Applications of Computer

Computer is an electronic device that takes input process it and gives output. The
speed of computer is very high and it perform task with 100% accuracy. Computer
is a versatile machine i.e. can be used in various field. Today computer is an
integrated part in Business Organization, Schools, Colleges, Bank and many other
institutes. The main impact of computer in various fields are :
1.

Education: Computers have a great impact on education. Computer have

opened many streams in the field of education like

a.

Using computer as teaching aid in class rooms.

b.

Self space learning by students by using various packages to gain

knowledge.

c.

Carrying out research in the remote fields which in the absence of computer
was impossible.

2.

Decision making: Computer is helping a lot in decision making particularly

in business organizations. e.g. computerized reports may help manager to keep

track of investments and return to check performance standards and to take further
decisions.
3.

Management Information System: Manager can identify problems and

find opportunities, alternatives, follow up checks on performance to see if planned

goals are being achieved. This allows managers to give more time and attention to
tackle business development and inter personal problems.

4.

Medicines and health care: Computer also contributes in medicine and

health area. It has improved the life of a physically handicapped person to a

comfortable life like other human beings. Patient monitoring in ICUs can be
completely computer controlled which was most essential for human-life.
5.

Office automation: Computer is the best known as IT tool which has

excellently lubricated every kind of activity in an office environment. In office

these machines are being offered at each and every event transaction desirable in
an office e.g. like electronic filling of documents, payroll, financial analysis,
documentation etc.
6. Robotics: Computers also have a great impact on other areas like robotics,
planning, design and manufacturing, communication etc. Robot is an electromechanical device designed to perform manual tasks. It is a computer
programmable machine with human like skills. Robots are really little more than
special purpose computers, programmed to manipulate electrically powered
machinery.
Robotics applications are used in various fields. These are :a.)

Industries -Industrial application of robotics include the performance of

tasks like- welding ,automatic control of machines or processing, spray
painting, packing, handling heavy loads, pattern recognition etc. Robots are
used where man is unable to work for a long time. For

e.g. at the places

where temperature is too high or in dirty and unpleasant environment etc.

b.)

Homes- Robots serve as domestic servants for accomplishing household

tasks or serving the peoples.

c.)

Hospitals- Robots are used in hospitals as nursing assistants.

Progress of robotics in artificial intelligence could lead to a new generation,

intelligent beings. Robots with AI will be providing better services.
7. Communication: Communication means to convey a message, an idea, a
picture or speech to any person or persons. Communication is one of the most
popular applications of computer. Computers are extensively used in sending and
receiving information. Various communication applications are:
a.)

E-mail- Computer communication are excessively being used to send and

receive electronic mails.

b.)

Online Conferencing- Video conferencing and teleconferencing are the

significant services accomplish with the help of computers.

c.)

Online Reservation- Online reservation on computers is quite beneficial.

Computers are used for reservation in airlines, railways, sporting events at
large stadiums etc.

d.)

Electronic Banking Service- Computers play a vital role in banking. ATM is

a significant e.g. of carrying out deposits and withdrawals etc. electronically.

e.)

Electronic Shopping- Business transaction, placing orders, payments

through credit cards etc are carried out most effectively with the help o
computers.

f.)

Air-traffic Control- Air traffic controlling requires a significant amount of

computer support.

Software
Software is a set of programs that is designed to perform a well defined function. A
program is a sequence of instruction written to solve a particular problem.
Software is responsible for controlling, integrating and managing the hardware
components of a computer system and to accomplish specific task.
Software are of two types :1. Application Software
2. System Software

Software

Application
Software

System Software

System Software
System software is a collection of
program designed to operate, control and extend the processing capabilities of the
computer itself. System software are generally prepared by computer
manufacturers some e.g. of system software are:- Compiler, Interpreter, Assembler,
Utility Program etc. A set of one or more programs designed to control the

operation of a computer system. They are general programs written to assist

humans in the use of computer system and for making the operation of the
computer system more effective and efficient. System Software are recommended
to be used only by advanced users who are having advance knowledge of the
computer system. System Software are the software which deals with the system or
hardware. For example: Disk Management Tools which are used to partition or
Features of System Software
i)

Closed to system

ii)

Fast in speed

iii)

Smaller in size

iv)

Less Intractable

v)

Difficult to design

vi)

Difficult to understand

System
Software
System
Control
Programs

System
Support
Programs

System
Developmen
t Programs

Application Software
Application software are the software that are designed according to a
particular application. Application software can satisfy the requirements of a
particular environment such Telephone Billing System, Banking system, Airline
reservation system. Application Software designed for a specific purpose such as
Microsoft Word is an example of Application Software. Application Software are
easier to be understood by normal users because they directly deal with the normal
real life applications.

