1.
Personal computer
–
A personal computer is a multi-purpose electronic computer whose size, capabilities, and price make it feasible for individual use. PCs are intended to be operated directly by a end-user, rather than by an expert or technician. In the 2010s, PCs are typically connected to the Internet, allowing access to the World Wide Web, personal computers may be connected to a local area network, either by a cable or a wireless connection. In the 2010s, a PC may be, a multi-component desktop computer, designed for use in a location a laptop computer, designed for easy portability or a tablet computer. In the 2010s, PCs run using a system, such as Microsoft Windows, Linux. The very earliest microcomputers, equipped with a front panel, required hand-loading of a program to load programs from external storage. Before long, automatic booting from permanent read-only memory became universal, in the 2010s, users have access to a wide range of commercial software, free software and free and open-source software, which are provided in ready-to-run or ready-to-compile form. Since the early 1990s, Microsoft operating systems and Intel hardware have dominated much of the computer market, first with MS-DOS. Alternatives to Microsofts Windows operating systems occupy a minority share of the industry and these include Apples OS X and free open-source Unix-like operating systems such as Linux and Berkeley Software Distribution. Advanced Micro Devices provides the alternative to Intels processors. PC is an initialism for personal computer, some PCs, including the OLPC XOs, are equipped with x86 or x64 processors but not designed to run Microsoft Windows. PC is used in contrast with Mac, an Apple Macintosh computer and this sense of the word is used in the Get a Mac advertisement campaign that ran between 2006 and 2009, as well as its rival, Im a PC campaign, that appeared in 2008. Since Apples transition to Intel processors starting 2005, all Macintosh computers are now PCs, the “brain” may one day come down to our level and help with our income-tax and book-keeping calculations. But this is speculation and there is no sign of it so far, in the history of computing there were many examples of computers designed to be used by one person, as opposed to terminals connected to mainframe computers. Using the narrow definition of operated by one person, the first personal computer was the ENIAC which became operational in 1946 and it did not meet further definitions of affordable or easy to use. An example of an early single-user computer was the LGP-30, created in 1956 by Stan Frankel and used for science and it came with a retail price of $47, 000—equivalent to about $414,000 today. Introduced at the 1965 New York Worlds Fair, the Programma 101 was a programmable calculator described in advertisements as a desktop computer. It was manufactured by the Italian company Olivetti and invented by the Italian engineer Pier Giorgio Perotto, the Soviet MIR series of computers was developed from 1965 to 1969 in a group headed by Victor Glushkov
2.
Operating system
–
An operating system is system software that manages computer hardware and software resources and provides common services for computer programs. All computer programs, excluding firmware, require a system to function. Operating systems are found on many devices that contain a computer – from cellular phones, the dominant desktop operating system is Microsoft Windows with a market share of around 83. 3%. MacOS by Apple Inc. is in place, and the varieties of Linux is in third position. Linux distributions are dominant in the server and supercomputing sectors, other specialized classes of operating systems, such as embedded and real-time systems, exist for many applications. A single-tasking system can run one program at a time. Multi-tasking may be characterized in preemptive and co-operative types, in preemptive multitasking, the operating system slices the CPU time and dedicates a slot to each of the programs. Unix-like operating systems, e. g. Solaris, Linux, cooperative multitasking is achieved by relying on each process to provide time to the other processes in a defined manner. 16-bit versions of Microsoft Windows used cooperative multi-tasking, 32-bit versions of both Windows NT and Win9x, used preemptive multi-tasking. Single-user operating systems have no facilities to distinguish users, but may allow multiple programs to run in tandem, a distributed operating system manages a group of distinct computers and makes them appear to be a single computer. The development of networked computers that could be linked and communicate with each other gave rise to distributed computing, distributed computations are carried out on more than one machine. When computers in a work in cooperation, they form a distributed system. The technique is used both in virtualization and cloud computing management, and is common in large server warehouses, embedded operating systems are designed to be used in embedded computer systems. They are designed to operate on small machines like PDAs with less autonomy and they are able to operate with a limited number of resources. They are very compact and extremely efficient by design, Windows CE and Minix 3 are some examples of embedded operating systems. A real-time operating system is a system that guarantees to process events or data by a specific moment in time. A real-time operating system may be single- or multi-tasking, but when multitasking, early computers were built to perform a series of single tasks, like a calculator. Basic operating system features were developed in the 1950s, such as resident monitor functions that could run different programs in succession to speed up processing
3.
Digital Research
–
Digital Research, Inc. was the company created by Dr. Gary Kildall to market and develop his CP/M operating system and related products. It was the first large company in the microcomputer world. Digital Research was based in Pacific Grove, California, the companys operating systems, starting with CP/M for 8080/Z80-based microcomputers, were the de facto standard of their era, as MS-DOS and Microsoft Windows came later. DRs product suite included the original CP/M and its various offshoots, DR-DOS which was a MS-DOS compatible version of CP/M, and MP/M, the first 16-bit system was CP/M-86, which was to be unsuccessful in competition with MS-DOS. There followed Concurrent CP/M, a version of the multi-tasking MP/M-86 featuring virtual consoles from which applications could be launched to run concurrently. Successive revisions of this system, which gradually supported MS-DOS applications, in May 1983 Digital Research announced that it would offer PC DOS versions of all of its languages and utilities. It remained influential, with $45 million in 1983 sales making Digital Research the fourth-largest microcomputer software company, jerry Pournelle warned later that year, however, that Many people of stature seem to have left or are leaving Digital Research. DR had better get its act together, in 1985, soon after the introduction of the Intel 80286, Digital Research introduced a real-time system, initially called Concurrent DOS286 and subsequently FlexOS. This exploited the greater memory addressing capability of the new CPU to provide a more flexible multi-tasking environment, there was a small but powerful set of system APIs, each with a synchronous and an asynchronous variant. Pipes were supported, and all named resources could be aliased by setting Environment variables and this system was to enjoy enduring favour in point-of-sale systems and was adopted as the basis for IBM4680 OS and IBM4690 OS. Digital Research was purchased by Novell in 1991, primarily for Novell to gain access to the operating system line. Digital Research produced a selection of programming language compilers and interpreters for their OS-supported platforms, including C, Pascal, COBOL, Forth, PL/I, PL/M, CBASIC, BASIC, and Logo. They also produced a version of the GKS graphics standard called GSX. Less known are their application programs, limited largely to the GSX-based DR DRAW, Dr. Halo for DOS, at the time IBM Personal Computer was being developed, Digital Researchs CP/M was the dominant operating system of the day. IBM asked DR to supply a version of CP/M written for the Intel 8086 microprocessor as the operating system for the PC. Digital Research, uneasy about making such an agreement with IBM, Microsoft seized this opportunity to supply an OS, in addition to other software for the new IBM PC. When the IBM PC arrived in late 1981, it came with PC DOS, which was developed from 86-DOS, by mid-1982, it was marketed as MS-DOS for use in hardware-compatible non-IBM computers. This one decision resulted in Microsoft becoming the name in computer software
4.
Graphics Environment Manager
–
The Graphics Environment Manager was an operating environment created by Digital Research for use with the DOS operating system on the Intel 8088 and Motorola 68000 microprocessors. GEM is known primarily as the user interface for the Atari ST series of computers. It also was available for standard IBM PC, at the time when the 6 MHz IBM PC AT was brand new and it was the core for a small number of DOS programs, the most notable being Ventura Publisher. It was ported to a number of computers that previously lacked graphical interfaces. DRI also produced X/GEM for their FlexOS real-time operating system with adaptations for OS/2 Presentation Manager, GEM started life at DRI as a more general purpose graphics library known as GSX, written by a team led by Don Heiskell. Lee Lorenzen who had recently left Xerox PARC wrote much of the code, GSX was essentially a DRI-specific implementation of the GKS graphics standard proposed in the late 1970s. GSX consisted of two parts, a selection of routines for common drawing operations, and the drivers that are responsible for handling the actual output. The former was known as GDOS and the latter as GIOS, originally known as Crystal as a play on an IBM project called Glass, the name was later changed to GEM. Under GEM, GSX became the GEM VDI, responsible for basic graphics, VDI also added the ability to work with multiple fonts and added a selection of raster drawing commands to the formerly vector-only GKS-based drawing commands. VDI also added multiple viewports, a key addition for use with windows, a new module, GEM AES, provided the window management and UI elements, and GEM Desktop used both libraries in combination to provide a GUI. The 8086 version of the system was first demoed at the 1984 COMDEX. GEM Desktop 1.0 was released on 28 February 1985, GEM Desktop 1.1 was released in April,1985, with support for CGA and EGA displays. A version for the Apricot Computers F-Series, supporting 640×200 in up to 8 colors was also available as GEM Desktop 1.2, later that month the company removed the restriction. Applications that supported GEM included Lifetree Softwares GEM Write, at this point, Apple Computer sued DRI in what would turn into a long dispute over the look and feel of the GEM/1 system, which was an almost direct copy of the Macintosh. This eventually led to DRI being forced to change several basic features of the system, Apple would later go on to sue other companies for similar issues, including their copyright lawsuit against Microsoft and HP. In addition to printers the system also contained drivers for some more unusual devices such as the Polaroid Palette, DRI responded with the lawsuit friendly GEM Desktop 2.0, released in March 1986, with support for VGA displays. It allowed the display of two fixed windows on the desktop, changed the trash can icon, and removed the animations for things like opening and closing windows. It was otherwise similar to GEM/1, but also included a number of bug fixes, the last commercial release was GEM/3 Desktop, released in November 1988, which had speed improvements and shipped with a number of basic applications
5.
