Computer

 

Computer

Science has discovered many wonders and computer is one of them. It is an ultra modern electronic device for storing and analysing information fed into it. It has no capacity to do anything by itself. It works on the basis of commands given by the operator.

 

Computer was not invented over night. It took long time and hard labour to invent computer. Many votaries of science worked hard. Thus computer is the result of hard labour of many votaries of science. First of all Pascal invented the theory of "Digital Calculating System" in 1642. Though his attempts were not crowned with success, he initiated the research which paved the way to the invention of computer. Finally Mr. Haward Akin, an American scientist invented such a machine in 1937 that could do difficult sums. So the credit for the invention of modern computer goes to Howard Akin. After seven years electric computer was used in Harvard University in 1944. After that many other computers have been invented such as EDSAC in 1945 and ENTANCE in 1946 etc. A computer consists of five major components. They are the input unit, the output unit, the memory unit, the control unit and the arithmatic unit.

 

A computer performs three functions 1. It receives data, 2. It processes data by various computations, 3. It emits data.

 

Every computer has a machine language of its own and accordingly a computer functions. Machine language is not fixed. It varies from machine to machine. Programmes written in machine languages are machine dependent and they are only good for that particular machine.

 

Of late computer has been introduced in Bangladesh. Many government and non-government offices, educational institutions are using computer. A course on computer has been introduced in secondary and higher secondary levels. The day is not far to come when computers will be used in every sphere of life.

 

Computer is of great use to us. We can not go a single moment without computers. It is part and parcel in our daily life.