Computer
The literal meaning of the word ‘computer’ is an instrument that computes or does various calculations. Fundamentally, it is a calculating machine. It can perform various calculations like addition, subtraction, division, multiplication and so on. In fact, it can receive innumerable data and instructions and perform thousands of calculations within seconds and then give the results. A part from doing mathematical calculations, a computer has surprising capabilities of manipulating the input data according to logic and making conclusions as per instructions. The work, which a man would otherwise do in thousands of days in done by the computer within minutes or hours. The modern computer is a very modern electronic instrument. A computer has two main aspects: The hardware and the software. The hardware is the machine itself, and the software is a combination of various symbolic instructions of codes, better know as computer language. It has some components as input devices, the CPU or the Central Processing Unit, the output devices. The input devices receive instructions in codes, which are similar to human language. The hardware can be thought of as the skeleton and the software as the flesh and blood-if the whole computers were to be imagined of as a human being. The software or the programs virtually help the hardware function the way the user wants it to. The programs are of two types –one is the operating system and the other, the applications program. The computer can be classified according to its size, speed, and internal structure. It is perhaps the strangest gift of science.