Atari TOS
–
TOS is the operating system of the Atari ST range of computers. This range includes the 520ST and 1040ST, their STF/M/FM and STE variants, later, 32-bit machines were developed using a new version of TOS, called MultiTOS, which allowed multitasking. More recently, users have further developed TOS into FreeMiNT, the Atari TOS debuted with the Atari 520ST in 1985. TOS combines Digital Researchs GEM GUI running on top of the DOS-like GEMDOS, features include a flat memory model, MS-DOS-compatible disk format, support for MIDI, and a variant of SCSI called ACSI in later versions. Ataris TOS is usually run from ROM chips contained in the computer, Thus, before local hard drives were available in home computers, it was an almost instant-running OS. TOS booted off floppy disks in the very first STs, but only half a year after the ST was introduced. TOS consisted of the following, Desktop - The main interface loaded after bootup, MultiTOS was developed to allow TOS to preemptively multitask. The TOS desktop uses icons to represent files and devices, windows, the desktop file DESKTOP. INF was read to determine window settings, icon placements and drive icons, otherwise the standard default desktop of two floppy icons and the trash icon was used. Later versions use NEWDESK. INF for saving and reading the desktop configuration, executable files are identified by their extensions, *. ACC - Desktop accessory. *. TOS - TOS program that doesnt use GEM — i. e. similar to a PCs. EXE or. COM running in a CLI-mode box, the desktop clears the screen, turns on the text cursor, and hides the mouse pointer. This opens a box where arguments can be added for the program. TOS programs can auto boot by placing them in a folder named AUTO, TOS1.4 allows GEM programs to be set to load automatically from the Install Application dialog. Programs with *. TTP extensions and environments can not be used for auto boot, Desktop accessories were placed in the root directory of the default drive and loaded automatically. Atari TOS is based on GEMDOS which uses a modified FAT12 file system, executable boot sectors for the Atari platform typically start with an MC68K jump opcode, and the last two byte word must sum with the rest of the boot sector to 0x1234 in order to be bootable. GEMDOS disc file systems can be read using DOS or Windows 9x,1.0 Earliest version released on disk. Formats, floppy,2 chip and 6 chip ROMs Rom date,20 Nov 1985 Machines, 520ST, 1040ST1.02 fixed bugs, supported Blitter co-processor and real-time clock. Formats,2 chip and 6 chip ROMs Rom date,22 Apr 1987 Machines, 520ST, 1040ST, Mega 2, Mega 41.04 Many bug fixes, file selector changed, DOS-compatible disk formatting, however, compatibility problems with older software. Formats,2 chip and 6 chip ROMs Rom date,6 Apr 1989 Machines, 520ST, 1040ST, Mega 2, Mega 4, Stacy 1.06 Support for STe machines only
6.
Central processing unit
–
The computer industry has used the term central processing unit at least since the early 1960s. The form, design and implementation of CPUs have changed over the course of their history, most modern CPUs are microprocessors, meaning they are contained on a single integrated circuit chip. An IC that contains a CPU may also contain memory, peripheral interfaces, some computers employ a multi-core processor, which is a single chip containing two or more CPUs called cores, in that context, one can speak of such single chips as sockets. Array processors or vector processors have multiple processors that operate in parallel, there also exists the concept of virtual CPUs which are an abstraction of dynamical aggregated computational resources. Early computers such as the ENIAC had to be rewired to perform different tasks. Since the term CPU is generally defined as a device for software execution, the idea of a stored-program computer was already present in the design of J. Presper Eckert and John William Mauchlys ENIAC, but was initially omitted so that it could be finished sooner. On June 30,1945, before ENIAC was made, mathematician John von Neumann distributed the paper entitled First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC and it was the outline of a stored-program computer that would eventually be completed in August 1949. EDVAC was designed to perform a number of instructions of various types. Significantly, the programs written for EDVAC were to be stored in high-speed computer memory rather than specified by the wiring of the computer. This overcame a severe limitation of ENIAC, which was the considerable time, with von Neumanns design, the program that EDVAC ran could be changed simply by changing the contents of the memory. Early CPUs were custom designs used as part of a larger, however, this method of designing custom CPUs for a particular application has largely given way to the development of multi-purpose processors produced in large quantities. This standardization began in the era of discrete transistor mainframes and minicomputers and has accelerated with the popularization of the integrated circuit. The IC has allowed increasingly complex CPUs to be designed and manufactured to tolerances on the order of nanometers, both the miniaturization and standardization of CPUs have increased the presence of digital devices in modern life far beyond the limited application of dedicated computing machines. Modern microprocessors appear in electronic devices ranging from automobiles to cellphones, the so-called Harvard architecture of the Harvard Mark I, which was completed before EDVAC, also utilized a stored-program design using punched paper tape rather than electronic memory. Relays and vacuum tubes were used as switching elements, a useful computer requires thousands or tens of thousands of switching devices. The overall speed of a system is dependent on the speed of the switches, tube computers like EDVAC tended to average eight hours between failures, whereas relay computers like the Harvard Mark I failed very rarely. In the end, tube-based CPUs became dominant because the significant speed advantages afforded generally outweighed the reliability problems, most of these early synchronous CPUs ran at low clock rates compared to modern microelectronic designs. Clock signal frequencies ranging from 100 kHz to 4 MHz were very common at this time, the design complexity of CPUs increased as various technologies facilitated building smaller and more reliable electronic devices
7.
Motorola 68000
–
The Motorola 68000 is a 32-bit CISC microprocessor with a 16-bit external data bus, designed and marketed by Motorola Semiconductor Products Sector. After 38 years in production, the 68000 architecture is still in use, the 68000 grew out of the MACSS project, begun in 1976 to develop an entirely new architecture without backward compatibility. It would be a higher-power sibling complementing the existing 8-bit 6800 line rather than a compatible successor, in the end, the 68000 did retain a bus protocol compatibility mode for existing 6800 peripheral devices, and a version with an 8-bit data bus was produced. However, the designers focused on the future, or forward compatibility. For instance, the CPU registers are 32 bits wide, though few self-contained structures in the processor itself operate on 32 bits at a time. The MACSS team drew heavily on the influence of minicomputer processor design, such as the PDP-11 and VAX systems, in the mid 1970s, the 8-bit microprocessor manufacturers raced to introduce the 16-bit generation. National Semiconductor had been first with its IMP-16 and PACE processors in 1973–1975, Intel had worked on their advanced 16/32-bit Intel iAPX432 since 1975 and their Intel 8086 since 1976. Arriving late to the 16-bit arena afforded the new processor more transistors, 32-bit macroinstructions, the original MC68000 was fabricated using an HMOS process with a 3.5 µm feature size. Formally introduced in September 1979, Initial samples were released in February 1980, Initial speed grades were 4,6, and 8 MHz.10 MHz chips became available during 1981, and 12.5 MHz chips by June 1982. The 16.67 MHz 12F version of the MC68000, the fastest version of the original HMOS chip, was not produced until the late 1980s, tom Gunter, retired Corporate Vice President at Motorola, is known as the Father of the 68000. The 68000 was used in Microsoft Xenix systems as well as an early NetWare Unix-based Server, the 68000 was used in the first generation of desktop laser printers including the original Apple Inc. In 1982, the 68000 received an update to its ISA allowing it to virtual memory and to conform to the Popek. The updated chip was called the 68010, a further extended version which exposed 31 bits of the address bus was also produced, in small quantities, as the 68012. To support lower-cost systems and control applications with smaller sizes, Motorola introduced the 8-bit compatible MC68008. This was a 68000 with an 8-bit data bus and an address bus. After 1982, Motorola devoted more attention to the 68020 and 88000 projects, several other companies were second-source manufacturers of the HMOS68000. These included Hitachi, who shrank the size to 2.7 µm for their 12.5 MHz version, Mostek, Rockwell, Signetics, Thomson/SGS-Thomson. Toshiba was also a maker of the CMOS 68HC000
8.
Byte
–
The byte is a unit of digital information that most commonly consists of eight bits. Historically, the byte was the number of used to encode a single character of text in a computer. The size of the byte has historically been hardware dependent and no standards existed that mandated the size. The de-facto standard of eight bits is a convenient power of two permitting the values 0 through 255 for one byte, the international standard IEC 80000-13 codified this common meaning. Many types of applications use information representable in eight or fewer bits, the popularity of major commercial computing architectures has aided in the ubiquitous acceptance of the 8-bit size. The unit symbol for the byte was designated as the upper-case letter B by the IEC and IEEE in contrast to the bit, internationally, the unit octet, symbol o, explicitly denotes a sequence of eight bits, eliminating the ambiguity of the byte. It is a respelling of bite to avoid accidental mutation to bit. Early computers used a variety of four-bit binary coded decimal representations and these representations included alphanumeric characters and special graphical symbols. S. Government and universities during the 1960s, the prominence of the System/360 led to the ubiquitous adoption of the eight-bit storage size, while in detail the EBCDIC and ASCII encoding schemes are different. In the early 1960s, AT&T introduced digital telephony first on long-distance trunk lines and these used the eight-bit µ-law encoding. This large investment promised to reduce costs for eight-bit data. The development of microprocessors in the 1970s popularized this storage size. A four-bit quantity is called a nibble, also nybble. The term octet is used to specify a size of eight bits. It is used extensively in protocol definitions, historically, the term octad or octade was used to denote eight bits as well at least in Western Europe, however, this usage is no longer common. The exact origin of the term is unclear, but it can be found in British, Dutch, and German sources of the 1960s and 1970s, and throughout the documentation of Philips mainframe computers. The unit symbol for the byte is specified in IEC 80000-13, IEEE1541, in the International System of Quantities, B is the symbol of the bel, a unit of logarithmic power ratios named after Alexander Graham Bell, creating a conflict with the IEC specification. However, little danger of confusion exists, because the bel is a used unit
9.
