State of the Art

1
State of the Art

• Business Applications
• Numerical Applications
• Applications for the Professions
• Applications in Education

2
Business Applications

• Business Accounting
• General Ledger, A/R, A/P, Payroll, Billing
• Home Finance
• Checkbook, Budgeting, Tax Preparation
• Inventory Control
• In Stock, Reordering, Valuation
• Desktop Publishing
• Brochures, Web Pages

3
Business Applications

• Relational Database
• Schema (defines content of database)
• Records (contain the actual data)
• SQL Queries (select and sort records)
• Reports (Format Selected Data)

4
SQL Database Example
Attributes (Columns)
Financial Aid
Meal Plan
Name
Year
GPA
Andrews
1
2.34
3450
true
Barton
3
3.67
0
true
A Record (A Row)
Cicci
2
3.08
750
false
5600
Dorzhinski
1
2.50
true

• SQL Queries
• LIST Year 2 AND Financial Aid gt 1000
• SORT Financial Aid

5
Numerical Applications

• Solving Systems of Algebraic Equations
• Statistical Plots and Curve Fitting

6
Applications for the Professions

• Computerized Axial Tomography (CAT Scan)

Beam 3
Beam 4
Beam 1
Value 1
A
B
Beam 2
Value 2
C
D
Value 4
Value 3
7
CAT Scan
A
B

• Two by Two Matrix of Boxes
• 16 Possible Patterns of Light (0) and Dark (1)

C
D
8
CAT Scan

• System of Algebraic Equations
• A B V1
• C D V2
• A C V3
• A D V4
• Four Equations in Four Unknowns
• V1, V2, V3, and V4 are Measured ( 0, 1, or 2)
• Solve for A, B, C, and D (Each is either 0 or 1)

9
CAT Scan

• Solution for A, B, C, and D
• A (-V2 V3 V4)/2
• B V1 - A
• C (V2 V3 V4)/2
• D (V2 V3 V4)/2
• JavaScript Program for the 2x2 CAT Scan
• See Demonstration in Class

10
Applications in Education

• This Class!!!
• Computer Assisted Instruction (CAI)
• Application presents subject information based on
  your answers to review questions
• Multi-User Domain (MUD)
• A chat room that allows users who are logged on
  simultaneously to exchange information

11
Implications

• Diminishing Skills
• Productivity
• Information Technology
• Implications of computers on archival of
  historical documents/information.

12
Diminishing Skills

• I believe that every generation of parents has
  worried about their children not learning the
  skills/technologies that they learned as kids.
• Is this really a problem?
• Should we be teaching our children how to churn
  butter, card/spin wool into yarn, or use goose
  grease on wagon wheel axles?
• How about a slide rule, a calculator, or a
  computer?

13
Diminishing Skills

• The Luddites destroyed factory machines out of
  fear that their skills would no longer be useful
  rather than upgrading their skills
• Computer literate people learn the new
  technology when it is appropriate/useful
• You dont have to be an early adopter and suffer
  the growing pains of the pioneers
• Its OK to wait for ease of use to develop

14
Productivity

• There are tradeoffs between typing our own text
  and having a professional typist do it for us.
• However, the textbook seems to overlook the fact
  that most of can type as fast as we can generate
  the thoughts for the text we are typing.
• We dont need to be as fast as a professional
  typist who can only type fast because all of the
  text has already been generated and written.

15
Information Technology

• Page 50 Text states we might be able to save
  a complete transcript of all work on a document,
  from the first keystroke to the last change.
• Word does this today in the Undo buffer as we
  discussed earlier.

16
Archival The Problem

• A lot of information that has high value to
  society for historical or archival purposes is
  currently stored on media used with obsolete
  computers some only a decade or two old.
• Also, some of the media that was used is
  deteriorating to the point where it cant be read
  - even using an old machine that is in perfect
  working condition.
• Imagine that you recorded your cherished video
  tapes of your children in Beta format or your
  audio tapes of their piano recitals on 8-track
  tapes or vinyl records.

17
Archival The problem

• So far, no computer format/media for data storage
  has achieved the same longevity and continued
  future usability as pen or pencil marks on a
  piece of paper!
• 7 or 9 Track Tape Drives ? Cartridge Tapes
• 20 Surface Disks ? Gigabyte Hard Drives
• 8 or 5-1/4 Floppy Disks ? 3-1/2 Disks

18
Archival Solutions?

• 1. We are printing paper hard copy from old
  machines to preserve the data! (Isnt this
  incredible?)
• 2. We are keeping a few obsolete machines
  working just to be able to maintain access to
  this valuable data. (What happens when the last
  working copy of a now obsolete computer breaks
  and cant be repaired?)
• 3. We are spending a lot of money to convert
  huge volumes of data from an obsolete format to a
  modern format. (Will we just need to do another
  conversion in the next decade or so?)

19
Homework

• Find Homework 6 on my CS105 web site
• Download a copy of the file to your disk.
• Do the Exercises in the Homework
• Write your answers in your copy of the file and
  email it to me before the next class.

20
Homework

• Start on the homework here in class