Application Software is software that APPLIES to the

real life application. For example: Microsoft Word is used to create documents
similar to you create manually on paper. Accounting Software those are used for
accounting which is similarly done manually on Account Book.

Application
Software
Special
General Purpose
Application
Software

Purpose
Application
Software

Features of Application Software

i)

Close to user

ii)

Slow in space

iii)

Easy to understand

iv)

Easy to manipulate

v)

More intractable

vi)

Easy to design

Generations of Programming
Language
Since Early 1950s programming languages have evolved tremendously. This
evolution has resulted in the development of hundreds of different languages. We
can classify the development of all languages in four generations :-

Programming Languages
1st Generation (Machine Language)

2nd Generation (Assembly Language)

3rd Generation (High Level Language)

4th Generation (Problem Oriented
Programming)

Machine Language
Machine Language is the language directly understood by the computer. In
other words this is the binary language i.e. the language of 0s and 1s. Any
information or instruction in this language is to be represented in term of 0s and
1s. Writing of a program in machine language is very difficult and complicated
task which can be accomplished by only the experts.

Assembly Language
Assembly Language is symbolic language in which symbols are used instead
of binary numbers. This reduced coding time. In assembly language the
programmer has to remember only the few information. In assembly language
symbols are used for both arithmetic and logical operations. The translation
process is carried out by the computer itself by means of software called assembler.
Assembler is a special program that convert assembly language in to binary
language.
High Level Language
High level language is close to human being. In High level language
symbols and word that are used are very similar to ordinary arithmetic and English.
So it is same like English language so we can understand it easily. For e.g. Fortran,
Cobol, Pascal .
Problem Oriented Language
The 4th generation language are highly user friendly. The user has to state the
problem, data and also state the output required. The computer system supporting
these languages invoke appropriate procedure to solve the problem and provide the
desired output.

Language Translator
Language translators are also known as language processor. Language translators
are used to convert code of one language into another language. There are mainly
three types of translator program:1. Assembler
2. Compiler
3. Interpreter
Assembler converts the assembly language program into machine language.
Assembler takes input program written in assembly language and gives output to
its binary equivalent program. Assembler assembles all the instructions in the main
memory for execution.

Assembly Language Program

Language Program

Assembler

Machine

Compiler translates the source program into object program. The object code is
saved on storage device and run later. Compiler firstly scan the entire program.
Debugging of program is quite slow. Once the program is translated compiler is
no more required.

High Level Language Program

Object

Compiler

Program

Interpreter is language translator that is used to translate the High level language
into machine code. It takes one statement of HLL and translates it into machine
instruction which is immediately executed. The program is translated line by line
and then translates into machine code. Debugging is very fast. Interpreter is
required for executing the program every time.

Source Program

Interpreter

Result

Desktop
When you switch on your computer windows XP is located into the main memory.
Immediately after this you will see a large area with memory and many small
pictures on the screen. This large area is known as Desktop. The small pictures on
the desktop are called icons. Each icon represent an object such as folder or
program.

On the desktop apart from the icon you will see the Taskbar and Start button
at the bottom of the screen. On the desktop there are few icons which are optional
and are created by the user according to their requirements. Whereas some icons
are by default such as :My Computer :My computer is used to quickly and easily see everything on your computer.
Double click the my computer icon on the desktop to browse through you files and
icons.

Recycle bin:Recycle bin is the same as the dustbin at your home. Anything which is not
required or you can waste you put it in your dustbin. Similarly when any data or a
record is not required you give a delete command and as a result windows put it
into the recycle bin.

Recycle bin provides the facility to restore the data back to its original
location by selecting the required option. To move all items back to their original
location, Click the restore all items. If you want to delete these items permanently
then click empty recycle bin.

My Documents:My documents folder contains all your official files which have been
created and saved in it. The relative program will be launched automatically. It is
the default location for all your MS-Office and all other user files. This means if
you do not specify the path while saving the file then automatically it will be stored
in My documents folder.