Atari 8-bit family
–
The Atari 8-bit family is a series of 8-bit home computers introduced by Atari, Inc. in 1979 and manufactured until 1992. All of the machines in the family are similar and differ primarily in packaging. They are based on the MOS Technology 6502 CPU running at 1.79 MHz, star Raiders is widely considered the platforms killer app. The original Atari 400 and 800 models were released with a series of plug-n-play peripherals that used Ataris SIO serial bus system, to meet stringent FCC requirements, the early machines were completely enclosed in a solid cast aluminum block, which made them physically robust but expensive to produce. Over the following decade, the models were replaced by the XL and XE series which had the same basic logical design. The Atari 8-bit computer line sold two million units during its production run between late 1979 and mid-1985. They were not only sold through dedicated computer retailers, but department stores such as Sears, the primary competition in the worldwide market was, starting in 1982, the Commodore 64. This was the first computer to offer similar performance. Atari also found a market in Eastern Europe and had something of a renaissance in the early 1990s as these countries joined a uniting Europe. On January 1,1992, Atari corp, officially dropped all remaining support of the 8-bit line. Design of the 8-bit series of machines started at Atari as soon as the Atari 2600 games console was released in late 1977. While designing the 2600 in 1976, the team from Atari Grass Valley Research Center felt that the 2600 would have about a three-year lifespan before becoming obsolete. They started blue sky designs for a new console that would be ready to replace it around 1979, what they ended up with was essentially a greatly updated version of the 2600, fixing its more obvious limitations but sharing a similar overall design philosophy. The newer design would be faster than the 2600, have better graphics, work on the chips for the new system continued throughout 1978 and focused on much-improved video hardware known as the Color Television Interface Adaptor, or CTIA. During this gestation the home computer era began in earnest in the form of the TRS-80, Commodore PET, Warner Communications had purchased Atari from Nolan Bushnell for $28 million in 1976 in order to fund the launch of the 2600. Atari had recently sent Ray Kassar to act as the CEO of the company, Kassar felt the chipset should be used in a home computer to challenge Apple. In order to adapt the machine to this role, it would need to support character graphics, include some form of expansion for peripherals, and run the then-universal BASIC programming language. The CTIA, like the 2600s TIA, was designed to produce Player-Missile graphics, instead of expanding the CTIA to handle these tasks, the designers instead introduced an entirely new chip for this purpose, the Alphanumeric Television Interface Controller, or ANTIC
10.
Home computer
–
Home computers were a class of microcomputers entering the market in 1977, and becoming common during the 1980s. They were marketed to consumers as affordable and accessible computers that, however, a home computer often had better graphics and sound than contemporaneous business computers. Their most common uses were playing games, but they were also regularly used for word processing, doing homework. Home computers were usually not electronic kits, home computers were already manufactured in stylish metal or plastic enclosures. There were, however, commercial kits like the Sinclair ZX80 which were home and home-built computers since the purchaser could assemble the unit from a kit. For example, using a typical 1980s home computer as a home automation appliance would require the computer to be powered on at all times. Personal finance and database use required tedious data entry, by contrast, advertisements in the specialty computer press often simply listed specifications. Since most systems shipped with the BASIC programming language included on the system ROM, many users found programming to be a fun and rewarding experience, and an excellent introduction to the world of digital technology. Often the only difference may be the outlet through which they are purchased. Another change from the computer era is that the once-common endeavour of writing ones own software programs has almost vanished from home computer use. As early as 1965, some projects such as Jim Sutherlands ECHO IV explored the possible utility of a computer in the home. In 1969, the Honeywell Kitchen Computer was marketed as a gift item, and would have inaugurated the era of home computing. Computers became affordable for the public in the 1970s due to the mass production of the microprocessor starting in 1971. Early microcomputers such as the Altair 8800 had front-mounted switches and diagnostic lights to control and indicate internal system status, while two early home computers could be bought either in kit form or assembled, most home computers were only sold pre-assembled. The keyboard - a feature lacking on the Altair - was usually built into the case as the motherboard. Ports for plug-in peripheral devices such as a display, cassette tape recorders, joysticks. Usually the manufacturer would sell peripheral devices designed to be compatible with their computers as extra cost accessories, peripherals were not often interchangeable between different brands of home computer, or even between successive models of the same brand. To save the cost of a monitor, the home computer would often connect through an RF modulator to the family TV set
11.
Atari Corporation
–
Atari Corporation was an American manufacturer of computers and video game consoles from 1984 to 1996. Atari Corp. was founded in July 1984 when Warner Communications sold the home computing and game console divisions of Atari and its chief products were the Atari ST, Atari XE, Atari 7800, Atari Lynx, and Atari Jaguar. The company reverse merged with JTS Inc. in 1996, becoming a small division, the company was founded by Commodore Internationals founder Jack Tramiel soon after his resignation from Commodore in January 1984. Initially named Tramel Technology, Ltd. the companys goal was to design, on July 1,1984 TTL bought the Consumer Division assets of Atari, Inc. from its owner Warner Communications, and TTL was renamed Atari Corporation. Warner sold the division for $240 million in stocks under the new company, under Tramiels ownership, Atari Corp. used the remaining stock of game console inventory to keep the company afloat while they finished development of their 16-bit computer system, the Atari ST. In 1985, they released their update to the 8-bit computer line—the Atari XE series—as well as the 16-bit Atari ST line. Then in 1986, Atari Corp. launched two consoles designed under the Warner Atari, Atari 2600 Jr and Atari 7800, which had a release in 1984. Atari Corp. rebounded, producing a $25 million profit that year, the Atari ST line proved very successful, ultimately selling more than 5 million units. Its built-in MIDI ports made it popular among musicians. Still, its closest competitor in the marketplace, the Commodore Amiga, Atari eventually released a line of inexpensive IBM PC compatibles as well as an MS-DOS compatible palm computer called the Atari Portfolio. Atari under Tramiel had a reputation in the marketplace. Pretty soon, you dont believe anything they say and he concluded, I think Atari Corp. had better start considering how theyre perceived by the non-Atari-using public. In 1987, Atari acquired Federated Group for $67.3 million to have their own retail store shelf space, Atari quickly discovered that Federateds financial problems were far worse than they had believed. During this time, the FBI investigated Atari for reselling Japanese DRAM chips in the US, in violation of U. S. import laws, Federated was eventually sold to Silo in 1989. In 1989, Atari Corp. released the Atari Lynx—a handheld console with color graphics—to critical acclaim, however, a shortage of parts kept the system from being released nationwide for the 1989 Christmas season. The Lynx lost market share to Nintendos Game Boy, which had only a display, but a much better battery life. Also in 1989, Atari Corp. lost a $250 million lawsuit alleging that Nintendo had an illegal monopoly, as the fortunes of Atari Corporations ST and PC compatible computers faded, consoles and software again became the companys main focus. In 1993, Atari Corp. released its last console, the Atari Jaguar, after a period of initial success, it failed to meet expectations
12.
Graphical user interface
–
GUIs were introduced in reaction to the perceived steep learning curve of command-line interfaces, which require commands to be typed on a computer keyboard. The actions in a GUI are usually performed through direct manipulation of the graphical elements, beyond computers, GUIs are used in many handheld mobile devices such as MP3 players, portable media players, gaming devices, smartphones and smaller household, office and industrial controls. Designing the visual composition and temporal behavior of a GUI is an important part of application programming in the area of human–computer interaction. Its goal is to enhance the efficiency and ease of use for the logical design of a stored program. Methods of user-centered design are used to ensure that the language introduced in the design is well-tailored to the tasks. The visible graphical interface features of an application are sometimes referred to as chrome or GUI, typically, users interact with information by manipulating visual widgets that allow for interactions appropriate to the kind of data they hold. The widgets of an interface are selected to support the actions necessary to achieve the goals of users. A model–view–controller allows a structure in which the interface is independent from and indirectly linked to application functions. This allows users to select or design a different skin at will, good user interface design relates to users more, and to system architecture less. Large widgets, such as windows, usually provide a frame or container for the main presentation content such as a web page, smaller ones usually act as a user-input tool. A GUI may be designed for the requirements of a market as application-specific graphical user interfaces. By the 1990s, cell phones and handheld game systems also employed application specific touchscreen GUIs, newer automobiles use GUIs in their navigation systems and multimedia centers, or navigation multimedia center combinations. Sample graphical desktop environments A GUI uses a combination of technologies and devices to provide a platform that users can interact with, a series of elements conforming a visual language have evolved to represent information stored in computers. This makes it easier for people with few computer skills to work with, the most common combination of such elements in GUIs is the windows, icons, menus, pointer paradigm, especially in personal computers. The WIMP style of interaction uses a virtual device to represent the position of a pointing device, most often a mouse. Available commands are compiled together in menus, and actions are performed making gestures with the pointing device, a window manager facilitates the interactions between windows, applications, and the windowing system. The windowing system handles hardware devices such as pointing devices, graphics hardware, window managers and other software combine to simulate the desktop environment with varying degrees of realism. Smaller mobile devices such as personal assistants and smartphones typically use the WIMP elements with different unifying metaphors, due to constraints in space
13.
Megabyte
–
The megabyte is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information. Its recommended unit symbol is MB, but sometimes MByte is used, the unit prefix mega is a multiplier of 1000000 in the International System of Units. Therefore, one megabyte is one million bytes of information and this definition has been incorporated into the International System of Quantities. However, in the computer and information fields, several other definitions are used that arose for historical reasons of convenience. A common usage has been to one megabyte as 1048576bytes. However, most standards bodies have deprecated this usage in favor of a set of binary prefixes, less common is a convention that used the megabyte to mean 1000×1024 bytes. The megabyte is commonly used to measure either 10002 bytes or 10242 bytes, the interpretation of using base 1024 originated as a compromise technical jargon for the byte multiples that needed to be expressed by the powers of 2 but lacked a convenient name. As 1024 approximates 1000, roughly corresponding to the SI prefix kilo-, in 1998 the International Electrotechnical Commission proposed standards for binary prefixes requiring the use of megabyte to strictly denote 10002 bytes and mebibyte to denote 10242 bytes. By the end of 2009, the IEC Standard had been adopted by the IEEE, EU, ISO, the Mac OS X10.6 file manager is a notable example of this usage in software. Since Snow Leopard, file sizes are reported in decimal units, base 21 MB =1048576 bytes is the definition used by Microsoft Windows in reference to computer memory, such as RAM. This definition is synonymous with the binary prefix mebibyte. Mixed 1 MB =1024000 bytes is the used to describe the formatted capacity of the 1.44 MB3. 5inch HD floppy disk. Semiconductor memory doubles in size for each address lane added to an integrated circuit package, the capacity of a disk drive is the product of the sector size, number of sectors per track, number of tracks per side, and the number of disk platters in the drive. Changes in any of these factors would not usually double the size, sector sizes were set as powers of two for convenience in processing. It was an extension to give the capacity of a disk drive in multiples of the sector size, giving a mix of decimal. Depending on compression methods and file format, a megabyte of data can roughly be, a 4 megapixel JPEG image with normal compression. Approximately 1 minute of 128 kbit/s MP3 compressed music,6 seconds of uncompressed CD audio. A typical English book volume in plain text format, the human genome consists of DNA representing 800 MB of data
14.
