Deck 5: It Infrastructure and Emerging Technologies

Question 1

A primary example of centralized processing is client/server computing.

Answer 1

False

Question 2

A SAN is a ________ network.

A) server area
B) storage area
C) scalable architecture
D) service-oriented architecture
E) software arrangement

Answer 2

B

Question 3

Which of the following is a leading networking hardware provider?

A) Dell
B) Intel
C) Seagate
D) IBM
E) Cisco

Answer 3

E

Question 4

SANs maintain a series of servers and provide fee-paying subscribers with space to maintain their Web sites.

Question 5

Software that manages the resources of the computer is called

A) operating system software.
B) application software.
C) data management software.
D) network software.
E) partitioning software.

Question 6

Place the following eras of IT infrastructure evolution in order, from earliest to most recent:
1) Cloud Computing Era;
2) Client/Server;
3) Enterprise Era;
4) Personal Computer; and
5) Mainframe and Minicomputer.

A) 5, 2, 3, 4, 1
B) 5, 4, 2, 3, 1
C) 4, 5, 2, 3, 1
D) 5, 4, 2, 1, 3
E) 4, 5, 3, 2, 1

Question 7

List and describe four services that comprise IT infrastructure, beyond physical devices and software applications.

Question 8

In N-tier computing, significant parts of Web site content, logic, and processing are performed by different servers.

Question 9

________ are computers consisting of a circuit board with processors, memory, and network connections that are stored in racks.

A) Mainframes
B) Rack servers
C) Cloud servers
D) Hybrid servers
E) Blade servers

Question 10

The introduction of the minicomputer

A) allowed computers to be customized to the specific needs of departments or business units.
B) strengthened centralized computing.
C) offered new, powerful machines at higher prices than mainframes.
D) represented the rise of Microsoft.
E) was dominated by IBM.

Question 11

Specifications that establish the compatibility of products and the ability to communicate in a network are called

A) network standards.
B) telecommunications standards.
C) technology standards.
D) Internet standards.
E) compatibility standards.

Question 12

Which of the following is not an IT infrastructure service component?

A) operating system software
B) computing platforms to provide a coherent digital environment
C) physical facilities management to manage the facilities housing physical components
D) IT management services to plan and develop the infrastructure and provide project management
E) IT education services that provide training to employees

Question 13

As referred to in the text, legacy systems are

A) systems that employ Unix.
B) electronic spreadsheets used on a PC.
C) any pre-1990 Wintel systems.
D) systems found on older ASPs.
E) traditional mainframe-based business information systems.

Question 14

Application server software is responsible for locating and managing stored Web pages.

Question 15

An application server may reside on the same computer as a Web server or on its own dedicated computer.

Question 16

The operating system is used to manage the computer's activities.

Question 17

A(n)________ server is used to communicate between a Web server and an organization's back-end systems.

A) public server
B) private server
C) legacy server
D) application server
E) blade server

Question 18

IT infrastructure consists of just those physical computing devices required to operate the enterprise.

Question 19

Legacy systems are still used because they

A) can only be run on the older mainframe computers.
B) are too expensive to redesign.
C) integrate well using new Web services technologies.
D) contain valuable data that would be lost during redesign.
E) incorporate cloud technologies.

Question 20

Which type of infrastructure service provides voice and video connectivity to employees, customers, and suppliers?

A) networking
B) telephone
C) VOIP
D) telecommunications
E) data management

Question 21

Which of the following is not an example of the emerging mobile digital platform?

A) tablets
B) the Kindle
C) cell phones
D) CRM
E) apps

Question 22

Today's nanotechnology-produced computer transistors are roughly equivalent in size to

A) the width of a fingernail.
B) a human hair.
C) a virus.
D) an atom.
E) a nanoparticle.

Question 23

A recent addition to the mobile digital platform is

A) quantum computing.
B) wearable computing devices.
C) cloud computing.
D) grid computing.
E) consumerization of IT.

Question 24

Interpretations of Moore's law assert that

A) computing power will eventually level off.
B) transistors decrease in size 50% every two years.
C) data storage costs decrease by 50% every 18 months.
D) PCs decrease in market share by 9% every 5 years.
E) computing power doubles every 18 months.

Question 25

At what percent of capacity do most servers operate?

A) 100%
B) 80-90%
C) approximately 70 percent
D) 40-50%
E) 15-20%

Question 26

The network standard for connecting desktop computers into local area networks that enabled the widespread adoption of client/server computing and local area networks and further stimulated the adoption of personal computers is

A) TCP/IP.
B) COBOL.
C) Ethernet.
D) ASCII.
E) Linux.

