IE141 Computer Programming I

2021–2022 Fall
Distance Education Notes

Week 1 (28.09.2021)

Asst. Prof. Tolga Ulaş Gürbüz │ Asst. Prof. Mehmet Merkepçi

IE141 Computer Programming I – Distance Education Week 1 (28.09.2021)

Textbooks

Sandeep Nagar, Introduction to Octave for Engineers and Scientists

Joyce Farrell, Programming Logic and Design - Comprehensive Version 8e.

Content

1 Computer Systems
2 Understanding Simple Program Logic
3 Octave GUI
4 Control Structures (Conditional and iterative structures)
5 Arrays
6 Plotting
7 Functions
8 Text, Sound and Image Files
IE141 Computer Programming I – Distance Education Week 1 (28.09.2021)

BASICS of COMPUTER SYSTEMS

A computer system is a combination of multiple pieces of hardware and software required to process and store
data using a computer.

Computer hardware and software accomplish together three major operations:

Input: Data items enter the computer system and are placed in memory, where they can be processed.
Hardware devices that perform input operations include keyboards and mice. Data items in clude all the
text, numbers, and other raw material that are entered into and processed by a computer, such as, facts
and figures about entities, images, sounds, and a user’s mouse or finger-swiping movements.

Processing: Processing data items may involve organizing or sorting them, checking them for accuracy,
or performing calculations with them. The hardware component that performs these types of tasks is the
central processing unit, or CPU. Some devices, such as tablets and smartphones, usually contain
multiple processors. Writing programs that efficiently use several CPUs requires special techniques.

Output: After data items have been processed, the resulting information usually is sent to a printer,
monitor, or some other output device so people can view, interpret, and use the results. Programming
professionals often use the term data for input items, but use the term information for data that has been
processed and output. Sometimes you place output on storage devices, such as your hard drive, flash
media, or a cloud-based device. (The cloud refers to devices at remote locations accessed through the
Internet.) When you send output to a storage device, sometimes it is used later as input for another
program.
IE141 Computer Programming I – Distance Education Week 1 (28.09.2021)

HARDWARE:
Hardware is the collection of physical elements that constitutes a computer system. Computer hardware refers to
the physical parts or components of a computer such as the monitor, mouse, keyboard, computer data storage,
hard drive disk (HDD), system unit (graphic cards, sound cards, memory, motherboard and chips), etc. all of
which are physical objects that can be touched.
IE141 Computer Programming I – Distance Education Week 1 (28.09.2021)

Input Devices

Input device is any peripheral (piece of computer hardware equipment to provide data and control signals to an
information processing system such as a computer or other information appliance. Input devices translate data
from form that humans understand to one that the computer can work with. Most common are keyboard and
mouse.
IE141 Computer Programming I – Distance Education Week 1 (28.09.2021)

Central Processing Unit (CPU)

A CPU is the “brain” of a computer. It is responsible for all functions and processes. Regarding computing power,
the CPU is the most important element of a computer system.

The CPU is comprised of three main parts:

1. Arithmetic Logic Unit (ALU): Executes all arithmetic and logical operations. Arithmetic calculations like as
addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. Logical operation like compare numbers, letters, or special
characters
2. Control Unit (CU): Controls and co-ordinates computer components.
i. Read the code for the next instruction to be executed.
ii. Increment the program counter so it points to the next instruction.
iii. Read whatever data the instruction requires from cells in memory.
iv. Provide the necessary data to an ALU or register.
v. If the instruction requires an ALU or specialized hardware to complete, instruct the hardware to
perform the requested operation.
3. Registers: Store the data that is to be executed next, "very fast storage area".
IE141 Computer Programming I – Distance Education Week 1 (28.09.2021)

Storage Devices

Primary Memory:
1. RAM: Random Access Memory (RAM) is a storage device within the computer system responsible for storing
data on a temporary basis. The data stored in RAM can be promptly written and read when needed by
applications. It is volatile in nature, which means that data will be erased once supply to the storage device is
turned off. RAM stores data randomly and the processor accesses these data randomly from the RAM storage.
RAM is considered "random access" because you can access any memory cell directly if you know the row and
column that intersect at that cell.
2. ROM (Read Only Memory): ROM is a permanent form of storage. ROM stays active regardless of whether
power supply to it is turned on or off. ROM devices do not allow data stored on them to be modified.