Random-access memory
–
Random-access memory is a form of computer data storage which stores frequently used program instructions to increase the general speed of a system. A random-access memory device allows data items to be read or written in almost the same amount of time irrespective of the location of data inside the memory. RAM contains multiplexing and demultiplexing circuitry, to connect the lines to the addressed storage for reading or writing the entry. Usually more than one bit of storage is accessed by the same address, in todays technology, random-access memory takes the form of integrated circuits. RAM is normally associated with types of memory, where stored information is lost if power is removed. Other types of non-volatile memories exist that allow access for read operations. These include most types of ROM and a type of memory called NOR-Flash. Integrated-circuit RAM chips came into the market in the early 1970s, with the first commercially available DRAM chip, early computers used relays, mechanical counters or delay lines for main memory functions. Ultrasonic delay lines could only reproduce data in the order it was written, drum memory could be expanded at relatively low cost but efficient retrieval of memory items required knowledge of the physical layout of the drum to optimize speed. Latches built out of vacuum tube triodes, and later, out of transistors, were used for smaller and faster memories such as registers. Such registers were relatively large and too costly to use for large amounts of data, the first practical form of random-access memory was the Williams tube starting in 1947. It stored data as electrically charged spots on the face of a cathode ray tube, since the electron beam of the CRT could read and write the spots on the tube in any order, memory was random access. The capacity of the Williams tube was a few hundred to around a thousand bits, but it was smaller, faster. In fact, rather than the Williams tube memory being designed for the SSEM, magnetic-core memory was invented in 1947 and developed up until the mid-1970s. It became a form of random-access memory, relying on an array of magnetized rings. By changing the sense of each rings magnetization, data could be stored with one bit stored per ring, since every ring had a combination of address wires to select and read or write it, access to any memory location in any sequence was possible. Magnetic core memory was the form of memory system until displaced by solid-state memory in integrated circuits. Data was stored in the capacitance of each transistor, and had to be periodically refreshed every few milliseconds before the charge could leak away
15.
Computer mouse
–
A computer mouse is a pointing device that detects two-dimensional motion relative to a surface. This motion is typically translated into the motion of a pointer on a display, physically, a mouse consists of an object held in ones hand, with one or more buttons. Mice often also other elements, such as touch surfaces and wheels. The earliest known publication of the mouse as referring to a computer pointing device is in Bill Englishs July 1965 publication. The plural for the rodent is always mice in modern usage. The plural of a mouse is mouses and mice according to most dictionaries. The first recorded usage is mice, the online Oxford Dictionaries cites a 1984 use. The trackball, a pointing device, was invented in 1944 by Ralph Benjamin as part of a World War II-era fire-control radar plotting system called Comprehensive Display System. Benjamin was then working for the British Royal Navy Scientific Service, Benjamins project used analog computers to calculate the future position of target aircraft based on several initial input points provided by a user with a joystick. Benjamin felt that a more elegant input device was needed and invented what they called a ball for this purpose. The device was patented in 1947, but only a prototype using a ball rolling on two rubber-coated wheels was ever built, and the device was kept as a military secret. Another early trackball was built by British electrical engineer Kenyon Taylor in collaboration with Tom Cranston, Taylor was part of the original Ferranti Canada, working on the Royal Canadian Navys DATAR system in 1952. DATAR was similar in concept to Benjamins display, the trackball used four disks to pick up motion, two each for the X and Y directions. When the ball was rolled, the pickup discs spun and contacts on their outer rim made periodic contact with wires, by counting the pulses, the physical movement of the ball could be determined. A digital computer calculated the tracks and sent the data to other ships in a task force using pulse-code modulation radio signals. This trackball used a standard Canadian five-pin bowling ball and it was not patented, since it was a secret military project. Douglas Engelbart of the Stanford Research Institute has been credited in published books by Thierry Bardini, Paul Ceruzzi, Howard Rheingold, Engelbart was also recognized as such in various obituary titles after his death in July 2013. That November, while attending a conference on computer graphics in Reno, Nevada, Engelbart began to ponder how to adapt the underlying principles of the planimeter to X-Y coordinate input
16.
Macintosh
–
The Macintosh (/ˈmækᵻntɒʃ/ MAK-in-tosh, is a series of personal computers designed, developed, and marketed by Apple Inc. Steve Jobs introduced the original Macintosh computer on January 24,1984 and this was the companys first mass-market personal computer featuring an integral graphical user interface and mouse. This first model was renamed to Macintosh 128k for uniqueness amongst a populous family of subsequently updated models which are also based on Apples same proprietary architecture. Since 1998, Apple has largely phased out the Macintosh name in favor of Mac, Macintosh systems still found success in education and desktop publishing and kept Apple as the second-largest PC manufacturer for the next decade. In the 1990s, improvements in the rival Wintel platform, notably with the introduction of Windows 3.0, then Windows 95, gradually took market share from the more expensive Macintosh systems. The performance advantage of 68000-based Macintosh systems was eroded by Intels Pentium, even after a transition to the superior PowerPC-based Power Macintosh line in 1994, the falling prices of commodity PC components and the release of Windows 95 saw the Macintosh user base decline. In 1998, after the return of Steve Jobs, Apple consolidated its multiple consumer-level desktop models into the all-in-one iMac G3, since their transition to Intel processors in 2006, the complete lineup is entirely based on said processors and associated systems. Its current lineup comprises three desktops, and three laptops and its Xserve server was discontinued in 2011 in favor of the Mac Mini and Mac Pro. Apple also develops the operating system for the Mac, currently macOS version 10.12 Sierra, Macs are currently capable of running non-Apple operating systems such as Linux, OpenBSD, and Microsoft Windows with the aid of Boot Camp or third-party software. Apple does not license macOS for use on computers, though it did license previous versions of the classic Mac OS through their Macintosh clone program from 1995 to 1997. The Macintosh project was begun in 1979 by Jef Raskin, an Apple employee who envisioned an easy-to-use, in 1978 Apple began to organize the Apple Lisa project, aiming to build a next-generation machine similar to an advanced Apple III or the yet-to-be-introduced IBM PC. In 1979, Steve Jobs learned of the work on graphical user interfaces taking place at Xerox PARC. He arranged a deal in which Xerox received Apple stock options in return for which Apple would license their designs, the basic layout of the Lisa was largely complete by 1982, at which point Jobs continual suggestions for improvements led to him being kicked off the project. At the same time that the Lisa was becoming a GUI machine in 1979, the design at that time was for a low-cost, easy-to-use machine for the average consumer. Raskin was authorized to start hiring for the project in September 1979 and his initial team would eventually consist of himself, Howard, Joanna Hoffman, Burrell Smith, and Bud Tribble. Smiths design used fewer RAM chips than the Lisa, which production of the board significantly more cost-efficient. Though there were no memory slots, its RAM was expandable to 512 kB by means of soldering sixteen IC sockets to accept 256 kb RAM chips in place of the factory-installed chips. The final products screen was a 9-inch, 512x342 pixel monochrome display, burrels innovative design, combining the low production cost of an Apple II with the computing power of Lisas Motorola 68000 CPU, began to receive Jobs attentions
17.
Amiga
–
The Amiga is a family of personal computers sold by Commodore in the 1980s and 1990s. The Amiga provided a significant upgrade from earlier 8-bit home computers, the Amiga 1000 was officially released in July 1985, but a series of production problems meant it did not become widely available until early 1986. The best selling model, the Amiga 500, was introduced in 1987 and became one of the home computers of the late 1980s. The A3000, introduced in 1990, started the second generation of Amiga systems, followed by the A500+, finally, as the third generation, the A1200 and the A4000 were released in late 1992. The platform became particularly popular for gaming and programming demos and it also found a prominent role in the desktop video, video production, and show control business, leading to video editing systems such as the Video Toaster. The Amigas native ability to play back multiple digital sound samples made it a popular platform for early tracker music software. It was also an expensive alternative to the Apple Macintosh. Initially, the Amiga was developed alongside various Commodore PC clones, Commodore ultimately went bankrupt in April 1994 after the Amiga CD32 model failed in the marketplace. Since the demise of Commodore, various groups have marketed successors to the original Amiga line, including Genesi, Eyetech, ACube Systems Srl, likewise, AmigaOS has influenced replacements, clones and compatible systems such as MorphOS, AmigaOS4 and AROS. The Amiga was so far ahead of its time that almost nobody—including Commodores marketing department—could fully articulate what it was all about. Today, its obvious the Amiga was the first multimedia computer, but in those days it was derided as a machine because few people grasped the importance of advanced graphics, sound. Nine years later, vendors are still struggling to make systems that work like 1985 Amigas, Jay Miner joined Atari in the 1970s to develop custom integrated circuits, and led development of the Atari 2600s TIA. Almost as soon as its development was complete, the team developing a much more sophisticated set of chips, CTIA, ANTIC and POKEY. With the 8-bit lines launch in 1979, Miner again started looking at a next generation chipset, Miner wanted to start work with the new Motorola 68000, but management was only interested in another MOS6502 based system. Miner left the company, and the industry, shortly thereafter, in 1982, Larry Kaplan was approached by a number of investors who wanted to develop a new game platform. Kaplan hired Miner to run the side of the newly formed company. The system was code-named Lorraine in keeping with Miners policy of giving systems female names, in case the company presidents wife. When Kaplan left the late in 1982 to rejoin Atari, Miner was promoted to head engineer
18.
