I started to discuss with you two hours ago about the Murphy’s laws applied to computers, mainly to software. Now, I want to tell you more laws about this subject. “Any program that lasts longer, costs more”. “The complexity of a program grows until it outruns the capacity of the program supposed to hold it”.
But which component of the system is supposed to do that? Any ideas? Of course, the processor. It is a very important part of any computer, but it cannot function without the other parts I mentioned in the article I wrote two hours ago. It cannot work mainly without its memory. The memory of the computer is sort of a wife for the processor. It does operations like fetching and executing the instructions. During the first part, the processor fetches the instruction from the main memory and during the execution process, it carries out the operation called for by the instruction. The process is very simple and easy to understand.
For example, when you type in your text editor, when you press a certain key, the memory immediately “remembers” the key and says it to Mr Processor. Then, the processor starts “thinking”: “What do to in this situation? To show the user the real key or to use another key?” I am joking, but this might be true if your computer has a virus. The computer sees the command from the memory (in fact from the user of the computer) and executes it. By execution we mean that the processor will show on the computer’s display the key pressed by the user. Of course, this operation takes a few nanoseconds or something like this. If you are a fast typist, you can write hundreds of words in no time. If the processor would think for every instruction that it gets for a few seconds, than no one would use computers. They would be too slow.
The ability of the system to perform demanding tasks, such as playing games lies with the program and not with the processor, which is only following the commands. This is true, up to one point. Try to do this with a processor that doesn’t support that certain type of application. For example, I am convinced that you cannot play World of Warcraft on a computer created in 1990. I am convinced and you cannot say anything that would change my opinion. You can upgrade the computer and still it won’t be able to play the game. You will not be able to install the game. This is the first issue. So, how can you play it, if you can’t even install the game on the computer?
An entire processor can be buolt on a single silicon chip or a small number of chips. This is also possible when we talk of other computer parts. A processor which is built on a silicon chip is called microprocessor.
Besides processor, in a computer exist other components. I kept talking about them and I don’t want to come back now. This is an article about the Murphy’s laws applicable to computer’s world. I started my article with two laws. Now I want to bring into your attention two more and then I will rest my case.
“If a program is usefull, it will be changed”. “If a program is useless, it will be kept”. Until our next meeting, take good care of you and of your computers. Don’t get mad on your processor or on your Internet speed, because as you have seen, not only the hardware parts are to be blamed. The software component is that part of the computer, which is rarely seen as a cause for the computer malfunctions. This is nothing more wrong. The software and the hardware parts will have 50%-50% chances to destroy a computer. The hardware can do this if the components are not compatible, if they are outdated, hacked or anything in between. The software can destroy a computer using the viruses. Ok, that’s it for today.
