STUDY SESSION 4: INPUT AND OUTPUT DEVICES

Introduction

We have looked at the capabilities, size and used of the computer system so far. We mentioned
that the computer takes in data in form of raw material and gives out information as processed
result of the input data. The process of taking in data is referred to as input and the tools for
achieving this is the input device, same for the output. Let us consider these devices in details
in the sessions that follows. The only way to communicate with a computer is through input
and output devices. These tools are the eyes, ears, hands, and mouth of the computer. Input
devices such as the keyboard and mouse translate a person's commands and data into electronic
impulses the computer can understand. Output devices such as printers and monitors translate
the computer's electronic responses back into a form people can understand.

Learning outcomes for study session 4

At the end of this study session, it expected that you should be able to:
 List and identify the major input and outputs and functions of the parts of these
input and output devices.
 Hands on experience is also expected as the student begin to use the computer
systems from this study session

4.1- Input device

Just as the steering wheel is the primary "input device" for automobiles, the keyboard has long
been the dominant input device for computers. Today, many other ways of "talking" to
computer are gaining in importance - including actual speech. In this section we'll examine the
kinds of keyboard, pointing tools, scanners, and voice-recognition devices used with
computers today.
1. Keyboards

Computer keyboards were originally designed to imitate electric typewriters so that typists
could learn to use computers more easily. The demands of computer technology, however,
have led to keys and keyboard layouts never before seen on a typewriter. While a typewriter
has only about 50 keys, a computer keyboard may have 100 or more. A computer's keys are
generally divided into four clusters:

Figure 4.1: A Keyboard

Figure 4.1 shows a generic sample of a keyboard which we shall consider now. Let us run
through the major sections on the keyboard to get familiar with its layout. Remember that from
this session you should start attempting to do a hands-on practice on the keyboard to enhance
your use of the computer system.

Alphanumeric keys include letters, numbers, and punctuation marks. They are arranged much
like the keys on a typewriter.

 Function keys are labeled Fl, F2, and so on up to F12 or F15. They can be used for giving
common commands such as "print" or "Quit program". The precise purpose of any
function key varies from one program to another. To remind you what these keys do in
specific programs, many software packages include keyboard templates, plastic "Cheat-
sheets" that fit around the keys, explaining the command that each key activates.

 Cursor keys are used to move the cursor around on the screen. The cursor is the little
blinking symbol that indicates where things will happen next on the screen. When you are
typing, the cursor always blinks just to the right of the last character you typed. If you want
to type on the next line up, for example, press the arrow key and the cursor will jump up a
line. Cursor keys include the arrow keys for moving up, down, left and right, as well as the
 Pg Up, Pg Dn, Home, and End Keys.

 The numerical keypad includes the mathematical keys found on a standard calculator.
People accustomed to using calculators appreciate having this extra set of number keys
arranged in the rectangular format familiar from calculator keyboards.

To save space, many keyboards combine the numeric keypad with the arrow keys. In this case,
some of the keys are labeled with both arrows and numbers. This can seem confusing when,
for example, you want to move the cursor upward but the key insists on typing 8s. The trick is
that a number lock key (usual marked "Num Lock") switches the keypad from one purpose to
another. Press ''Num Lock" once and the arrow keys will type only numbers. Press ''Num Lock
again and the arrow keys will again move the cursor. Press "Num Lock" again and the arrow
keys will type only numbers. Several other non-typewriter keys are used on computer
keyboards.
The control key (usually labeled "Ctrl") can be very important. Like the shift key it doesn't do
anything if you press it by itself. But if you hold the control key down and then press one of
the alphanumeric keys, you can issue a wide variety of commands. What these commands are
depends on which other key you press and what program you are using. In one program, for
example, holding down control key and pressing S might save a copy of your work onto a disk.
Some programs also make use of the keyboard's second control key, known as the alternate
key. Often labeled "Alt," it works like the first control key but activates different commands.
The escape key, abbreviated "Esc," usually lets you escape when a program gives you a list of
choices and for some reason you don't like any of them. Sometimes the escape key serves as
an antidote to the commands unleashed by the control or functions keys. Suppose your sleeve
accidentally brushes a function key and the screen suddenly erupts with puzzling questions
about merge code. Chances are that pressing the escape key will make the whole nightmare go
away.
The enter key (sometimes marked " " or "Return") is located where an electric typewriter's
carriage return key would be. But because computers don't have carriages, the enter key is used
for other things: to mark the ends of paragraphs to accept choices from lists, and to enter
commands on programs with command line interfaces.
The delete key is usual marked "Del" and erases whatever character shown at the cursor. The
backspace key, sometimes simply marked deletes characters in a different way. It moves the
cursor to the left, erasing everything in its path. The insert key, abbreviated "Ins," is generally
used as a switch to determine whether newly typed text becomes an addition to or a
replacement to existing text.
Most keyboards have several shortcut keys for moving the cursor around the screen. The keys
marked "PgDn" (page down) and "PgUp" (page up) shifts cursor by an entire page of text. The
keys marked "Home" and "End" have various meanings, but typically will zip the cursor to the
top of the screen or to end of a line.
Be warned that most of the keys on the keyboard are repeating keys; thus if you hold them
down for more than a fraction of a second, they start repeating their message. Holding down
the hypen key, for example, produces a string hypens. Similarly, holding down the “ key
will send the cursor sailing at the page. If your cat sits on a function key while you're out? The
computer might frantically repeat a "Delete line" command until your history report really is
history.

