separated values. Programming

Excel offers users the useful ability to write code using the programming language Visual Basic for Applications (VBA). Programmers write this code using an editor viewed separately from the spreadsheet. Manipulation of the spreadsheet entries is controlled using objects.[7] With this code any function or subroutine that can be set up in a Basic- or Fortran-like language can be run using input taken from the spreadsheet proper, and the results of the code are instantaneously written to the spreadsheet or displayed on charts (graphs). The spreadsheet becomes an interface or window to the code, enabling easy interaction with the code and what it calculates.

The most common and easiest way to generate VBA code is by use of the macro recorder function that writes the code for the actions that the user carries out with mouse/keyboard. There is a relative/absolute toggle button that allows the user to switch between the two whilst recording a macro. Relative/absolute in this context means the relative to the start cell location or an absolute cell reference for example cell A1 (column A, row 1).

Microsoft PowerPoint

- - 46 - Microsoft PowerPoint is a presentation program developed by Microsoft. It is part of the Microsoft Office system, and runs on Microsoft Windows and the Mac OS computer operating systems. The Windows version can run in Linux operating system, under the Wine compatibility layer.

PowerPoint is widely used by business people, educators, students, and trainers and is among the most prevalent forms of persuasive technology. Beginning with Microsoft Office 2003, Microsoft revised the branding to emphasize PowerPoint's place within the office suite, calling it Microsoft Office PowerPoint instead of just Microsoft PowerPoint. The current versions are Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007 for Windows and 2008 for Mac.

Operation

PowerPoint presentations consist of a number of individual pages or "slides". The "slide" analogy is a reference to the slide projector, a device that has become obsolete due to the use of PowerPoint and other presentation software. Slides may contain text, graphics, movies, and other objects, which may be arranged freely on the slide. PowerPoint, however, facilitates the use of a consistent style in a presentation using a template or "Slide Master".

- - 47 - The presentation can be printed or displayed live on a computer and navigated through at the command of the presenter. For larger audiences the computer display is often projected using a video projector. Slides can also form the basis of webcasts.

PowerPoint provides three types of movements:

1. Entrance, emphasis, and exit of elements on a slide itself are controlled by what PowerPoint calls Custom Animations 2. Transitions, on the other hand are movements between slides. These can be animated in a variety of ways 3. Custom animation can be used to create small story boards by animating pictures to enter, exit or move

With callouts, speech bubbles with edited text can be sent on and off to create speech. The overall design of a presentation can be controlled with a master slide; and the overall structure, extending to the text on each slide, can be edited using a primitive outliner.

Presentations can be saved and run in any of the file formats: the default .ppt (presentation), .pps (PowerPoint Show) or .pot (template). In PowerPoint 2007 and Mac OS X 2008 versions, the XML-based file formats .pptx, .ppsx and .potx have been introduced, along with the macro-enabled file formats .pptm, .potm, .ppsm.

Cultural effects

Supporters and critics generally agree that the ease of use of presentation software can save a lot of time for people who otherwise would have used other types of visual aid—hand-drawn or mechanically typeset slides, blackboards or whiteboards, or overhead projections. Ease of use also encourages those who otherwise would not have used visual aids, or would not have given a presentation at all, to make presentations. As PowerPoint's style, animation, and multimedia abilities have become more sophisticated, and as the application has generally made it easier to produce presentations (even to the point of having an "AutoContent Wizard" suggesting a structure for a presentation), the difference in needs and desires of presenters and audiences has become more noticeable.

Versions

- - 48 - Versions for the Mac OS include:

• 1987 PowerPoint 1.0 for Mac OS classic • 1988 PowerPoint 2.0 for Mac OS classic • 1992 PowerPoint 3.0 for Mac OS classic • 1994 PowerPoint 4.0 for Mac OS classic • 1998 PowerPoint 98 (8.0) for Mac OS classic (Office 1998 for Mac) • 2000 PowerPoint 2001 (9.0) for Mac OS X (Office 2001 for Mac) • 2002 PowerPoint v. X (10.0) for Mac OS X (Office:Mac v. X) • 2004 PowerPoint 2004 (11.0) for Mac OS X Office:Mac 2004 • 2008 PowerPoint 2008 (12.0) for Mac OS X Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac

Note: There is no PowerPoint 5.0, 6.0 or 7.0 for Mac. There is no version 5.0 or 6.0 because the Windows 95 version was launched with Word 7. All of the Office 95 products have OLE 2 capacity - moving data automatically from various programs - and PowerPoint 7 shows that it was contemporary with Word 7. There was no version 7.0 made for Mac to coincide with either version 7.0 for Windows or PowerPoint 97. Versions for Microsoft Windows include:

