Principles of Computing Exam Preparation Guide
Course Introduction
Principles of Computing introduces students to the foundational concepts and methodologies of computer science. The course explores topics such as computational thinking, algorithmic problem solving, data representation, programming fundamentals, and the societal impact of computing. Students will engage with hands-on programming exercises, analyze how computers process information, and learn how to design efficient solutions to real-world problems using computational approaches. This course provides a solid groundwork for further study in computer science and related fields, fostering critical thinking and a deeper understanding of technology in modern society.
Recommended Textbook
Invitation to Computer Science 7th Edition by G.Michael
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17 Chapters
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Page 2
Schneider
Chapter 1: An Introduction to Computer Science
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Q1) The three types of ____________________ used to construct algorithms are sequential, conditional, and iterative.
Answer: operations
Q2) Algorithms usually contain a set of instructions to be executed in any order.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
Q3) In 1946, John Von Neumann proposed a radically different computer design based on a model called the ____ computer.
A) stored program
B) external program
C) programmable function
D) memory unit
Answer: A
Q4) Leibniz's ____________________ could carry out addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division.
Answer: Wheel
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3
Chapter 2: Algorithm Discovery and Design
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Q1) <u>Natural language</u> is a set of English language constructs designed to resemble the statements in a programming language but that do not actually run on a computer._________________________
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
Q2) One of the most powerful features of a computer is its ability to handle loops.
A)True
B)False
Answer: True
Q3) A ____ is the repetition of a block of instructions.
A) cycle
B) nucleus
C) matrix
D) loop
Answer: D
Q4) Having an infinite loop in an algorithm is an error.
A)True
B)False
Answer: True
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Chapter 3: The Efficiency of Algorithms
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Q1) An ____ algorithm is called an exponential algorithm.
A) (lg n)
B) (n)
C) (n2)
D) (2n)
Answer: D
Q2) Given a sorted list, the sequential search algorithm is more efficient than the binary search.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
Q3) The number of comparisons done by the selection sort algorithm does not grow at the same rate as the problem size n, instead it grows at approximately the ____________________ of that rate.
Answer: square
Q4) Binary search uses significantly more space than sequential search.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
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Chapter 4: The Building Blocks: Binary Numbers, Boolean
Logic, and Gates
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Q1) After we normalize a number, its first significant digit is immediately to the <u>left</u> of the binary point._________________________
A)True
B)False
Q2) A(n) ____ is a distinct point located on an image's surface.
A) pitch
B) amplitude
C) pixel
D) bit
Q3) Two's complement representation is a signed integer representation that does not suffer from the problem of two zeros.
A)True
B)False
Q4) A strictly black/white image has greater storage requirements than an image represented using a gray scale.
A)True
B)False
Q5) To construct an OR gate, two transistors are connected in
Q6) Sequential circuits contain ____________________ loops. Page 6
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Chapter 5: Computer Systems Organization
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Q1) The Von Neumann bottleneck is the inability of the sequential one-instruction-at-a-time computer Von Neumann model to handle today's large-scale problems.
A)True
B)False
Q2) To solve the difficulty of scaling memory organization, memories are physically organized into a ____-dimensional organization.
A) one
B) two
C) three
D) multi
Q3) The normal mode of operation of a Von Neumann machine is <u>sequential</u>._________________________
A)True
B)False
Q4) The branch of computer science that studies computers in terms of their major functional units and how they work is known as computer organization.
A)True
B)False
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Chapter 6: An Introduction to System Software and Virtual Machines
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Q1) An interface prevents accidental damage to hardware, programs, and data.
A)True
B)False
Q2) It is the responsibility of the ____________________ to safeguard the password file that stores all valid user name/password combinations.
Q3) Each symbolic assembly language instruction is translated into one or more machine language instructions.
A)True
B)False
Q4) Describe four problems with machine language.
Q5) ____________________ labels increase the maintainability of a program.
Q6) A Von Neumann computer without any helpful user-oriented features is called a(n) ____ machine.