Another feature of computer keyboard is the type-ahead buffer, a tiny amount of built-in
memory that lets the keyboard store about 20 characters. This buffer lets typists keep working
even when the computer is busy processing something else for a few seconds. If the buffer
becomes full, the keyboard is likely to beep when you press further keys. Once the computer
is ready again to accept data, whatever was typed into the buffer will appear on the screen.

2. The Mouse

Though mouse is being faced out in the design of the computer system, it derives its name
from the look of the small house rat, with a long tail. Sure some of you don’t like rats, but you
have seen an important use of dreaded rodent! Mice are popular because it is easier to point
than to type, and because the arrow keys don't work very well for drawing pictures or moving
things on the screen. A mouse consists of a ball mounted under a plastic housing with one or
more buttons on top. As you move the mouse around the tabletop, sensors inside register the
rolling of the ball and move the cursor around the screen to match.
The mouse is generally controlled by clicking to give command to the computer on what to
do. First, you can click the button to identify something-perhaps to indicate which part of a
drawing you want to change. Second, you can drag the mouse; that is, you can hold the button
down while you move the mouse. Dragging can be used to move a drawing across the screen.
You might also drag the mouse if you need to mark off an area on the screen-for example, a
paragraph you want to italicize. The third way to give a command is to double-click the
mouse's button by pressing it twice within about a half second. (If you click slowly, the mouse
will register two single clicks.) Double-clicking is used to select things on the screen. On most
computers, for example, if you double-click on a symbol of a document file, the program opens
that document.
Mice require uncluttered desk space. If your desk is a mess, or if you're using a laptop computer
without a desk space at all, you'll want a different pointing tool

3. Other Pointing Tools

Trackballs, Pointer Pegs, and Touch Pads

Trackballs, pointer pegs, touch pads are alternatives to the mouse that can be built right into
the keyboard or its frame, making them ideal for notebook computers. All of these pointing
devices can be used without moving your hands from a typing position. A trackball,
essentially a mouse turned upside down, is a small plastic ball mounted in a socket. By rolling
the ball with your thumb or your palm, you can move the cursor around on the screen. Like
mice, trackballs are outfitted with command bottoms for clicking, dragging, and double-
clicking. A pointer peg is a miniature joystick, usually mounted between the letters G and H
on the keyboard. Wiggle the peg to move-the cursor. A touch pad is a small, sensitive
rectangular surface, usually at the front of the keyboard. To click or move the cursor, simply
tap or drag a finger across the pad.