• 1990 PowerPoint 2.0 for Windows 3.0 • 1992 PowerPoint 3.0 for Windows 3.1 • 1993 PowerPoint 4.0 (Office 4.x) • 1995 PowerPoint for Windows 95 (version 7.0) — (Office 95) • 1997 PowerPoint 97 — (Office 97) • 1999 PowerPoint 2000 (version 9.0) — (Office 2000) • 2001 PowerPoint 2002 (version 10) — (Office XP) • 2003 PowerPoint 2003 (version 11) — (Office 2003) • 2007 PowerPoint 2007 (version 12) — (Office 2007)

- - 49 - File formats

PowerPoint Presentation Filename extension .ppt application/vnd.ms- Internet media type powerpoint Uniform Type com.microsoft.powerpoint.ppt[6] Identifier Developed by Microsoft Type of format Presentation

The binary format specification has been available from Microsoft on request, but since February 2008 the .ppt format specification can be freely downloaded and implemented under the Microsoft Open Specification Promise patent licensing.[7]

In Microsoft Office 2007 the binary file formats were replaced as the default format by the new XML based Office Open XML formats, which are published as an open standard.

Gallery

Office PowerPoint Microsoft PowerPoint 2000 running The about box for PowerPoint 1.0, with an empty 2003 under Windows 2000 document in the background

Microsoft Access

- - 50 - Microsoft Office Access, previously known as Microsoft Access, is a relational database management system from Microsoft that combines the relational Microsoft Jet Database Engine with a graphical user interface and software development tools. It is a member of the 2007 Microsoft Office system.

Access can use data stored in Access/Jet, Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle, or any ODBC-compliant data container (including MySQL and PostgreSQL). Software developers and data architects can use it to develop application software and non-programmer "power users" can use it to build simple applications. It supports some object-oriented techniques but falls short of being a fully object-oriented development tool.

Access was also the name of a communications program from Microsoft, meant to compete with ProComm and other programs. This proved a failure and was dropped. Years later Microsoft reused the name for its database software.

[edit] History

Access 1.1 manual cover

Access version 1.0 was released in November 1992, followed in May of 1993 by an Access 1.1 release to improve compatibility with other Microsoft products.

Microsoft specified the minimum operating system for Version 2.0 as Microsoft Windows v3.0 with 4 MB of RAM. 6 MB RAM was recommended along with a minimum of 8 MB of available hard disk space (14 MB hard disk space recommended). The product was shipped on seven 1.44 MB diskettes. The manual shows a 1993 copyright date.

- - 51 - Access's initial codename was Cirrus; the forms engine was called Ruby. This was before Visual Basic - Bill Gates saw the prototypes and decided that the BASIC language component should be co-developed as a separate expandable application, a project called Thunder. The two projects were developed separately as the underlying forms engines were incompatible with each other; however, these were merged together again after VBA.

Uses

Microsoft has strongly recommended for the past decade that Jet databases are inappropriate for basic web based applications hosted on Microsoft's Internet Information Services and utilizing Microsoft Active Server Pages ASP.

Some professional application developers use Access for rapid application development, especially for the creation of prototypes and standalone applications that serve as tools for on-the-road salespeople.

Access applications do not scale well if data access is via a network, however by moving an Access application to an Application Server such as Microsoft Terminal Services the number of users that can be supported is substantially increased. Moving to an Application Server also has the benefit of allowing database use over a Wide Area Network.

Features

One of the benefits of Access from a programmer's perspective is its relative compatibility with SQL (structured query language) — queries can be viewed graphically or edited as SQL statements, and SQL statements can be used directly in Macros and VBA Modules to manipulate Access tables. Users can mix and use both VBA and "Macros" for programming forms and logic and offers object-oriented possibilities.

MSDE (Microsoft SQL Server Desktop Engine) 2000, a scaled down version of Microsoft SQL Server 2000, has been a free download for a decade and may be used with Access as an alternative to the Jet Database Engine.

Unlike other RDBMS, Microsoft Access does not implement database triggers or stored procedures.

Starting in Access 2000 (Jet 4.0), there is a new syntax for creating queries with parameters, in a way that looks like creating stored procedures, but these procedures are still limited to one statement per procedure.[2]

Development

- - 52 - All database tables, queries, forms, and reports are stored in the database. For query development, Access utilizes the Query Design Grid, a graphical user interface that allows users to create queries without knowledge of the SQL programming language. In the Query Design Grid, users can "show" the source tables of the query and select the fields they want returned by clicking and dragging them into the grid. Joins can be created by clicking and dragging fields in tables to fields in other tables. Access allows users to view and manipulate the SQL code if desired.