Apple IIGS
–
The GS in the name stands for Graphics and Sound, referring to its enhanced multimedia hardware, especially its state of the art sound and music synthesis. The machine is a departure from any previous Apple II, with its 65C816 16-bit microprocessor, direct access to megabytes of RAM. It was the first computer produced by Apple to use a graphical user interface and Apple Desktop Bus interface for keyboards, mice. It is the first personal computer to come with a built-in wavetable synthesis chip, the machine outsold all other Apple products, including the Macintosh, during its first year in production. Apple ceased IIGS production in December 1992, the Apple IIGS made significant improvements over previous machines from the line such as the Apple IIe and Apple IIc. Use of the 65C816 allows the IIGS to address considerably more RAM, the IIGS also includes enhanced graphics and sound, which led to its GS name. Its graphics are the best of the Apple II series, with new higher resolution video modes. These include a 640×200-pixel mode with 2-bit color and a 320×200-pixel mode with 4-bit color, through some clever programming, it is possible to make the IIGS display as many as 3,200 colors at once. When first introduced, Apples user interface known as MouseDesk and the IIGS System Demo were both in black and white only, users did not see color until an application which took advantage of the new features was launched. Audio is generated by a built-in sound-and-music synthesizer in the form of the Ensoniq 5503 digital oscillator chip and these channels are paired to produce 15 voices in stereo audio. Although Apple had hoped that the IIc would outsell the IIe, the IIGS supports both 5. 25-inch and 3. 5-inch floppy disks and, like the IIe before it, has several expansion slots. These include seven general-purpose expansion slots compatible with those on the Apple II, II+, the IIGS, like the IIc, also has dedicated ports for external devices. These ports are associated with the slots, so for example using a card in slot 1 means that the port is disabled. The machine also features a control panel and real-time clock. The IIGS also supports booting from an AppleShare server, via the AppleTalk protocol, when the Apple IIe Workstation Card was introduced, this capability was given to the IIe. This was over a decade before NetBoot offered the capability to computers running Mac OS8. 320×200 pixels with a palette of 16 colors. 320×200 pixels with up to 16 palettes of 16 colors, in this mode, the VGC holds 16 separate palettes of 16 colors in its own memory
19.
Acorn Archimedes
–
The first Archimedes was launched in 1987. ARMs RISC design – 32-bit CPU, running at 8 MHz, was stated as running at 4. 5+ MIPS, claims of being the fastest micro in the world and running at 18 MIPS were also made during tests. While the computers are no longer sold, computers such as the Raspberry Pi can still run its operating system, RISC OS, the Acorn Archimedes was the first RISC-based home computer. The first models were released in June 1987, as the 300 and 400 series, the 400 series included four expansion slots and an ST506 controller for an internal hard drive. All models featured eight channel 8-bit stereo sound and were capable of displaying 256 colours on screen, four models were initially released with different amounts of memory, the A305, A310, A410 and A440. The 540 was unveiled in September 1990, and included higher speed SCSI, the 300 and 400 were followed by a number of machines with minor changes and upgrades, Work began on a successor to the Arthur operating system. Initially named Arthur 2, it was renamed to RISC OS2, new computers were shipped with it pre-installed. A number of new machines were introduced along with RISC OS2 and in May 1989, earlier models which shipped with Arthur could be upgraded to RISC OS2 by replacing the ROM chips containing the operating system. The A3000 used an 8 MHz ARM2 and was supplied with 1 MB of RAM, unlike the previous models, the A3000 came in a single-part case similar to the BBC Micro, Amiga 500 and Atari ST computers, with the keyboard integrated in the base unit. This kind of housing consumes a lot of space, a problem that Acorn tried to overcome by offering a monitor stand that attached to the base unit. The new model sported only an internal expansion slot, which was physically different from that of the earlier models. An external connector could interface to existing cards, although they really needed to be housed in an external case joined to the main unit. This meant that in screen modes with sixteen colours or fewer, however, in 256 colour modes,4 bits of the colour data were hardware derived and could not be adjusted. The net result was 256 colours, but only 16 of them could be assigned as desired, covering a range of the 4096 available colours. It also had no Horizontal sync interrupt, meaning that it was difficult to display additional colours by changing the palette for each scan line, in 1991, the A5000 was launched. It featured the new 25 MHz ARM3 processor,2 or 4 MB of RAM, either a 40 MB or an 80 MB hard drive and its enhanced video capabilities allowed the A5000 to comfortably display VGA resolutions of up to 800×600 pixels. It was the first Archimedes to feature a High Density capable floppy disc drive as standard and this natively supported various formats including DOS and Atari discs. A later version of the A5000 featured a 33 MHz ARM3,4 or 8 MB of RAM, an 80 or 120 MB hard drive
20.
Monochrome monitor
–
A monochrome monitor is a type of CRT computer monitor which was very common in the early days of computing, from the 1960s through the 1980s, before color monitors became popular. They are still used in applications such as computerized cash register systems. Green screen was the name for a monochrome monitor using a green P1 phosphor screen. Abundant in the early-to-mid-1980s, they succeeded Teletype terminals and preceded color CRTs, unlike color monitors, which display text and graphics in multiple colors through the use of alternating-intensity red, green, and blue phosphors, monochrome monitors have only one color of phosphor. All text and graphics are displayed in that color, some monitors have the ability to vary the brightness of individual pixels, thereby creating the illusion of depth and color, exactly like a black-and-white television. But typically only a set of brightness levels was provided to save display memory which was very expensive in the 70s and 80s. Either normal/bright or normal/dim per character as in the VT100 or black/white per pixel in the Macintosh 128K or black, dark gray, light gray, monochrome monitors are commonly available in three colors, if the P1 phosphor is used, the screen is green monochrome. If the P3 phosphor is used, the screen is amber monochrome, if the P4 phosphor is used, the screen is white monochrome, this is the same phosphor as used in early television sets. An amber screen was claimed to give improved ergonomics, specifically by reducing eye strain, well-known examples of early monochrome monitors are the VT100 from Digital Equipment Corporation, released in 1978, and the IBM5151, which accompanied the IBM PC model 5150 upon its 1981 release. This was much higher resolution than the alternative IBM Color Graphics Adapter 320×200 pixel and it could also run most programs written for the CGA cards standard graphics modes. Pixel for pixel, monochrome monitors produce sharper text and images than color CRT monitors, other green screens avoided the heavy afterglow-effects, but at the cost of much more pixelated character images. The 5151, amongst others, had brightness and contrast controls to allow the user to set their own compromise, the ghosting effects of the now-obsolete green screens have become an eye-catching visual shorthand for computer-generated text, frequently in futuristic settings. The opening titles of the first Ghost in the Shell film, green text is also featured in the Swans computer in Lost series. Monochrome monitors are particularly susceptible to burn, because the phosphors used are very high intensity. Another effect of the high-intensity phosphors is a known as ghosting. This has a place in pop culture, as evidenced in movies such as The Matrix. This ghosting effect is deliberate on some monitors, known as long persistence monitors and these use the relatively long decay period of the phosphor glow to reduce flickering
21.
Germany
–
Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a federal parliamentary republic in central-western Europe. It includes 16 constituent states, covers an area of 357,021 square kilometres, with about 82 million inhabitants, Germany is the most populous member state of the European Union. After the United States, it is the second most popular destination in the world. Germanys capital and largest metropolis is Berlin, while its largest conurbation is the Ruhr, other major cities include Hamburg, Munich, Cologne, Frankfurt, Stuttgart, Düsseldorf and Leipzig. Various Germanic tribes have inhabited the northern parts of modern Germany since classical antiquity, a region named Germania was documented before 100 AD. During the Migration Period the Germanic tribes expanded southward, beginning in the 10th century, German territories formed a central part of the Holy Roman Empire. During the 16th century, northern German regions became the centre of the Protestant Reformation, in 1871, Germany became a nation state when most of the German states unified into the Prussian-dominated German Empire. After World War I and the German Revolution of 1918–1919, the Empire was replaced by the parliamentary Weimar Republic, the establishment of the national socialist dictatorship in 1933 led to World War II and the Holocaust. After a period of Allied occupation, two German states were founded, the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic, in 1990, the country was reunified. In the 21st century, Germany is a power and has the worlds fourth-largest economy by nominal GDP. As a global leader in industrial and technological sectors, it is both the worlds third-largest exporter and importer of goods. Germany is a country with a very high standard of living sustained by a skilled. It upholds a social security and universal health system, environmental protection. Germany was a member of the European Economic Community in 1957. It is part of the Schengen Area, and became a co-founder of the Eurozone in 1999, Germany is a member of the United Nations, NATO, the G8, the G20, and the OECD. The national military expenditure is the 9th highest in the world, the English word Germany derives from the Latin Germania, which came into use after Julius Caesar adopted it for the peoples east of the Rhine. This in turn descends from Proto-Germanic *þiudiskaz popular, derived from *þeudō, descended from Proto-Indo-European *tewtéh₂- people, the discovery of the Mauer 1 mandible shows that ancient humans were present in Germany at least 600,000 years ago. The oldest complete hunting weapons found anywhere in the world were discovered in a mine in Schöningen where three 380, 000-year-old wooden javelins were unearthed
22.
Small business
–
Small businesses are privately owned corporations, partnerships, or sole proprietorships that have fewer employees and/or less annual revenue than a regular-sized business or corporation. Businesses are defined as small in terms of being able to apply for government support, some professionals operate as small businesses, such as lawyers, accountants, dentists and medical doctors. Small businesses vary a great deal in terms of size, revenues and regulatory authorization, some small businesses, such as a home accounting business, may only require a business license. However, owner-managers often do not delineate their behavior to accord with the separation between their personal and business interests. Lenders also often contract around organizational boundaries by seeking personal guarantees or accepting privately held assets as collateral, because of this behavior, researchers and analysts may wish to be cautious in the way they assess the organizational types and implied boundaries in contexts relating to owner-managed firms. These include analyses that use traditional accounting disclosures, and studies that view the firm as defined by some formal organizational structure, the term entrepreneur is often conflated with the term small business or used interchangeably with this term. While most entrepreneurial ventures start out as a business, not all small businesses are entrepreneurial in the strict sense of the term. Successful entrepreneurs have the ability to lead a business in a direction by proper planning, to adapt to changing environments and understand their own strengths. The legal definition of small business varies by country and by industry.5 million in receipts for most non manufacturing businesses. The European Union generally defines a business as one that has fewer than fifty employees. However, in Australia, a business is defined by the Fair Work Act 2009 as one with fewer than fifteen employees. By comparison, a business or mid-sized business has fewer than five hundred employees in the US. In addition to number of employees, other methods used to small companies include annual sales, value of assets and net profit. These criteria are followed by the European Union, for instance, Small businesses are usually not dominant in their field of operation. The table below serves as a guide to business size nomenclature. 9.9 million of these businesses in the United States were owned or led by a woman, African Americans have a long tradition of business ownership in the United States. Franchising is a way for business owners to benefit from the economies of scale of the big corporation. McDonalds and Subway are examples of a franchise, the small business owner can leverage a strong brand name and purchasing power of the larger company while keeping their own investment affordable
23.