Question 27

________ states that the value or power of a network grows exponentially as a function of the number of network members.

A) Metcalfe's Law
B) Moore's Law
C) Law of scalability
D) Law of outsourcing
E) Law of networks

Question 28

________ uses individual atoms and molecules to create computer chips and other devices thinner than a human hair.

A) Virtualization
B) Nanotechnology
C) Quantum computing
D) A minicomputer
E) On-demand computing

Question 29

A client computer networked to a server computer, with processing split between the two types of machines, is called a(n)

A) service-oriented architecture.
B) on-demand architecture.
C) multi-tiered client/server architecture.
D) two-tiered client/server architecture.
E) divided architecture.

Question 30

The ________ PC, becoming the standard PC in the Personal Computer Era, uses the Windows operating system software on a computer with an Intel microprocessor.

A) Wintel
B) Dell
C) IBM
D) Altair
E) Digital Equipment Corporation

Question 31

The multitasking, multi-user, operating system developed by Bell Laboratories that operates on a wide variety of computing platforms is

A) Unix.
B) Linux.
C) OS X.
D) COBOL.
E) DOS.

Question 32

The development of TCP/IP occurred during the ________ era.

A) cloud and mobile computing
B) general-purpose mainframe and minicomputer
C) client/server era
D) personal computer
E) enterprise computing

Question 33

Enterprise infrastructure requires software that can link disparate applications and enable data to flow freely among different parts of the business.

Question 34

All of the following are current hardware platform trends except

A) green computing.
B) virtualization.
C) cloud computing.
D) Unix.
E) quantum computing.

Question 35

The process of presenting a set of computing resources (such as computing power or data storage) so that they can all be accessed in ways that are not restricted by physical configuration or geographic location is called

A) cloud computing.
B) autonomic computing.
C) virtualization.
D) multicore processing.
E) ubiquitous computing.

Question 36

In a multi-tiered network

A) the work of the entire network is centralized.
B) the work of the entire network is balanced over several levels of servers.
C) processing is split between clients and servers.
D) processing is handled by multiple, geographically-remote clients.
E) processing is located in the cloud.

Question 37

________ surfaces allow users to gesture on a screen with several fingers to execute commands.

A) Hypertouch
B) Nanotech
C) Multitouch
D) Android
E) Scalable

Question 38

________ unleash powerful economies of scale and result in price declines in manufactured computer products.

A) Internet and Web technologies
B) Technology standards
C) Linux and open-source software
D) Client/server technologies
E) Virtualization technologies

Question 39

Explain why standards are so important in information technology. What standards have been important for the growth of Internet technologies?

Question 40

The ability to be in many different states at once, dramatically increasing processing power, is a hallmark of

A) co-location.
B) edge computing.
C) grid computing.
D) utility computing.
E) quantum computing.

Question 41

What are the drawbacks of cloud computing?
Do you think these ever outweigh the benefits, and if so, in what cases?

Question 42

Which of the following is the most popular mobile operating system?

A) Linux
B) Android
C) Chrome OS
D) iOS
E) Unix

Question 43

A(n) ________ is an integrated circuit to which two or more processors have been attached for enhanced performance and reduced power consumption.

A) multicore processor
B) legacy processor
C) scalable processor
D) aggregate circuit
E) green circuit

Question 44

________ allows a single computing resource, such as a server, to appear to the user as multiple logical resources.

A) Cloud computing
B) Virtualization
C) Quantum computing
D) Nanotechnology
E) Utility computing

Question 45

The marketplace for computer hardware

A) has become increasingly concentrated in top firms.
B) has expanded to include a wide variety of start-up and mobile-computing firms.
C) has moved significantly to Asian firms.
D) has been decimated by mobile and cloud computing.
E) has begun moving away from blade servers.

Question 46

Running a Java program on a computer requires

A) a Java Virtual Machine to be installed on that computer.
B) a Java Virtual Machine to be installed on the server hosting the Java applet.
C) a miniature program to be downloaded to the user's computer.
D) no specialized software, as Java is platform-independent.
E) the Mozilla Firefox browser and no other browsers.

Question 47

All of the following are cloud computing services except

A) infrastructure as a service.
B) platform as a service.
C) software as a service.
D) on-demand computing.
E) virtualization as a service.

Question 48

Which of the following statements about Linux is not true?

A) It plays a major role in the back office running local area networks.
B) It is available in free versions downloadable from the Internet.
C) It has garnered 20 percent of the server operating system market.
D) Linux applications are embedded in cell phones, smartphones, netbooks, and other handheld devices.
E) Linux works on all the major hardware platforms.

Question 49

In green computing, reducing computer power consumption is a top priority.

Question 50

Which type of computing refers to firms purchasing computing power from remote providers and paying only for the computing power they use?

A) on-demand
B) grid
C) edge
D) autonomic
E) quantum

Question 51

Which of the following is not one of the current software platform trends?