The programming language available in Access is, as in other products of the Microsoft Office suite, Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications. Two database access libraries of COM components are provided: the obsolete Data Access Objects (DAO), which has not been included in Office, Windows or MDAC for most of the past decade.

ADO has been much more widespread; and this is why it is recommended to upgrade all DAO to ADO (but still accessible) by ActiveX Data Objects (ADO); however (DAO) has been reintroduced as an option in the latest version, Microsoft Access 2007.

Microsoft Access can be applied to small projects (the Access 97 speed characterization was done for 32 users) but scales poorly to larger projects with more than several 10MB of data or many users because of the way indexing and locking are handled. As a Microsoft Access database can be cached locally when used on network, processing speed may be substantially better when there is only a single user. Because of the effect of packet latency on the record locking system, Access databases are effectively too slow to be used on a Virtual Private Network (VPN) or a Wide Area Network (WAN). If an Access Database needs to be accessed over a WAN then Microsoft Terminal Services is an effective solution. Access Data Projects work great over VPN and WAN.

Access includes an Upsizing Wizard that allows users to upsize their database to Microsoft SQL Server if they want to move to an ODBC client-server database.

Protection

If the database design needs to be secured to prevent changes, Access databases can be locked/protected (and the source code compiled) by converting the database to an .MDE file. All changes to the VBA project (forms or reports) need to be made to the original MDB and then reconverted to MDE.

Some tools are available for unlocking and 'decompiling', although certain elements including original VBA comments and formatting are normally irretrievable.

File extensions

- - 53 - Microsoft Access saves information under the following file formats:

File format Extension Access Project .adp Access Blank Project Template .adn Access Database (2007) .accdb Access Database Runtime (2007) .accdr Access Database Template (2007) .accdt Access Database (2003 and earlier) .mdb Access Database, used for addins (2,95,97), previously used for workgroups (2). .mda Access Workgroup, database for user-level security. .mdw Access (SQL Server) detached database (2000) .mdf Protected Access Database, with compiled VBA (2003 and earlier) .mde Protected Access Database, with compiled VBA (2007) .accde Windows Shortcut: Access Macro .mam Windows Shortcut: Access Query .maq Windows Shortcut: Access Report .mar Windows Shortcut: Access Table .mat Windows Shortcut: Access Form .maf Versions

Version Date Version Supported OS Office suite version number 1992 Access 1.1 1 Windows 3.1x 1993 Access 2.0 2.0 Windows 3.1x Office 4.3 Pro Access for Windows 1995 7.0 Windows 95 Office 95 Professional 95 Windows 9x, NT 1997 Access 97 8.0 Office 97 Professional and Developer 3.5/4.0 Windows 9x, NT 4.0, Office 2000 Professional, Premium and 1999 Access 2000 9.0 2000 Developer Windows 98, Me, 2001 Access 2002 10 Office XP Professional and Developer 2000, XP Office 2003 Professional and Professional 2003 Access 2003 11 Windows 2000, XP Enterprise Microsoft Office Windows XP SP2, Office 2007 Professional, Professional Plus, 2007 12 Access 2007 Vista Ultimate and Enterprise

Internet

The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that interchange data by packet switching using the standardized Internet Protocol Suite (TCP/IP). It is a "network of networks" that consists of millions of private and public, academic, business, and government networks of local to global scope that are linked by copper wires, fiber-optic cables, wireless connections, and other technologies.

- - 54 - The Internet carries various information resources and services, such as electronic mail, online chat, file transfer and file sharing, online gaming, and the inter-linked hypertext documents and other resources of the World Wide Web (WWW).

Visualization of the various routes through a portion of the Internet. Terminology

The terms Internet and World Wide Web are often used in every-day speech without much distinction. However, the Internet and the World Wide Web are not one and the same. The Internet is a global data communications system. It is a hardware and software infrastructure that provides connectivity between computers. In contrast, the Web is one of the services communicated via the Internet. It is a collection of interconnected documents and other resources, linked by hyperlinks and URLs.

History

Creation

- - 55 - A 1946 comic science-fiction story, A Logic Named Joe, by Murray Leinster laid out the Internet and many of its strengths and weaknesses. However, it took more than a decade before reality began to catch up with this vision.

The USSR's launch of Sputnik spurred the United States to create the Advanced Research Projects Agency, known as ARPA, in February 1958 to regain a technological lead.[2][3] ARPA created the Information Processing Technology Office (IPTO) to further the research of the Semi Automatic Ground Environment (SAGE) program, which had networked country-wide radar systems together for the first time. J. C. R. Licklider was selected to head the IPTO, and saw universal networking as a potential unifying human revolution.