Computer-aided design
–
Computer-aided design is the use of computer systems to aid in the creation, modification, analysis, or optimization of a design. CAD software is used to increase the productivity of the designer, improve the quality of design, improve communications through documentation, CAD output is often in the form of electronic files for print, machining, or other manufacturing operations. The term CADD is also used and its use in designing electronic systems is known as electronic design automation, or EDA. In mechanical design it is known as mechanical design automation or computer-aided drafting, however, it involves more than just shapes. CAD may be used to design curves and figures in space, or curves, surfaces. CAD is also used to produce computer animation for special effects in movies, advertising and technical manuals. The modern ubiquity and power of computers means that even perfume bottles, because of its enormous economic importance, CAD has been a major driving force for research in computational geometry, computer graphics, and discrete differential geometry. The design of models for object shapes, in particular, is occasionally called computer-aided geometric design. Eventually CAD provided the designer with the ability to perform engineering calculations, during this transition, calculations were still performed either by hand or by those individuals who could run computer programs. CAD was a change in the engineering industry, where draftsmen, designers. It did not eliminate departments, as much as it merged departments and empowered draftsman, CAD is just another example of the pervasive effect computers were beginning to have on industry. Current computer-aided design software packages range from 2D vector-based drafting systems to 3D solid, modern CAD packages can also frequently allow rotations in three dimensions, allowing viewing of a designed object from any desired angle, even from the inside looking out. Some CAD software is capable of mathematical modeling, in which case it may be marketed as CAD. CAD technology is used in the design of tools and machinery and in the drafting and design of all types of buildings and it can also be used to design objects. Furthermore, many CAD applications now offer advanced rendering and animation capabilities so engineers can better visualize their product designs, 4D BIM is a type of virtual construction engineering simulation incorporating time or schedule related information for project management. CAD has become an important technology within the scope of computer-aided technologies, with benefits such as lower product development costs. CAD enables designers to layout and develop work on screen, print it out, computer-aided design is one of the many tools used by engineers and designers and is used in many ways depending on the profession of the user and the type of software in question. Document management and revision control using Product Data Management, potential blockage of view corridors and shadow studies are also frequently analyzed through the use of CAD
24.
Desktop publishing
–
Desktop publishing is the creation of documents using page layout skills on a personal computer primarily for print. Desktop publishing software can generate layouts and produce typographic quality text and images comparable to traditional typography and this technology allows individuals, businesses, and other organizations to self-publish a wide range of printed matter. Desktop publishing is also the reference for digital typography. When used skillfully, desktop publishing allows the user to produce a variety of materials, from menus to magazines and books. Desktop publishing methods provide more control over design, layout, however, word processing software has evolved to include some, though by no means all, capabilities previously available only with professional printing or desktop publishing. Although what is classified as DTP software is usually limited to print and PDF publications, the content produced by desktop publishers may also be exported and used for electronic media. Desktop publishing began in 1983 with a developed by James Davise at a community newspaper in Philadelphia. The program Type Processor One ran on a PC using a card for a WYSIWYG display and was offered commercially by Best info in 1984. Later on, Adobe PageMaker overtook Microsoft Word in professional DTP in 1985, before the advent of desktop publishing, the only option available to most people for producing typed documents was a typewriter, which offered only a handful of typefaces and one or two font sizes. Indeed, one popular desktop publishing book was entitled The Mac is not a typewriter, newspapers and other print publications made the move to DTP-based programs from older layout systems such as Atex and other programs in the early 1980s. By the standards of the 2010s, early 1980s desktop publishing was a primitive affair, however, it was a revolutionary combination at the time, and was received with considerable acclaim. Behind-the-scenes technologies developed by Adobe Systems set the foundation for professional desktop publishing applications, the LaserWriter and LaserWriter Plus printers included high quality, scalable Adobe PostScript fonts built into their ROM memory. Macintosh-based systems continued to dominate the market into 1986, when the GEM-based Ventura Publisher was introduced for MS-DOS computers and this made it suitable for manuals and other long-format documents. Software was published even for 8-bit computers like the Apple II and Commodore 64, Home Publisher, The Newsroom, however, some desktop publishers who mastered the programs were able to realize truly professional results. DTP skill levels range from what may be learned in a few hours to what requires a college education, the discipline of DTP skills range from technical skills such as prepress production and programming to creative skills such as communication design and graphic image development. There are two types of pages in desktop publishing, electronic pages and virtual paper pages to be printed on physical paper pages, all computerized documents are technically electronic, which are limited in size only by computer memory or computer data storage space. Some desktop publishing programs allow custom sizes designated for large format printing used in posters, billboards, a virtual page for printing has a predesignated size of virtual printing material and can be viewed on a monitor in WYSIWYG format. Each page for printing has trim sizes and an area if bleed printing is not possible as is the case with most desktop printers
25.
MIDI
–
A single MIDI link can carry up to sixteen channels of information, each of which can be routed to a separate device. These messages are sent via a MIDI cable to other devices where they control sound generation, a simple example of a MIDI setup is the use of a MIDI controller such as an electronic musical keyboard to trigger sounds created by a sound module. This MIDI data can also be recorded into a hardware or software device called a sequencer, advantages of MIDI include compactness, ease of modification and manipulation and a wide choice of electronic instruments and synthesizer or digitally-sampled sounds. MIDI technology was standardized in 1983 by a panel of industry representatives. In June 1981, Roland founder Ikutaro Kakehashi proposed the idea of standardization to Oberheim Electronics founder Tom Oberheim, in October 1981, Kakehashi, Oberheim and Smith discussed the idea with representatives from Yamaha, Korg and Kawai. Smith proposed this standard at the Audio Engineering Society show in November 1981, MIDIs development was announced to the public by Robert Moog, in the October 1982 edition of Keyboard magazine. By the time of the January 1983 Winter NAMM Show, Smith was able to demonstrate a MIDI connection between his Prophet 600 analog synthesizer and a Roland JP-6, the MIDI Specification was published in August 1983. The MIDI standard was unveiled by Ikutaro Kakehashi and Dave Smith, MIDIs appeal was originally limited to professional musicians and record producers who wanted to use electronic instruments in the production of popular music. The standard allowed different instruments to speak with other and with computers. This interoperability allowed one device to be controlled from another, which reduced the amount of hardware musicians needed to own, MIDIs introduction coincided with the dawn of the personal computer era and the introductions of samplers and digital synthesizers. The creative possibilities brought about by MIDI technology have been credited as having helped to revive the industry in the 1980s. MIDI introduced many capabilities which transformed the way musicians work, MIDI sequencing made it possible for a user with no notation skills to build complex arrangements. A musical act with as few as one or two members, each operating multiple MIDI-enabled devices, could deliver a performance which sounds similar to that of a larger group of musicians. By performing preproduction in an environment, an artist can reduce recording costs by arriving at a recording studio with a song that is already partially completed and worked out. Educational technology enabled by MIDI has transformed music education and those new to the subject of MIDI might confuse it with digital audio. MIDI symbolically represents a note, whereas digital audio represents the sound produced by the note, MIDI was invented so that musical instruments could communicate with each other and so that one instrument can control another. Analog synthesizers that have no digital component and were built prior to MIDIs development can be retrofit with kits that convert MIDI messages into analog control voltages. When a note is played on a MIDI instrument, it generates a signal that can be used to trigger a note on another instrument
26.
Music sequencer
–
This software also improved on the quality of the earlier sequencers which tended to be mechanical sounding and were only able to play back notes of exactly equal duration. Software-based sequencers allowed musicians to program performances that were more expressive and these new sequencers could also be used to control external synthesizers, especially rackmounted sound modules, and it was no longer necessary for each synthesizer to have its own devoted keyboard. As the technology matured, sequencers gained more features, such as the ability to record multitrack audio, Sequencers used for audio recording are called digital audio workstations. Many modern sequencers can be used to control virtual instruments implemented as software plug-ins and this allows musicians to replace expensive and cumbersome standalone synthesizers with their software equivalents. Today the term sequencer is used to describe software. Workstation keyboards have their own proprietary built-in MIDI sequencers, drum machines and some older synthesizers have their own step sequencer built in. There are still also standalone hardware MIDI sequencers, although the demand for those has diminished greatly due to the greater feature set of their software counterparts. Music sequencers are often categorized by handling data types, as following, or, the phrase samplers including Groove machines, etc. Also, music sequencer can be categorized by its construction and supporting modes, realtime sequencers record the musical notes in real-time as on audio recorders, and play back musical notes with designated tempo, quantizations, and pitch. For editing, usually punch in/punch out feature originated in the recording is provided. For detailed editing, possibly another visual editing modes under graphical user interface may be more suitable, anyway, this mode provides usability similar to the audio recorder already familiarized by musicians, and it is widely supported on software sequencer, DAW, and built-in hardware sequencers. Analog sequencers are typically implemented with analog electronics, and play the musical notes designated by a series of knobs or sliders corresponding to each musical note and it is designed for both composition and live performance, users can change the musical notes at any time without regarding recording mode. And also possibly, the time-interval between each note can be independently adjustable. Typically, analog sequencer is used to generate the repeated minimalistic phrases which is reminiscent of Tangerine Dream, on the bass machines, select a step note from a chromatic keypads, then select a step duration from a group of length-buttons, sequentially. In general, step mode, along with roughly quantized semi-realtime mode, is supported on the analog drum machines, bass machines. Software sequencer is a class of application software providing a functionality of music sequencer, the features provided as sequencers vary widely depending on the software, even an analog sequencer can be simulated. The user may control the software sequencer either by using the user interfaces or a specialized input devices. The early music sequencers were sound producing devices such as musical instruments, music boxes, mechanical organs, player pianos
27.