A) distributed
B) virtual C) assembler
D) naked
Q8) What is the most important task of the operating system? Page 9
Q7) Explain what a real-time operating system does.Then give a detailed example.
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Chapter 7: Computer Networks and Cloud Computing
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Q1) Everyone today should buy their own I/O or storage devices because it is a cost-effective way to configure computer systems.
A)True
B)False
Q2) What do the Physical layer protocols govern? What do they specify? What is the goal of the Physical layer?
Q3) While <u>WiMAX</u> is great for communicating with a nearby router, its transmission limit means it cannot provide mobile Internet access from a car or outdoor site far from any base station._________________________
A)True
B)False
Q4) In the ____________________ topology all nodes are connected to a single shared communication line.
Q5) What are the two critical responsibilities of the Network layer?
Q6) A(n) <u>LAN</u> connects devices that are not in close proximity but rather are across town, across the country, or across the ocean._________________________
A)True
B)False
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Chapter 8: Information Security
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Q1) A(n) <u>asymmetric</u> encryption algorithm requires the use of a secret key known to both the sender and receiver._________________________
A)True
B)False
Q2) Explain what an embedded computer is and provide examples.
Q3) Some laptops now use ____ information such as fingerprint scanning.
A) psychometric
B) electromagnetic
C) biometric
D) optical
Q4) A text file can be hidden in an image file by changing (if needed) the least significant bit of each byte of the image file to match the ____________________ form of the characters in the text.
Q5) Sometimes the word cracker is used to denote those who break into someone else's computer.
A)True
B)False
Q6) ____________________ is the science of "secret writing."
Q7) Explain at length what a Caesar cipher does.
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Chapter 9: Introduction to High-Level Language Programming
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Q1) The problem identification document commits the final and complete problem specification to paper and guides the software developers in all subsequent decisions.
A)True
B)False
Q2) ____ are instructions in the programming language.
A) Immediate commands
B) Imperative commands
C) Intrinsic commands
D) Internal commands
Q3) In early programming languages, conserving machine resources was not an issue.
A)True
B)False
Q4) ____ allows miscommunications between the user and the programmer to be identified and corrected early in the development process.
A) Rapid deployment
B) Rapid configuration
C) Rapid prototyping
D) Rapid interfacing
Q5) List four expectations of a program written in a high-level language.
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Chapter 10: The Tower of Babel
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Q1) ____, which includes MIMD, is really a catchall term for a variety of approaches to computing architectures and algorithm design.
A) Distributed processing
B) Serial processing
C) Parallel processing
D) Scalable processing
Q2) Provide an explanation of the word function in the context of functional languages.
Q3) Briefly discuss the relationship between facts and queries in logic programming.
Q4) Early versions of FORTRAN allowed the use of mathematical symbols such as < to compare two quantities.
A)True
B)False
Q5) Unlike FORTRAN, COBOL, C, C++, and Ada, which were carefully developed as programming languages, ____________________, a modern, object-oriented language, was almost an accident.
Q6) Discuss dynamic webpages and PHP.
Q7) Explain what an expert system is.
Q8) With what is SQL designed to be used?
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Chapter 11: Compilers and Language Translation
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Q1) A ____ is a data structure that stores information about a nonterminal, such as the actual name of the object and its data type.
A) rule
B) production
C) parse tree
D) semantic record
Q2) In BNF, a ____ is an intermediate grammatical category used to help explain and organize the language.
A) production
B) rule
C) terminal
D) nonterminal
Q3) What are the four phases of compilation?
Q4) The output of a(n) ____________________ is a list of all the tokens contained in a high-level language statement, as well as the classification number of each token found.
Q5) The righthand side of a BNF rule is the name of a single grammatical category. A)True
B)False
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Chapter 12: Models of Computation
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Q1) We assumed that there was a Turing machine that could solve the halting problem, and this assumption led to a(n) ____.
A) computable problem
B) impossible situation
C) unsolved problem
D) complex solution
Q2) Discuss at length the assertion that Turing machines define the limits of computability.
