Deck 1: Catalysts for Change

Question 1

Software that allows multiple users to edit and run their programs simultaneously on the same computer is called
a) a data-processing system.
b) an intranet.
c) a microprocessor.
d) a programming language.
e) a time-sharing system.

Answer 1

a time-sharing system

Question 2

Which of the following phrases does not describe the Gilded Age in America?
a) rapid industrialization
b) economic expansion
c) widespread electrification
d) concentration of corporate power
e) corporate mergers

Answer 2

widespread electrification

Question 3

Which of the following was not a result of the adoption of mechanical calculators?
a) Less demand for "superstars" who could rapidly compute sums by hand
b) Higher productivity of bookkeepers
c) Higher salaries of bookkeepers
d) Proliferation of companies making calculators
e) Feminization of bookkeeping

Answer 3

Higher salaries of bookkeepers

Question 4

Programming languages FORTRAN and COBOL became international standards, meaning
a) they were approved by the United Nations.
b) the United States and other members of NATO agreed to share the designs.
c) the United States and the Soviet Union agreed to share the designs.
d) they were supported by every computer manufacturer.
e) they were based on the metric system.

Question 5

The mechanical adding machines of Pascal and Leibniz were not widely adopted because
a) they were too expensive.
b) there were unreliable.
c) they were too difficult to program.
d) they could not handle fractions.
e) bookkeepers successfully lobbied the King, and he made the machines illegal.

Question 6

Programming languages were developed in order to
a) make it possible to program computers in English.
b) make programming faster and less error-prone.
c) speed translations between English and Russian during the Cold War.
d) improve the computation speed of computers, which were very expensive.
e) All of the above.

Question 7

Punched card tabulation was invented by Herman Hollerith when he was an employee of
a) the Pennsylvania Railroad.
b) the Census Bureau.
c) the Pennsylvania Steel Company.
d) the Burroughs Adding Machine Company.
e) IBM.

Question 8

The first commercial electronic digital computers were produced just after
a) the Spanish-American War.
b) World War I.
c) World War II.
d) the Korean War.
e) the Vietnam War.

Question 9

Which statement best supports the conclusion that society can control whether to adopt a new technology?
a) No new nuclear power plants were built in the United States for 25 years after the accident at Three Mile Island.
b) About half of all email messages are spam.
c) Despite decades of research, fusion power is an elusive goal.
d) People do not have to listen to Rush Limbaugh if they do not want to.
e) Some new technologies are simply too expensive to even consider adopting.

Question 10

A semiconductor device containing transistors, capacitors, and resistors is called
a) a difference engine.
b) a diode.
c) an integrated circuit.
d) a radio.
e) a transformer.

Question 11

The calculating machine of Georg and Edvard Sheutz
a) computed the values of polynomial functions.
b) typeset the results of its computations.
c) performed calculations faster than they could be done manually.
d) performed calculations more reliably than they could be done manually.
e) All of the above.

Question 12

Tablets, abacuses, and manual tables
a) are no longer used, because of the proliferation of calculators and computers.
b) are examples of aids to manual calculating.
c) were developed in Western Europe in the late Middle Ages.
d) replaced Hindu-Arabic numerals as the preferred way to do calculations.
e) All of the above.

Question 13

Which of the following was not an activity of the People's Computer Company, a not-for-profit corporation in the San Francisco area?
a) Publishing a newspaper containing the source code to programs
b) Allowing people to rent time on a time-shared computer
c) Hosting Friday-evening game-playing sessions
d) Promoting a culture in which computer enthusiasts freely shared software
e) Developing the world's first graphical user interface

Question 14

The company that invented the microprocessor is
a) Fujitsu
b) Hewlett-Packard
c) IBM
d) Intel
e) Texas Instruments

Question 15

Which of the following was not a feature of cash registers in the early 1900s?
a) Ability to compute total of purchases
b) Ability to print itemized receipts for customers
c) Ability to print log of transactions for owners
d) Ability to compute amount of change to give customer
e) Ability to ring a bell every time cash drawer is opened

Question 16

The two principal catalysts for the Information Age have been
a) books and pamphlets.
b) computers and communication networks.
c) radio and television.
d) newspapers and magazines.
e) telephones and television networks.

Question 17

Which of the following phrases best describes a machine that inputs data, performs one or more calculations, and produces output data?
a) manual calculator
b) digital computer
c) data-processing system
d) difference engine
e) cash register

Question 18

Who wrote "An Open Letter to Hobbyists," complaining about software theft?
a) Stewart Brand
b) Bob Frankston
c) Bill Gates
d) Steve Jobs
e) Steve Wozniak

Question 19

Which company produced the System/360, a family of 19 compatible mainframe computers?
a) Fujitsu
b) Hewlett-Packard
c) IBM
d) Intel
e) Texas Instruments

Question 20

Which Cold War program played an important role in advancing integrated circuit technology?
a) B-52 bomber
b) Hydrogen bomb
c) Mark 37 torpedo
d) Minuteman II ballistic missile
e) NORAD radar network

Question 21

Enabling a single physical computer to emulate many virtual computing devices is called
a) emulation.
b) extension processing.
c) parallel processing.
d) virtualization.
e) the World Wide Web.