Licklider moved from the Psycho-Acoustic Laboratory at Harvard University to MIT in 1950, after becoming interested in information technology. At MIT, he served on a committee that established Lincoln Laboratory and worked on the SAGE project. In 1957 he became a Vice President at BBN, where he bought the first production PDP-1 computer and conducted the first public demonstration of time-sharing.

The opening of the network to commercial interests began in 1988. The US Federal Networking Council approved the interconnection of the NSFNET to the commercial MCI Mail system in that year and the link was made in the summer of 1989. Other commercial electronic e-mail services were soon connected, including OnTyme, Telemail and Compuserve. In that same year, three commercial Internet service providers (ISP) were created: UUNET, PSINET and CERFNET. Important, separate networks that offered gateways into, then later merged with, the Internet include Usenet and BITNET. Various other commercial and educational networks, such as Telenet, Tymnet, Compuserve and JANET were interconnected with the growing Internet. Telenet (later called Sprintnet) was a large privately funded national computer network with free dial-up access in cities throughout the U.S. that had been in operation since the 1970s. This network was eventually interconnected with the others in the 1980s as the TCP/IP protocol became increasingly popular. The ability of TCP/IP to work over virtually any pre-existing communication networks allowed for a great ease of growth, although the rapid growth of the Internet was due primarily to the availability of commercial routers from companies such as Cisco Systems, Proteon and Juniper, the availability of commercial Ethernet equipment for local-area networking and the widespread implementation of TCP/IP on the UNIX operating system.

Growth

Although the basic applications and guidelines that make the Internet possible had existed for almost a decade, the network did not gain a public face until the 1990s. On August 6, 1991, CERN, which straddles the

- - 56 - border between France and Switzerland, publicized the new World Wide Web project. The Web was invented by English scientist Tim Berners-Lee in 1989.

An early popular web browser was ViolaWWW, patterned after HyperCard and built using the X Window System. It was eventually replaced in popularity by the Mosaic web browser. In 1993, the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois released version 1.0 of Mosaic, and by late 1994 there was growing public interest in the previously academic, technical Internet. By 1996 usage of the word Internet had become commonplace, and consequently, so had its use as a synecdoche in reference to the World Wide Web.

Meanwhile, over the course of the decade, the Internet successfully accommodated the majority of previously existing public computer networks (although some networks, such as FidoNet, have remained separate). During the 1990s, it was estimated that the Internet grew by 100% per year, with a brief period of explosive growth in 1996 and 1997.[4] This growth is often attributed to the lack of central administration, which allows organic growth of the network, as well as the non-proprietary open nature of the Internet protocols, which encourages vendor interoperability and prevents any one company from exerting too much control over the network.

Today's Internet

The My Opera Community server rack. From the top, user file storage (content of files.myopera.com), "bigma" (the master MySQL database server), and two IBM blade centers containing multi-purpose machines (Apache front ends, Apache back ends, slave MySQL database servers, load balancers, file servers, cache servers and sync masters).

Aside from the complex physical connections that make up its infrastructure, the Internet is facilitated by bi- or multi-lateral commercial contracts (e.g., peering agreements), and by technical specifications or protocols

- - 57 - that describe how to exchange data over the network. Indeed, the Internet is defined by its interconnections and routing policies.

Common uses

E-mail

The concept of sending electronic text messages between parties in a way analogous to mailing letters or memos predates the creation of the Internet. Even today it can be important to distinguish between Internet and internal e-mail systems. Internet e-mail may travel and be stored unencrypted on many other networks and machines out of both the sender's and the recipient's control. During this time it is quite possible for the content to be read and even tampered with by third parties, if anyone considers it important enough. Purely internal or intranet mail systems, where the information never leaves the corporate or organization's network, are much more secure, although in any organization there will be IT and other personnel whose job may involve monitoring, and occasionally accessing, the e-mail of other employees not addressed to them.

The World Wide Web

Graphic representation of a minute fraction of the WWW, demonstrating hyperlinks

Many people use the terms Internet and World Wide Web (or just the Web) interchangeably, but, as discussed above, the two terms are not synonymous.

The World Wide Web is a huge set of interlinked documents, images and other resources, linked by hyperlinks and URLs. These hyperlinks and URLs allow the web servers and other machines that store

- - 58 - originals, and cached copies, of these resources to deliver them as required using HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol). HTTP is only one of the communication protocols used on the Internet.