Pens
Another input device, the pen, operates electronically. A typical pen based computer is shaped
like a tablet, with a screen that responds to the touch of a stylus. These portable computers
include software programs that can recognize handwriting and convert it into neatly printed
characters. Likewise, pen-based computers can usually recognize even relatively crude
sketches of geometric shapes and can convert them into neat, smooth drawings.
The programs in pen-based computers also understand numerous gestures-motions with the
pens that are used for giving commands.
Let us practice some of the uses of the pen or how it can be used. Here are a few of the most
common gestures:
Tap - selects a word, a drawing, or an option
Cross out - deletes a word or drawing
Draw a pigtail - deletes a character
Draw a caret - inserts characters
Press and drag - moves something on screen or marks a large area of text.
Pens are not suited for entering large amounts of text because typing is now always faster than
writing with a pen.

Digitizing Tablets

Engineers, artists, and architects use digitizing tablets, touch-sensitive bond covered with thin
sheets of plastic. When you draw on the sheet, the tablet underneath records what you have
drawn and displays it on a screen. The tablets are also useful for tracing patterns.

Touch Screens

The simplest pointing tool of all, of course, is the finger. In fact, touch screen are widely used
in department-store advertising displays, information kiosks, and other places where users are
not expected to have fan1iliarity with computers. On these machines you simply touch the part
of the display screen you want to select, just as you might push a vending machine's button.
Depending on the sensing method used by the touch screen, your finger might interrupt a
network of infrared rays projected across the screen's surface. This would tell the computer
where you pointed.

Optical Input Tools

Computers are becoming increasingly adept at accepting visual input from a variety of optical
devices.

Scanners and Digital Cameras

A scanner captures a digital image of a photograph, a drawing, or a page of text by shining a

bright light across the surface and registering the reflection as a pattern of tiny dots, Page
scanners can scan an entire page at once. They look like small photocopying machines and
work much the same way, except that instead of printing images onto paper, they display the
images on computer screen. Gray-scale scanners cannot reproduce colour, but do well with
black-and-white photographs because they typically are able to record each individual dot as
one of 256 shades of gray. Colour scanners are more expensive, but often can register 16.8
million different colours.
Handheld scanners can capture images only up to 5 inches wide, but their software can "sew
together" adjacent strips seamlessly to reproduce a larger image. To avoid distorting the image,
it is important to pull the scanner with a straight, even motion.
Digital video cameras provide another way to capture images for use on computers. Digital
video cameras may look like regular cameras or camcorders, but instead of recording pictures
on film, they store pictures as digital data. Although digital cameras produce somewhat lower
quality images than film-based cameras, publishers are using them more and more, both to
eliminate the time and expense of film processing, and because digital images can be
transferred directly to the electronic page composition programs now used in publishing.
Once a scanner or digital camera has captured an image, special software programs make it
possible to alter the image in countless ways. You can stretch the image, shrink it, crop it,
colour it, animate it, reverse it, or even make it look like it was painted with a brush. Optical
Character Recognition (OCR)

Scanners are often used to "read" text-that is, to convert a typed or printed document into a
form that can be handled by a word processing program. This is useful, for example, if
someone has sent you a paper copy of a report and you don't want to retype the whole thing
before you can work on the text with your computer. To make this kind of conversion, you
need a scanner and an optical character recognition (OCR) program,

An OCR program works by recognizing the shapes of individual characters. Because even
printed characters vary greatly in size and style, some OCR programs are trainable-that is, each
time the program misinterprets a character, it keeps track of your corrections and uses that
information to do better next time. Most OCR programs also spell-check their work against a
stored dictionary of words, so that a word they originally interpret as rnis5ing will be corrected
to missing. Although OCR programs are rapidly improving, they take about a minute to
translate a page of typewritten text and generally still misread a few words. Among the most
enthusiastic supporters of OCR development are the blind; already computer systems are
available that can scan printed materials and read them out loud.

4. Bar-code Readers

Although computers still make occasional mistakes when reading printed text, they almost
never err when scanning are codes, the striped symbols used to identify merchandise in stores.
Bar-code readers operate by registering the light of a laser bounced off the codes printed on
items; the kind of bar-code symbol used in supermarkets is the Universal Product Code (UPC).
The UPC consists of two five-digit numbers, one identifying the manufacturer and another
identifying the specific product. Each of the ten digits is represented by two bars. When the
bar-code reader scans the symbol, the numbers are relayed to the store's central computer,
which instantly identifies the product, checks the price, and adjusts inventory records.
Business with these computerized systems are replacing the word "cash register" with the more
accurate term, point-of-sale terminal or POS terminal, because each machine is actually just
a terminal relaying information to the business's central computer.
Bar-code readers are finding many uses in noncommercial environments, too. Identifying
books in libraries, patients in hospitals, and prisoner’s jails "Scientists have even glued tiny
bar codes on the back of bees to record when they enter a hive.