Question 22

The Pony Express went out of business when
a) the Mexican War ended in 1846.
b) the Civil War began in 1861.
c) the transcontinental telegraph was completed.
d) AT&T completed the national telephone network.
e) the radio was invented.

Question 23

Most early telephones were installed in businesses, because
a) people were afraid that telephones were dangerous.
b) people thought that the government was using telephones as eavesdropping devices.
c) only men were allowed to use a telephone.
d) most homes did not have electricity.
e) leasing a telephone was expensive.

Question 24

Hypertext is supposed to mimic
a) the associative memory of human beings.
b) the way that creeks flow into streams and streams merge into rivers.
c) constellations in the night sky.
d) road networks.
e) the way that some people "channel surf" with a remote control.

Question 25

A key application that first made personal computers more attractive to business was
a) the spreadsheet program.
b) the World Wide Web.
c) desktop publishing.
d) video editing.
e) email.

Question 26

What term is used to describe a high-speed Internet connection?
a) broadband
b) hypertext
c) Internet2
d) the Matrix
e) World Wide Web

Question 27

One of the first and most important applications of the ARPANET was
a) email.
b) voice mail.
c) spreading computer viruses.
d) disseminating anti-Communist propaganda to American citizens.
e) stealing secrets from the Soviet Union.

Question 28

Guglielmo Marconi originally conceived of the radio as a way to
a) transmit telegraph messages without wires.
b) transmit electricity without wires.
c) transmit votes in national elections.
d) transmit light without wires.
e) All of the above

Question 29

The first electronic networking technology widely used in the United States was the
a) Internet.
b) radio.
c) telegraph.
d) telephone.
e) television.

Question 30

The utilization of remote computing resources over the Internet is called
a) cloud computing.
b) distributed computing.
c) lend-leasing.
d) parallel computing.
e) WiFi.

Question 31

What visionary invented the computer mouse and demonstrated windows, email, and live network videoconferencing at "the mother of all demos" in 1968?
a) Vannevar Bush
b) Douglas Engelbart
c) Al Gore
d) Alan Kay
e) Ted Nelson

Question 32

Which country has the fastest broadband connections on average?
a) China
b) Germany
c) India
d) South Korea
e) United States

Question 33

Alexander Graham Bell invented the harmonic or musical telegraph, which enabled
a) more than one message to be sent over a single telegraph wire at the same time.
b) human speech to be sent over a telegraph wire.
c) music to be send over a telegraph wire.
d) B and C
e) None of the above.

Question 34

The power of radio as a medium of mass communication was demonstrated in 1938 when Orson Welles put on a dramatization of
a) War of the Worlds.
b) Hamlet.
c) Homer's Odyssey.
d) the assassination of Franklin Roosevelt.
e) 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.

Question 35

The first alphabet to represent vowels as well as consonants was developed by the
a) Babylonians.
b) Egyptians.
c) Greeks.
d) Romans.
e) Syrians.

Question 36

A common name for a wireless Internet access point is
a) broadband hub.
b) hotspot.
c) Internet access-ory.
d) Internet café.
e) wap.

Question 37

In the fourth century the codex replaced the scroll because
a) it was more durable, and it was much easier to look up a particular passage.
b) it was much lighter, and it could be made much more rapidly.
c) Gutenberg's printing press had just been invented.
d) there was a worldwide shortage of papyrus.
e) All of the above

Question 38

ARPA Director J.C.R. Licklider conceived of a Galactic Network that would
a) control weapons from space.
b) guide spacecraft to distant planets.
c) become the world's most powerful number-crunching machine.
d) facilitate the exchange of programs and data.
e) All of the above

Question 39

The software company that provided IBM with the operating system for its PC was
a) Apple.
b) Boeing.
c) Microsoft.
d) Novell.
e) Tandy.

Question 40

A typewriter that prints a message transmitted over a telegraph line is called a
a) computer.
b) monitor.
c) teletype.
d) terminal.
e) transponder.

Question 41

A Web browser enables you to
a) view Web pages.
b) edit Web pages.
c) create Web pages.
d) delete Web pages.
e) All of the above

Question 42

The first popular personal computer with a graphical user interface was the
a) Apple Macintosh.
b) Compaq Presario.
c) IBM PC.
d) NeXT workstation.
e) Tandy TRS-80.

Question 43

Storing data remotely on servers accessed through the Internet is often called
a) cloud storage.
b) distributed hard drive.
c) random access memory.
d) solid state memory.
e) virtual memory.

Question 44

A program that accepts a list of keywords and returns documents most closely matching them is called an)
a) folder.
b) object-oriented database.
c) relational database.
d) search engine.
e) Web browser.

Question 45

The World Wide Web is the creation of
a) Tim Berners-Lee.
b) Vannevar Bush.
c) Douglas Engelbart.
d) Alan Kay.
e) Ted Nelson.