Q3) Although we can compare two Turing machine algorithms for the same task, we can't really compare the efficiency of a Turing machine algorithm with an algorithm that runs on a "real" computer.
A)True
B)False
Q4) In any collection of Turing machine instructions, there can be two different instructions that both begin with the same current state and current symbol.
A)True
B)False
Q5) What do we require any computing agent to be able to do?
Q6) According to its definition, what must an algorithm be or do?
Page 16
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Chapter 13: Simulation and Modeling
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Q1) The very essence of <u>randomness</u> is that we can never know what event will occur next._________________________
A)True
B)False
Q2) What is the difference between computer graphics and scientific visualization?
Q3) It is the ____ of a model who best determines what data should be collected and displayed.
A) designer
B) engineer
C) user
D) consumer
Q4) What about stochastic components makes some systems difficult to model?
Q5) One way to discover a pattern is to know something about the statistical <u>distribution</u> of quantities that behave in a similar way._________________________
A)True
B)False
Q6) In a(n) ____________________ event simulation, we do not model time as continuous.
Q7) What happens in a simulated system when we process an event?
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Chapter 14: Electronic Commerce, Databases, and Personal
Privacy
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Q1) What is required by the SQL command to create a table?
Q2) Briefly, what are the goals of establishing an online shopping/ecommerce presence?
Q3) To manage a relational table, you need only be able to add new tuples to the table and delete tuples from a table.
A)True
B)False
Q4) To the user, distributed databases look like a single database with fast access times, just like data being accessed on the local machine.
A)True
B)False
Q5) The SQL command to create a table only requires specification of the various attributes by name and data type.
A)True
B)False
Q6) How do you manage a relational table?
Q7) List four risks (in the form of questions to consider) that may be involved with the decision to move into ecommerce?
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Chapter 15: Artificial Intelligence
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Q1) The human brain uses a ____ architecture, characterized by a large number of simple "processors" with multiple interconnections.
A) neural
B) network
C) connectionist
D) Victorian
Q2) Complex recognition tasks are easy for computers to perform.
A)True
B)False
Q3) Explain the characteristics that any knowledge representation scheme that we select must have.
Q4) A brute force approach is commonly used for intelligent chess-playing strategy.
A)True
B)False
Q5) The term ____ means the language of formal logic.
A) graphical scheme
B) natural language
C) logic scheme
D) formal language
Q6) Explain in detail what swarm intelligence is.
Page 19
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Chapter 16: Computer Graphics and Entertainment: Movies, Games,
and Virtual Communities
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Q1) CBS used the UNIVAC I to predict the outcome of the 1952 presidential election.
A)True
B)False
Q2) ____ is a rapidly growing area of computer and biological science research in which computers and graphics software are used to produce highly accurate two- and three-dimensional images of the human body.
A) Medical processing
B) Medical imaging
C) Virtual medicine
D) Visual medicine
Q3) A noncompetitive MMOG is sometimes called a ____.
A) nanoverse
B) metaverse
C) miniverse
D) microverse
Q4) In 1952, a UNIVAC I cost $100 million.
A)True
B)False
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Q5) List at least three of the technical problems that must be solved by the designers of MMOGs.
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Chapter 17: Making Decisions About Computers,
Information, and Society
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Q1) What is Kant's second categorical imperative?
Q2) The opponents of ____________________ hold that in the long run there may be far less music available because artists and publishers will have far less incentive to create and disseminate music.
Q3) Music file copying has encouraged CD buying over the long term.
A)True
B)False
Q4) One of the challenges when using a(n) ____________________ argument in a dialectic about hacking is that it is sometimes difficult to predict consequences with any accuracy.
Q5) Although music sales on physicalmedia still account for slightly over half of the recording industry's revenue,39% now comes from digital sales and <u>VoIP</u>._________________________
A)True
B)False
Q6) Define cyberbullying.
Q7) What is Anonymous? What are its best-known actions?
Q8) All musicians are naturally opposed to music file sharing.
A)True
B)False Page 21
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