5. Voice Recognition
Today, computers are still struggling with the basics of voice recognition: converting speech
into digital form, comparing the result against a computerized dictionary of speech patterns,
and attempting to decide which words were spoken.
Many voice-recognition programs limit this task by concentrating on understanding only one
person. This system is used in programs that let you give verbal commands to your car's
cellular telephone or to your personal computer. With these programs, you might record
yourself speaking a command such as "Engage!" and instruct the computer to identify that set
of sounds with the "Enter" command. However, the computer may not understand if someone
else says "Engage" -or even if you say "Engage" in a different tone.
Other voice-recognition programs can understand a wide variety of speakers, but only if they
use specific words. These systems are currently used in job situations, where workers must
take notes while their hands are busy.

Other Input Tools

Some input tools have become so commonplace we take them for granted. Voters punch little
'holes in ballot cards to be tallied by computer. Students pencil in squares on test forms to be
scored by computer. Musicians perform on synthesizer keyboards to record data for release e
on compact disks.
In the future, the development of smart materials will make computer input devices a part of
many other everyday object. In the world of tennis for example, a mesh of sensors can be
embedded in the playing court, allowing judges to determine whether a ball is "out" by as little
as 1 one··hundredth of an inch. As another example, the U.S. Air Force is researching a "smart"
fibre optic skin that can be applied to the surface of an aircraft to alert the pitch computer
system if the plane has been scanned by radar, stressed by fatigue or dangerously layered with
ice. As the applications of computer expand, the definition of an "input device" may include
everything from a club to the kitchen sink.

4.2- Output Devices

Computers present information to us through output device. In this section we first compare
the many types of monitors and printers, and then we'll look at the common ways of handling
computer output.

1. Monitors
A monitor, or display screen, provides a convenient but temporary way to get information. The
earliest computer monitors were simply converted television sets. While ordinary TV s are still
used for some video games, most computer programs today demand higher-quality monitors.
The quest for better monitors has taken two paths: the improvement of TV-like screens and
the development of screens. Let's look at the developments in these two fields.
Cathode-Ray Tube (CRT) Monitors

TV-like screens are called cathode-ray tube (CRT) monitors because the glass tubes inside
them are lit by beams of electrons shot from cathodes or electron guns. The electrons hit
phosphors on the screen surface, causing them to glow. Each dot of light on a CRT screen is
called a pixel, an abbreviation for picture element. To hit all the pixels, the electron gun covers
the screen with a raster scan-a zigzagging pattern of rows that is repeated from 30 to 100 times
a second. A monochrome monitor has only one electron gun and its screen has only one colour
of phosphor (often amber or green). A colour monitor, on the other hand, requires three elec-
tron-guns-one each to target the red, green and biphosphors that compose each color pixel.
For CRT monitors, however, quality and price mostly depend on how many pixels fit on the
screen and how many colours each pixel can portray. The more pixels packed onto the screen
the better the resolution or sharpness of the image. A typical personal common monitor may
be set to show 1024 pixels on each of 768 rows and is said to have a resolution of 1024 x 768.

Flat-screen Monitors
Despite improvements in CRT technology, monitors built around big glass are still too bulky
to fit in portable computers. What's more, CRT monitors use too much energy to run on
batteries for long. As a result, manufacturers of portable computers have turned to alternative
technologies that provide energy, lightweight, flat-screen monitors.

Most flat-screen monitors use the liquid crystal displays (LCDs) familiar from digital watches.
LCD screens are already standard on portable computers, and they may one day replace CRT
monitors even on desktop computers. A less common flat-screen technology, the gas plasma
display, produces sharp images in shades of orange.

1 Printers
Different kinds of computer printers use surprisingly different technologies. Some printers
squirt ink, some apply heat to sensitive paper, others hammer inked ribbons, and still others
create images with lasers. In this section we'll compare half a dozen of the most widely used
printer technologies and consider what kinds of jobs each does best.