Musical instrument
–
A musical instrument is an instrument created or adapted to make musical sounds. In principle, any object that produces sound can be a musical instrument—it is through purpose that the object becomes a musical instrument, the history of musical instruments dates to the beginnings of human culture. Early musical instruments may have used for ritual, such as a trumpet to signal success on the hunt. Cultures eventually developed composition and performance of melodies for entertainment, Musical instruments evolved in step with changing applications. The date and origin of the first device considered an instrument is disputed. The oldest object that some refer to as a musical instrument. Some consensus dates early flutes to about 37,000 years ago, many early musical instruments were made from animal skins, bone, wood, and other non-durable materials. Musical instruments developed independently in many populated regions of the world, however, contact among civilizations caused rapid spread and adaptation of most instruments in places far from their origin. By the Middle Ages, instruments from Mesopotamia were in maritime Southeast Asia, development in the Americas occurred at a slower pace, but cultures of North, Central, and South America shared musical instruments. By 1400, musical instrument development slowed in areas and was dominated by the Occident. Musical instrument classification is a discipline in its own right, Instruments can be classified by their effective range, their material composition, their size, etc. However, the most common method, Hornbostel-Sachs, uses the means by which they produce sound. The academic study of instruments is called organology. Once humans moved from making sounds with their bodies—for example, by using objects to create music from sounds. Primitive instruments were designed to emulate natural sounds, and their purpose was ritual rather than entertainment. The concept of melody and the pursuit of musical composition were unknown to early players of musical instruments. A player sounding a flute to signal the start of a hunt does so without thought of the notion of making music. Musical instruments are constructed in an array of styles and shapes
28.
Atari TT030
–
The Atari TT030 is a member of the Atari ST family, released in 1990. In 1992 the TT was replaced by the Atari Falcon, a low cost consumer oriented machine with improved graphics and sound capability. The Falcon possessed only a fraction of the TTs raw CPU performance, though well priced for a workstation machine, the TTs high cost kept it mostly out of reach of the existing Atari ST market until after the TT was discontinued and sold at discount. The nascent open source movement eventually filled the void, by 1995 NetBSD had also been ported to the Atari TT. At that time, the highest performance member was the 68020 and it was the first true thirty-two bit bus/thirty-two bit instruction chip from Motorola. Unlike the 68000 used in the original STs, the 68020 was capable of fetching a 32-bit value in one cycle, while the older STs took two. The TT was initially designed around the 68020 CPU, however as the project progressed, the 68020 still lacked certain important features offered by the next successor in the 68000 line, the new 68030. When the decision was made to switch from a 68020 to a 68030 CPU, the original specifications for the TTs clock speed was 16 MHz, which was selected to maintain backward compatibility. The existing ST chips used in the TT could not handle anything over 16 MHz, some software also had problems running at faster speeds. To make the work with a 32 MHz 68030, Atari Corp. had to scale back their plans somewhat. As a result, the runs at 32 MHz, while the system bus runs at 16 MHz. This is similar to the tactic employed by Apple with the ill-fated Macintosh IIvx, TOS3.01 was the operating system that came with the Atari TT. It was a 512 kB ROM specifically designed for the TT, however, it did not feature pre-emptive multitasking. Another variant, known as TT/X, used Unix System V R4, the TT030 was first introduced at CeBIT in Hannover, Germany and launched in 1990. It retailed for $2995 with 2 MB RAM and a 50 MB hard drive, the US release came the following year. In 1993, Atari Corp. s exit from the computer business marked the end of the TT, a number of TT machines were built as developer systems for Jaguar. The TT featured a number of devices that had previously been unavailable for Atari Corp. systems, for example, an Appletalk network port, VME expansion bus, new VGA video graphics modes, and a true SCSI port. Existing ST features such as MIDI ports, a port
29.
Atari MEGA STE
–
The Atari Mega STE was Atari Corporations last ST series personal computer, released in 1991. The MEGA STE was essentially a late-model 680x0-based STE mounted in the case of the otherwise unrelated Atari TT computer, the resulting machine was a more business-like version of the ST line. The MEGA STE is based on STE hardware, physically, the 2 MB and 4 MB models shipped with a high resolution mono monitor, and an internal SCSI hard disk.44 MB HD floppy support. Support for a mouse button was included, too. An upgrade to the system was also produced after the first units were shipped that upgraded the onboard ROMs to TOS2.05. Web page of Guillaume Tello What to do with a Mega STE, & Programs for the ST/TT family and technical articles Atari MegaSTe Memory Cache The MEGA STe review,1992
30.
Atari Falcon
–
The Atari Falcon030 Computer System is a personal computer released by Atari Corporation in 1992. The machine is based on a Motorola 68030 main CPU, and had a Motorola 56000 digital signal processor, the Falcon was Ataris final computer product. The Falcon sold in small numbers, chiefly to hobbyists. Atari Corp. created a number of prototypes of the Falcon040, the microbox case resembled the later Sony PlayStation 2, right down to the ability to run it vertically or horizontally. It is even referenced in the PS2 patent applications, shortly after release, Atari Corp. bundled the MultiTOS operating system in addition to TOS. TOS remained in ROM, and MultiTOS was supplied on floppy disk, in 1995, the music company C-Lab bought the rights to the Falcon hardware design and began producing their own versions. The Falcon Mk I was a continuation of Atari Corp. s Falcon030 with TOS4.04. The Falcon Mk X was mounted in a 19 1U rack case, with external keyboard, today, the Falcon is one of Atari Corp. s most popular machines for hardware modding. Due to its capabilities, several accelerators have been produced. Some of them overclock the CPU and/or the bus, while others upgrade the CPU to a Motorola 68060, processor, Motorola 68030 at 16 MHz with MMU and 256 byte instruction and data caches. FPU, optional Motorola 68881 or Motorola 68882, PLCC socket DSP, graphics, VIDEL fully programmable video controller. In order to achieve the potential of the Videl one has to use one of the numerous existing alternative utilities, such as Videlity, Videl Inside. BLiTTER graphics co-processor at 16 MHz Backwards compatible with all ST resolutions, character set, Atari ST character set, based on codepage 437. Audio, 16-bit audio input and output up to 50 kHz -8 stereo channels SDMA sound/DMA Co-processor Yamaha Y3439-F3 Channel PSG Memory,1,4, or 14 MB of RAM with 512 kB ROM. Bus Speed,16 MHz, Bus width,16 bit Drives and it runs at about 5.76 MIPS while displaying video modes with the fewest colors. Despite its 32-bit CPU, the Falcon does not have 32-bit architecture throughout its design, as it has a 16-bit data bus and this reduces the 68030s performance when not operating inside its tiny cache and limits the maximum system memory to ~14 MB. The microprocessor is supported by a Motorola 56001 DSP clocked at 32 MHz, although it is oriented to sound processing, it is also capable of graphics processing. It can even, jointly with the 68030, play MP3 files in real time, another innovation is the VIDEL video controller
31.
Atari, Inc.
–
Atari, Inc. was an American video game developer and home computer company founded in 1972 by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney. In 1966, Nolan Bushnell saw Spacewar. for the first time at the University of Utah, the resulting game, Computer Space, was released by a coin-op game company, Nutting Associates. For the first time at the University of Utah, Computer Space did not fare well commercially when it was placed in Nuttings customary market, bars. Feeling that the game was too complex for the average customer unfamiliar and unsure with the new technology. Bushnell and Ted Dabney left Nutting to form their own engineering firm, Syzygy Engineering, initially wanting to start Syzygy off with a driving game, Bushnell had concerns that it might be too complicated for the young Alcorns first game. In May 1972, Bushnell had seen a demonstration of the Magnavox Odyssey, according to Alcorn, Bushnell decided to have him produce an arcade version of the Odysseys Tennis game, which would go on to be named Pong. Atari later had to pay Magnavox a licensing fee after the latter sued Atari because of this, when they went to incorporate their firm that June, they soon found that Syzygy already existed in California. Atari was incorporated in the state of California on June 27,1972, by August 1972, the first Pong was completed. It consisted of a black and white television from Walgreens, the game hardware. It was placed in a Sunnyvale tavern by the name of Andy Capps to test its viability. When the game begun malfunctioning a few days later and Alcorn returned to fix the machine, he was met by a lineup of people waiting for the bar to open so they could play the game. On examination, the turned out to be mundane, the coin collector was filled to overflowing with quarters, and when customers tried to jam them in anyway. Though Kees relationship to Atari was discovered in 1974, Joe Keenan did such a job managing the subsidiary that he was promoted to president of Atari that same year. In 1975, Bushnell started an effort to produce a video game console that was capable of playing all four of Ataris then-current games. Development took place at an engineering lab, which initially had serious difficulties trying to produce such a machine. However, in early 1976 the now-famous MOS Technology 6502 was released, the result was the Atari 2600, released in October 1977 as the Video Computer System, one of the most successful consoles in history. Bushnell knew he had another hit on his hands. In 1976 Bushnell sold Atari to Warner Communications for $28 million and he departed from the division in 1979
32.
Commodore International
–
Commodore International was a North American home computer and electronics manufacturer. Commodore International, along with its subsidiary Commodore Business Machines, participated in the development of the computer industry in the 1970s and 1980s. The company developed and marketed one of the worlds best-selling desktop computers, the company that would become Commodore Business Machines, Inc. was founded in 1954 in Toronto as the Commodore Portable Typewriter Company by Polish immigrant and Auschwitz survivor Jack Tramiel. He moved to Toronto to start production, by the late 1950s a wave of Japanese machines forced most North American typewriter companies to cease business, but Tramiel instead turned to adding machines. In 1955, the company was incorporated as Commodore Business Machines. In 1962, Commodore went public on the New York Stock Exchange, in the late 1960s, history repeated itself when Japanese firms started producing and exporting adding machines. The companys main investor and chairman, Irving Gould, suggested that Tramiel travel to Japan to understand how to compete, instead, he returned with the new idea to produce electronic calculators, which were just coming on the market. Commodore soon had a profitable calculator line and was one of the popular brands in the early 1970s. However, in 1975, Texas Instruments, the supplier of calculator parts, entered the market directly. Commodore obtained an infusion of cash from Gould, which Tramiel used beginning in 1976 to purchase several second-source chip suppliers, including MOS Technology, Inc. in order to assure his supply. He agreed to buy MOS, which was having troubles of its own, through the 1970s, Commodore also produced numerous peripherals and consumer electronic products such as the Chessmate, a chess computer based around a MOS6504 chip, released in 1978. In December 2007 when Tramiel was visiting the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California, for the 25th anniversary of the Commodore 64 and he said, I wanted to call my company General, but theres so many Generals in the U. S. Then I went to Admiral, but that was taken, so I wind up in Berlin, Germany, with my wife, and we were in a cab, and the cab made a short stop, and in front of us was an Opel Commodore. Tramiel gave this account in interviews, but Opels Commodore didnt debut until 1967. Once Chuck Peddle had taken over engineering at Commodore, he convinced Jack Tramiel that calculators were already a dead end, from PETs 1977 debut, Commodore would be a computer company. The operational headquarters, where research and development of new products occurred, retained the name Commodore Business Machines, in 1980 Commodore launched production for the European market in Braunschweig. By 1980 Commodore was one of the three largest microcomputer companies, and the largest in the Common Market and this was addressed with the introduction of the VIC-20 in 1981, which was introduced at a cost of US$299 and sold in retail stores. Commodore took out ads featuring William Shatner asking consumers Why buy just a video game
33.