Secondary Memory:
Stores data and programs permanently: it is retained after the power is turned off

1. Hard drive (HD): A hard disk is part of a unit, often called a "disk drive," "hard drive," or "hard disk drive," that
store and provides relatively quick access to large amounts of data on an electromagnetically charged surface or
set of surfaces.
2. Optical Disk: an optical disc drive (ODD) is a disk drive that uses laser light as part of the process of reading
or writing data to or from optical discs. Some drives can only read from discs, but recent drives are commonly
both readers and recorders, also called burners or writers. Compact discs, DVDs, and Blu-ray discs are common
types of optical media which can be read and recorded by such drives. Optical drive is the generic name; drives
are usually described as "CD" "DVD", or "Bluray", followed by "drive", "writer", etc. There are three main types of
optical media: CD, DVD, and Blu-ray disc. CDs can store up to 700 megabytes (MB) of data and DVDs can store
up to 8.4 GB of data. Blu-ray discs, which are the newest type of optical media, can store up to 50 GB of data.
3. Flash Disk: A storage module made of flash memory chips. Flash disks have no mechanical platters or
access arms, but the term "disk" is used because the data are accessed as if they were on a hard drive. The disk
storage structure is emulated.
IE141 Computer Programming I – Distance Education Week 1 (28.09.2021)

SOFTWARE:

Software is a generic term for organized collections of computer data and instructions, often broken into two major
categories: system software that provides the basic non-task-specific functions of the computer, and application
software which is used by users to accomplish specific tasks.
Software can be classified into two broad types:

System software is responsible for controlling, integrating, and managing the individual hardware
components of a computer system so that other software and the users of the system see it as a functional
unit without having to be concerned with the low-level details such as transferring data from memory to
disk, or rendering text onto a display. Generally, system software consists of an operating system and
some fundamental utilities such as disk formatters, file managers, display managers, text editors, user
authentication (login) and management tools, and networking and device control software.

Application software is used to accomplish specific tasks other than just running the computer system.
Application software may consist of a single program, such as an image viewer; a small collection of
programs (often called a software package) that work closely together to accomplish a task, such as a
spreadsheet or text processing system; a larger collection (often called a software suite) of related but
independent programs and packages that have a common user interface or shared data format, such as
Microsoft Office, which consists of closely integrated word processor, spreadsheet, database, etc.; or a
software system, such as a database management system, which is a collection of fundamental programs
that may provide some service to a variety of other independent applications.
IE141 Computer Programming I – Distance Education Week 1 (28.09.2021)

System Software Application Software

Computer software, or just Application software, also known as an
software is a general term application or an "app", is computer software
primarily used for digitally stored designed to help the user to perform specific
data such as computer tasks.
programs and other kinds of
information read and written by
computers. App comes under
computer software though it has
a wide scope now.

Example: 1) Microsoft Windows 1) Opera (Web Browser)

2) Linux 2) Microsoft Word (Word Processing)
3) Unix 3) Microsoft Excel (Spreadsheet software)
4) Mac OSX 4) MySQL (Database Software)
5) DOS 5) Microsoft PowerPoint (Presentation
Software)
6) Adobe Photoshop (Graphics Software)

Interaction: Generally, users do not interact Users always interact with application
with system software as it works software while doing different activities.
in the background.

Dependency: System software can run Application software cannot run without the
independently of the application presence of the system software.
software.
IE141 Computer Programming I – Distance Education Week 1 (28.09.2021)

Units of Measurements

Storage measurements:

The basic unit used in computer data storage is called a bit (binary digit). Computers use these little bits, which
are composed of ones and zeros, to do things and talk to other computers. All your files, for instance, are kept in
the computer as binary files and translated into words and pictures by the software (which is also ones and
zeros). This two number system, is called a “binary number system” since it has only two numbers in it. The
decimal number system in contrast has ten unique digits, zero through nine.
Size examples:

• 1 bit - answer to a yes/no

question
• 1 byte - a number from 0 to
255.
• 90 bytes: enough to store a
typical line of text from a
book.
• 4 KB: about one page of
Unit Abbrevia Information
text.
tion
• 120 KB: the text of a
Bit Smallest unit of data (either 1 or 0)
typical pocket book.
Byte 1 byte = 8 bits
• 3 MB - a three minute song
Kilobyte KB 1 KB = 210 bytes = 1024 bytes
(128k bitrate)
Megabyte MB 1 MB = 210 Kilobytes = 1024 Kilobytes
• 1 GB -114 minutes of
Gigabyte GB 1 GB = 210 Megabytes = 1024
uncompressed CD-quality
Megabytes
audio at 1.4 Mbit/s
Terabyte TB 1 TB = 210 Gigabytes = 1024 Gigabytes
IE141 Computer Programming I – Distance Education Week 1 (28.09.2021)

Units of Measurements

Speed measurements:

The speed of Central Processing Unit (CPU) is measured by Hertz (Hz), Which represent a CPU cycle. The
speed of CPU is known as Computer Speed.

CPU Speed Measures

1 hertz or Hz 1 cycle per second

1 MHz 1 million cycles per second

1 GHz 1 billion cycles per second or 1000 MHz
IE141 Computer Programming I – Distance Education Week 1 (28.09.2021)

This is the end of this week’s notes.