A) Web services and service-oriented architecture
B) open-source software
C) HTML5
D) software outsourcing
E) multicore processors

Question 52

Which of the following is not one of the NIST defined characteristics of cloud computing?

A) ubiquitous network access
B) location-independent resource pooling
C) on-demand self service
D) measured service
E) reduced elasticity

Question 53

An ad-hoc group of oceanographers needs to set up a system to analyze massive amounts of data on ocean temperatures. The technology and hardware for gathering the data and transmitting the data to a central computer is in place. What additional hardware might they need?
What techniques might they use to make their research more efficient and lower costs?

Question 54

The phenomenon of employees using their own devices in the workplace is known as

A) wearable computing.
B) mobile consolidation.
C) cloud computing.
D) BYOD.
E) self computing.

Question 55

Distinguish between cloud computing, green computing, and quantum computing.

Question 56

Sets of loosely coupled software components that exchange information with each other using standard Web communication standards and languages are referred to as

A) Web services.
B) EAI software.
C) SOA.
D) SOAP.
E) SaaS.

Question 57

Quantum computing is implemented primarily with enterprise or ISP servers.

Question 58

Which type of software is created and updated by a worldwide community of programmers and available for free?

A) software packages
B) mashups
C) outsourced
D) open source
E) closed source

Question 59

Linux is

A) primarily concerned with the tasks of end users.
B) designed for specific machines and specific microprocessors.
C) an example of open-source software.
D) especially useful for processing numeric data.
E) poorly suited to power fast computers.

Question 60

A software tool with a graphical user interface for displaying Web pages and for accessing the Web and other Internet resources is called a Web

A) service.
B) client.
C) browser.
D) app.
E) beacon.

Question 61

Which of the following factors does not help explain why computing resources today are ever more available than in previous decades?

A) network economics
B) law of mass digital storage
C) Moore's law
D) declining communications costs and the Internet
E) widespread rejection of technology standards

Question 62

Identify and describe five or more of the current trends in contemporary software platforms.

Question 63

A set of self-contained services that communicate with each other to create a working software application is called

A) Web services.
B) EAI software.
C) SOA.
D) SOAP.
E) a software package.

Question 64

SaaS refers to

A) supplying online access over networks to storage devices and storage area network technology.
B) managing combinations of applications, networks, systems, storage, and security as well as providing Web site and systems performance monitoring to subscribers over the Internet.
C) self-contained services that communicate with each other to create a working software application.
D) easy-to-use software tools for displaying Web pages.
E) hosting and managing access to software applications delivered over the Internet to clients on a subscription basis.

Question 65

________ are created by combining and customizing components from different online software applications.

A) Apps
B) Web browsers
C) SaaS
D) Web services
E) Mashups

Question 66

Prewritten, commercially available sets of software programs that eliminate the need for a firm to write its own software programs for certain functions, are referred to as

A) software packages.
B) mashups.
C) outsourced software.
D) open-source software.
E) service level agreements.

Question 67

Hypertext markup language specifies how text, graphics, video, and sound are placed on a Web page document.

Question 68

The practice of contracting custom software development to an outside firm is commonly referred to as

A) outsourcing.
B) scaling.
C) service-oriented architecture.
D) application integration.
E) utility computing.

Question 69

________ takes place when a firm contracts custom software development or maintenance of existing legacy programs to outside firms.

A) Cloud computing
B) Utility computing
C) On-demand computing
D) Outsourcing
E) Consumerization of IT

Question 70

What is the foundation technology for Web services?

A) XML
B) HTML
C) SOAP
D) UDDI
E) SCSI

Question 71

________ provides a standard format for data exchange, enabling Web services to pass data from one process to another.

A) HTML
B) HTML5
C) Java
D) Chrome OS
E) XML

Question 72

Web services can exchange information between two different systems only if the operating systems and programming languages upon which the systems are based are identical.

Question 73

Briefly explain why corporations are increasingly interested in using Unix or Linux for their operating system.

Question 74

The collection of Web services that are used to build a firm's software systems constitutes what is known as a service-oriented architecture.

Question 75

The technology trends exhibited by Portugal Telecom, as discussed in the chapter opening case, illustrate the shift away from green computing.

Question 76

Today, many business firms continue to operate their legacy systems that meet a business need and would be costly to replace.

Question 77

A formal contract between customers and their service providers that outlines the specific responsibilities of the service provider and to the customer is called a(n)

A) SOA.
B) SLA.
C) TCO.
D) RFQ.
E) SaaS.

Question 78

Java software is designed to run on any computing device, regardless of the specific microprocessor or operating system it uses.

Question 79

The decision to purchase your own IT assets or rent them from external providers is also referred to as the rent-versus-buy decision.

Question 80

Whereas HTML is limited to describing how data should be presented in the form of Web pages, XML can perform presentation, communication, and data storage tasks.