Web services also use HTTP to allow software systems to communicate in order to share and exchange business logic and data.

Software products that can access the resources of the Web are correctly termed user agents. In normal use, web browsers, such as Internet Explorer, Firefox and Apple Safari, access web pages and allow users to navigate from one to another via hyperlinks. Web documents may contain almost any combination of computer data including graphics, sounds, text, video, multimedia and interactive content including games, office applications and scientific demonstrations.

Through keyword-driven Internet research using search engines like Yahoo! and Google, millions of people worldwide have easy, instant access to a vast and diverse amount of online information. Compared to encyclopedias and traditional libraries, the World Wide Web has enabled a sudden and extreme decentralization of information and data.

Collaboration

The low cost and nearly instantaneous sharing of ideas, knowledge, and skills has made collaborative work dramatically easier. Not only can a group cheaply communicate and test, but the wide reach of the Internet allows such groups to easily form in the first place, even among niche interests. An example of this is the free software movement in software development, which produced GNU and Linux from scratch and has taken over development of Mozilla and OpenOffice.org (formerly known as Netscape Communicator and StarOffice).

Internet "chat", whether in the form of IRC "chat rooms" or channels, or via instant messaging systems, allow colleagues to stay in touch in a very convenient way when working at their computers during the day. Messages can be sent and viewed even more quickly and conveniently than via e-mail. Extension to these systems may allow files to be exchanged, "whiteboard" drawings to be shared as well as voice and video contact between team members.

File sharing

A computer file can be e-mailed to customers, colleagues and friends as an attachment. It can be uploaded to a website or FTP server for easy download by others. It can be put into a "shared location" or

- - 59 - onto a file server for instant use by colleagues. The load of bulk downloads to many users can be eased by the use of "mirror" servers or peer-to-peer networks.

In any of these cases, access to the file may be controlled by user authentication; the transit of the file over the Internet may be obscured by encryption, and money may change hands before or after access to the file is given. The price can be paid by the remote charging of funds from, for example, a credit card whose details are also passed—hopefully fully encrypted—across the Internet. The origin and authenticity of the file received may be checked by digital signatures or by MD5 or other message digests.

These simple features of the Internet, over a worldwide basis, are changing the basis for the production, sale, and distribution of anything that can be reduced to a computer file for transmission. This includes all manner of print publications, software products, news, music, film, video, photography, graphics and the other arts. This in turn has caused seismic shifts in each of the existing industries that previously controlled the production and distribution of these products.

Internet collaboration technology enables business and project teams to share documents, calendars and other information. Such collaboration occurs in a wide variety of areas including scientific research, software development, conference planning, political activism and creative writing.

The terms “internet” and “Internet”

The term internet is written both with capital and without capital, and is used both with and without article. This can be explained from the various ways in which the term has come to be used over time.

The term originated as a determiner, a shorthand for internetworking, and is mostly used in this way in RFCs, the documentation for the evolving Internet Protocol (IP) standards for internetworking between ARPANET and other computer networks in the 1970s. As the impetus behind IP grew, it became more common to regard the results of internetworking as entities of their own, and internet became a noun, used both in a generic sense (any collection of computer networks connected through internetworking) and in a specific sense (the collection of computer networks that internetworked with ARPANET, and later NSFNET, using the IP standards, and that grew into the connectivity service we know today).

In its generic sense, internet is a common noun, a synonym for internetwork; therefore, it has a plural form (first appearing in RFC 870 and RFC 872), and is not to be capitalized.

In its specific sense, it is a proper noun, and therefore, with article, without a plural form, and with capitalization.

A sentence that uses both meanings:

- - 60 - "The Internet is an internet based on the Internet Protocol suite."

The proper noun can again be used as a determiner, which will then carry a capital (e.g. "Internet mail").

The Internet Society, the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), and several other Internet-related organizations use this convention in their publications, including the RFCs.

As Internet connectivity grew more popular, it became known as a service, similar to TV, radio, and telephone, and the word came to be used in this way (e.g. "I have Internet at home" and "I saw it on (the) Internet"). For this type of use, English spelling and grammar do not prescribe whether the article or capitalization are to be used, which explains the inconsistency that exists in practice.

Many newspapers, newswires, periodicals, and technical journals capitalize the term (Internet). Examples include The Dhaka Daily Star, The New York Times, the Associated Press, Time, The Times of India, Hindustan Times, and Communications of the ACM.

Other publications do not capitalize the term, including The Economist, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, the Financial Times, The Guardian, The Times, The Sydney Morning Herald, and Wired News; this appears to be more popular outside North America.

- - 61 -