Internet Explorer:Internet Explorer is a web browser. Web browser is a software used to view
websites. It acts as a interface between the user and world wide web (WWW). The
icon of Internet Explorer looks Like

Internet Explorer is needed to surf the internet. To access some information

on internet, user is required to:i)

Double click on Internet Explore icon to open the internet explorer

window.

ii)

Enter the address of desired website in address bar of internet explorer

window and press the enter key.

Basic components of a window

Title Bar:- Title bar appear on the top of window. Title bar contain the name of
file.
Menu Bar :- Menu bar contains the name of commands through which a program
runs. It appears below the title bar.

Tool Bar

Menu
Bar

Title
Bar

Control
Box

Scroll
Bar

Status
Bar

Work
Area

Scroll Bar:- Some time the work done on window exceeds to the limit of screen
and therefore some adjustments are needed to see the entire work. Scroll bar is a
bar at the right and bottom of a window that appears when the contents of a
window are not fully displayed.
Tool Bar:- Toolbar is a horizontal bar with various commands buttons. These
buttons provide a shortcut to access the commonly used menu commands.
Control Box:- Control box provides a shortcut menu that enables you to restore,
move, minimize, maximize and close a window.

Status Bar:- Status bar is displayed at the bottom of the window. It provides
information about the status of your program.
Work Area:- Work area is that area in which text can be entered, edited etc.

Notepad
Notepad is a text editor for reading and writing short length text file. You can use
notepad to create or edit text file that does not require any special formatting.
Notepad files can not contain pictures or any other objects. Notepad is also used as
a source code editor for creating HTML files.
How to start Notepad: Click on start button
Point to all programs
Point to accessories
Click on notepad

WordPad
Word Pad is a word processor. Word pad is used to process the textual information
including typing, editing, formatting and printing. Word pad is more powerful than
Notepad but less powerful than MS-Word. Words are processed and spelling
mistakes are corrected.
How to start Wordpad: Click on start button
Point to all programs
Point to accessories
Click on Word Pad

Components of Word Pad : Title Bar

Menu Bar
Standard Bar
Formatting Tool Bar
Ruler
Status Bar

Menu
Bar
Standar
d
Tool Bar

Title
Bar
Formatt
ing Tool
Bar

Ruler

Document Work
Area

Status
Bar

MS-Excel
MS-EXCEL is a very powerful and easy to use spreadsheet package of ms-office
which is being commonly used these days. It works very well with numbers and
their complex calculations. An electronic spreadsheet is a grid of rows and
columns. A Intersection of a row and a column is called cell. In MS-EXCEL we
have 66536 rows, 256 column and 16777216 cells and 255 worksheets. It provides
all the tools to manipulate, format and represent data. Excel is a powerful
spreadsheets application .The extension of MS-Excel files in MS-Excel 2003 is
.XLS where as in MS-Excel 2007 is .XLSX.
Uses of MS-Excel
1)

It can be used for preparing analytical reports including statistical analysis,

forecasting and regression analysis.

2)

It can also be used to prepare profit and loss accounts .Balance sheet and

other tax statements.

3)

Using MS-EXCEL we can create a good looking and attractive charts with

clearer and meaningful fashion.

4)

It can also perform simple and complex calculations in few seconds with

more accuracy.
5)

It is used for scientific and statistical analysis and so on.

Feature of MS Excel
1)

It is very easy to use.

2)

Working with any type of complex calculation.

3)

Using for creating any type of charts ,prepare balance sheet etc.

4)

Create a Pivot chart and Pivot Table.

5)

Working with many formulas with accuracy.

6)

Insert rows, columns, cells and worksheets according to our need.

7)

Work with goal seeks to achieve a specific target.

8)

create linear and growth trends with the series command.

9)

Working with filter to filter our data

10)

Move or copy a worksheet.

11)

Sort data in Ascending and Descending order

Applications of MS-Excel
The application of a spreadsheet is limited only by your imagination .you
can store all kinds of information in the spreadsheet .some common application of
a spreadsheet are in the following areas :

Budgets

Annual Report of Business Firms

Payrolls

Invoicing (Billing)

Accounts Payable and Receivable

Investment and loan analysis

Banking and other Financial Services

Inventory control

Tender evaluation

Scientific calculation

Cost-effective analysis

How to Start MS-Excel: Click on start Button

Point to All programmers
Point to Microsoft Office
Click on Microsoft Office Excel 2007