Laser Printers
Although laser printers are slightly more expensive than other types of printers, they are so
fast, quiet, and precisely, that they are standard equipment in most offices and have become
common for home use. Because laser printers can affordably produce typeset-quality text and
digital photographs, they have launched many PC users into desktop publishing-designing and
printing newsletters, ads, books, and other published materials with personal computer tools.
Laser printers, an acronym for Light Amplifying Simulating Emitting Ray, work by reflecting
a laser beam from a rapidly rotating octagonal mirror onto a light-sensitive roller. An electric
charge forms wherever light hits the roller, attracting particles toner (powdered plastic ink).
As the roller turns, the toner particles are transferred to a sheet of paper, where they are heated
and fused permanently in place. Laser printers are quiet because the paper is not actually
struck. This also categorizes them as nonimpact printers-incapable of printing multipart forms.
Text printed by a laser printer is not merely letter quality, it often looks typeset. Because the
images are composed of tiny dots, the sharpness is gauged by the number of dots per inch
(dpi). The least expensive laser printers print at 300 dpi while costlier models achieve 900 dpi
or more, enabling them to print newspaper quality screened photographs. Laser printers
produce an entire page at a time, so their print speed is measured in pages per minute (ppm).
Black-and-white laser printers print from 2 to 20 or more pages per minute. Colour laser
printers nm more slowly, because they have to print each page four times: once each to add
red, yellow, blue, and black toner to the paper.

Ink-jet Printers
Increasingly popular, especially for inexpensive colour printing, ink-jet printers work by
squirting tiny droplets of liquid ink on the paper. Some models use magnetic plates to deflect
each drop to its proper position by acting on the drop's static electricity charge. Ink-jet printers
are nearly as inexpensive as dot-matrix printers and yet approach the resolution quality of laser
printers. Advantages of ink-jet printers are their virtually silent operation and their reliability.
Small, portable models are available, even for printing in colour. Disadvantages of ink-jet
printers are that they smear on some kinds of paper and they cannot print multipart forms.
Their speed, at about 200 characters per second, is similar to that of dot-matrix printers but
well behind the speed of laser printers.

Dot-matrix Printers
Inexpensive and versatile but noisy and slow, a dot-matrix printer features a movable print head
containing a row of tiny pins. The pins push an inked ribbon against the paper, producing a
matrix (or pattern) of dots. As the print head moves back and forth across the page, the dots
can form either letter or graphics. Because dot-matrix printers are impact printers (a printer
that strikes the paper), they have the advantage of being able to print through multipart form.
Like most impact printers, however, they are noisy.

2 Plotters
Architects and engineers sometimes use plotters, computer-driven drafting tools that draw
diagrams and charts with coloured pens. In a flatbed plotter, the pens move across the paper
on mechanical arms. In a drum plotter, the paper rolls back and forth so the pens only need to
move along a single cross-arm. Although slow, plotters can create poster-sized drawing.
Plotters are being replaced by much faster colour laser printers as these gain the ability to
handle larger sheets of paper.

4. Printing onto Film

Some output devices print directly onto film, creating full-colour slides or over-head
transparencies. This is useful for people who need to prepare classroom office presentations.
Other output devices print information onto microfilm for storage purposes. Computer output
microfilm (COM) technology is used to store miniaturized images of next on rolls of film or
on small sheets known as microfiche. Library catalogs, back issues of newspapers, and parts
catalogs are often microfilmed because the film takes very little space to store and because the
film printing process is roughly 200 times faster and 10 times cheaper than printing paper. To
be sure, microfilmed information is slow and difficult to access by hand even with the best
magnification readers, but computerized information retrieval systems are available that can
cut the search time to a matter of seconds.

Other Types of Output

Computers are not limited to communicating information visually. The speaker of your
compact disk player are also computer output devices.

Voice output is becoming another common output method: grocery store point-of-sale
terminals announce your purchases, cars remind you to "Please fasten seat belts," and
telephones apologize when you dial a disconnected number. In some cases, the words are
simply playbacks of digital recordings. More complex voice synthesizing programs can study
almost any text and generate sounds of speech, adding appropriate intonation.
One of the most interesting new ways of presenting computer information is through virtual
reality: computer-generated simulations of objects and landscapes with which people can
interact Already gloves and goggles are available that enable you to "feel: and "see" three-
dimensional simulations with startling immediacy. The U. S. Air Force uses virtual reality in
flight simulators so that pilots-in-training "get the feel" of new aircraft without risking crashes.
In the future, medical students will use virtual reality to practice surgery. At the same time,
video arcades will bring virtual reality to everyone, with 3-D simulations of race cars, space
battles, and mazes.

4.3-Summary of study session 4

The main means of communicating with the computer system from and to the outer world is
through input and output devices. The output devices help communicate processed data to the
user as information. Data to be processed is entered using input devices. Input and output
devices are made of different technologies and are used with respect to categories and types of
computer. The most familiar of all input devices is the keyboard. It usually includes function
keys (for giving commands), arrow keys (for moving the cursor, the blinking marker on the
screen), a numeric keypad similar to a calculator's and alphanumeric keys (typewriter-like
keys). Expect several special key too; the number lock key can convert arrow keys to number
keys, the control key is used to give commands, the escape key stops certain commands, and
the enter key registers choices or commands. The names of the delete key, backspace key,
and insert key explain their most common uses. Most keys reveal themselves as repeating
keys when held down. A type-ahead buffer lets you keep typing even when the computer is
busy processing.
A mouse is a pointing device with a button that can be clicked, quickly double-clicked, or
dragged (pressed and moved) to give commands. Trackballs, pointer pegs, and touch pad
work like mice but are often built into portable computers' keyboards. On some computers,
pens can be used to write', draw, and give commands with gestures or motions. Engineers and
artists use digitizing tablets for design work. Touch screens respond to users' fingertips.
Scanners capture images for use on a computer. A page scanner records an entire page, while
a handheld scanner records a narrower swath. Scanned text can be converted to a word
processing file by an optical character recognition (OCR) program. Digital video cameras
record photos or movies as data files. Many stores use bar-code readers to scan purchases at
point-of-sale (POS) terminals, computerized cash registers. The most convenient form of
input, however, is voice recognition.
The most common monitor, or display screen, uses a TV -like cathode-ray tube (CRT), either
for monochrome (single-colour) or colour display. Each dot on the screen is called a pixel.
The number of pixels determines a monitor's resolution.
Dot-matrix printers use tiny pins to print dots. Laser printers cost more but are faster-about
8 pages per minute (ppm) - and use plastic toner particles to print sharp images composed
of at least 300 dots per inch (dpi). Ink-jet printers spray droplets of ink at the paper. Architects
use plotters to draft large drawings.
Other varieties of output include microfiche sheets, a kind of computer output microfilm
(COM) used for storing miniaturized information on film. Voice output programs simulate
speech, while virtual reality programs simulate the feel and look of 3-D objects.
 4.4- Self-Assessment Questions (SAQs)
1. What are the input devices you know?
2. What are the technologies for the manufacturing of some input and output devices?

Match each term with the description that fits best.

a. OCR b. dpi c. digitizing tablet
d. CRT
4. A measure of dot density used in gauging the sharpness of printed output.
5. The process by which the computer scan and interpret printed words
6. The glass tube used in television like monitor
7. A touch sensitive board covered with a thin, plastic sheet.

4.5-FILL-IN QUESTIONS

1.The number lock key converts arrow keys to ............................ .

2.To issue a command with the control key, hold it down and .... ......... .

3.A portable computer with no room for a mouse might use a ...... ....... .
.............................................................................. or a .
4.A scanner that reads UPC symbols is called a ..............................
5.The number of .............................on a monitor's screen determines its
resolution.
6... ............................ printers strike an inked rib on with a pattern of

References/ Suggestions for further Reading

Introduction to computers by Norton, peter, 4th ed. THM

Introduction to digital computer design by Rajaraman, V/ Radhakrishan T. 4th ed. PHI

How to manage computer at work? By Jones, Graham Jaico

Fundamentals of computers by Rajaraman, V 4th ed PHI

Digital computer fundamentals by Bartee, T.C. 6th ed. TMH

Computer today by Basandra, SK updated ed. Galgotia