Jay Miner
–
Jay Glenn Miner was an American integrated circuit designer, known primarily for developing multimedia chips for the Atari 2600 and Atari 8-bit family and as the father of the Amiga. He received a BS in EECS from UC Berkeley in 1959, Miner started in the electronics industry with a number of designs in the medical world, including a remote-control pacemaker. He moved to Atari in the late 1970s, one of his first successes was to combine an entire breadboard of components into a single chip, known as the TIA. The TIA was the hardware for the Atari 2600, which would go on to sell millions. After working on the TIA he headed up the design of the chip set known as ANTIC. These chips would be used for the Atari 8-bit family of home computers, in the early 1980s, Jay, along with other Atari staffers, had become fed up with management and decamped. They set up another project under a new company in Santa Clara, called Hi-Toro. There, they started to create a new Motorola 68000-based games console, codenamed Lorraine, to raise money for the Lorraine project, Amiga Corp. Atari continued to be interested in the teams efforts throughout this period, also in the early 1980s Jay worked on a project with Intermedics, Inc. to create their first microprocessor-based cardiac pacemaker. The microprocessor was called Lazarus and the pacemaker was eventually called Cosmos, Jay was listed co-inventor on two patents. US patent 4390022, Richard V. Calfee & Jay Miner, Implantable device with microprocessor control, issued 1983-06-28, assigned to Intermedics, Inc. US patent 4404972, Pat L. Gordon, Richard V. Calfee & Jay Miner, Implantable device with microprocessor control, issued 1983-06-28, assigned to Intermedics, the Amiga crew, having continuing serious financial problems, had sought more monetary support from investors that entire Spring. Amiga entered into discussions with Commodore, the discussions ultimately led to Commodore wanting to purchase Amiga outright, which would cancel any outstanding contracts - including Atari Inc. s. Jay worked at Commodore-Amiga for several years, in Los Gatos, Miner later worked as a consultant for Commodore until it went bankrupt. He was known as the Padre of the Amiga among Amiga users, Jay always took his dog Mitchy with him wherever he went. Jay endured kidney problems for most of his life, according to his wife and his sister donated one of her own. Miner died due to complications from kidney failure at the age of 62, on the Edge, The Spectacular Rise and Fall of Commodore, Variant Press. Jay Miner Society Amiga Forever Premium Edition and Amiga Forever Video Edition, a DVD set featuring Jay Miner in several interviews and speeches
34.
Atari 2600
–
The Atari 2600 is a home video game console by Atari, Inc. This format contrasts with the model of having non-microprocessor dedicated hardware. The console was sold as the Atari VCS, an abbreviation for Video Computer System. Following the release of the Atari 5200 in 1982, the VCS was renamed to the Atari 2600, after the units Atari part number, CX2600. The 2600 was typically bundled with two controllers, a conjoined pair of paddle controllers, and a game cartridge, initially Combat. Ted Dabney and Nolan Bushnell developed the Atari gaming system in the 1970s, originally operating under the name Syzygy, Bushnell and Dabney changed the name of their company to Atari in 1972. In 1973, Atari Inc. had purchased an engineering think tank called Cyan Engineering to research next-generation video game systems, and had been working on a prototype known as Stella for some time. Unlike prior generations of machines that use custom logic to play a number of games, its core is a complete CPU. It was combined with a RAM-and-I/O chip, the MOS Technology 6532, the first two versions of the machine contain a fourth chip, a standard CMOS logic buffer IC, making Stella cost-effective. Some later versions of the console eliminated the buffer chip, programs for small computers of the time were generally stored on cassette tapes, floppy disks, or paper tape. In 1976, Fairchild Semiconductor released their own CPU-based system, the Video Entertainment System. Stella was still not ready for production, but it was clear that it needed to be there were a number of me too products filling up the market. Atari Inc. didnt have the flow to complete the system quickly. Nolan Bushnell eventually turned to Warner Communications, and sold the company to them in 1976 for US$28 million on the promise that Stella would be produced as soon as possible. Key to the success of the machine was the hiring of Jay Miner. Once that was completed and debugged, the system was ready for shipping, the unit was originally priced at US$199, and shipped with two joysticks and a Combat cartridge. In a move to compete directly with the Channel F, Atari Inc. named the machine the Video Computer System, as the Channel F was at that point known as the VES, for Video Entertainment System. The VCS was also rebadged as the Sears Video Arcade and sold through Sears, Roebuck, another breakthrough for gaming systems was Ataris invention of a computer-controlled opponent, rather than the usual two-player or asymmetric challenges of the past
35.
Amiga Corporation
–
Amiga Corporation was a United States computer company formed in the early 1980s as Hi-Toro. It is most famous for having developed the Amiga computer, code named Lorraine, in the early 1980s Jay Miner, along with other Atari staffers, had become fed up with management and decamped. In September 1982, they set up another project under a new company in Santa Clara, California, called Hi-Toro. There, they started to create a new 68000-based games console, codenamed Lorraine, the initial start-up financing of Amiga Corporation was provided by three dentists in Florida, who later regained their investment once Commodore bought the company. During development in 1983, Amiga had exhausted venture capital and was desperate for more financing, Jay Miner and company approached former employer Atari, and the Warner owned Atari paid Amiga to continue development work. In return Atari was to obtain one-year exclusive use of the design, Atari had plans for a 68000-based machine, code-named Mickey, that would have used customized chips, but details were sparse. During this period a downturn started in the game business that would soon turn into an outright rout known as the Video game crash of 1983. By the end of the year, Atari was losing about $1 million a day, for some time, no one was interested. Meanwhile, at Commodore International a fight was brewing between Jack Tramiel, the president, and Irving Gould, the primary shareholder, the fighting continued until Tramiel was dismissed on January 13,1984. While initially entering talks with Tramiel, Amigas talks eventually fell through as Tramiel told Amiga staff that he was interested in the chipset. In the meantime, he had set his chief engineer the task of developing a new low-cost, Tramiels design for his next generation computer was 95% completed by June. Tramiel discovered that Warner Communications wanted to sell Atari, which at that point was losing about $10,000 a day, interested in Ataris overseas manufacturing and worldwide distribution network for his new computer, he approached Atari and entered talks. After on again/off again negotiations with Atari in May and June 1984, Tramiel had secured his funding, Commodore almost immediately filed an injunction against Tramiel and Atari Corp. seeking to bar them from releasing their new computer. One of Tramiels first acts after forming Atari Corp. was to fire most of Ataris remaining staff and it was during this time in late July that Tramiels representatives discovered the original Atari Inc. /Amiga contract. BYTE had reported in April 1984 that Amiga is developing a 68000-based home computer with a graphics processor. With 128K bytes of RAM and a drive, the computer will reportedly sell for less than $1000 late this year. It turned out that Amiga was supposed to deliver the Amiga chipset to Atari Inc. on June 30,1984 or forfeit the company, remembering Tramiels visit that Spring during their investor campaign, they began scrambling for another large investor. So, at around the time that Tramiel was in negotiations with Atari
36.
Warner Communications
–
Warner Communications Inc. was established in 1972 when Kinney National Company spun off its non-entertainment assets due to a financial scandal over its parking operations, and changed its name. It was the parent company for Warner Bros and it also owned DC Comics and Mad magazine. Warner made considerable profits with Atari, Inc. which it owned from 1976 to 1984, in 1979, Warner formed a joint venture with credit card company American Express, Warner-Amex Satellite Entertainment, which owned such cable channels as MTV, Nickelodeon, and The Movie Channel. Warner bought out American Expresss half in 1984, and sold the venture a year later to Viacom, in 1982, Warner purchased Popular Library from CBS Publications. In 1987, it was announced that Warner Communications and Time Inc. were to merge, before the merger closed in 1989, Warner purchased Lorimar-Telepictures. In early 1990, the companies were named Time Warner. The Warner Communications name was credited on releases from Elektra Records. The Warner Music Group continues to use the Big W logo, Kinney National Company Kinney Parking Company National Kinney Corporation Warner Bros. -Seven Arts
37.
Jack Tramiel
–
Jack Tramiel was a Polish American businessman, best known for founding Commodore International. The Commodore PET, Commodore VIC-20 and Commodore 64 are some home computers produced while he was running the company, Tramiel later formed Atari Corporation after he purchased the remnants of the original Atari, Inc. from its parent company. Tramiel was born as Idek Trzmiel into a Jewish family, the son of Abram Josef Trzmiel, after the German invasion of Poland in 1939 his family was transported by German occupiers to the Jewish ghetto in Łódź, where he worked in a garment factory. When the ghettos were liquidated his family was sent to the Auschwitz concentration camp and he was examined by Josef Mengele and selected for a work party, after which he and his father were sent to the labor camp Ahlem near Hanover, while his mother remained at Auschwitz. Like many other inmates, his father was reported to have died of typhus in the camp, however. Tramiel was rescued from the camp in April 1945 by the 84th Infantry Division of the US army. On 10 November 1947, Tramiel immigrated to the United States and he soon joined the U. S. Army, where he learned how to repair office equipment, including typewriters. In 1953, while working as a driver, Tramiel bought a shop in the Bronx to repair office machinery. He named it Commodore Portable Typewriter, Tramiel wanted a military-style name for his company, but names such as Admiral and General were already taken, so he settled on the Commodore name. In 1955, Tramiel signed a deal with a Czechoslovak typewriter manufacturer Zbrojovka Brno NP to assemble, in 1962, Commodore went public, but the arrival of Japanese typewriters in the U. S. market made the selling of Czechoslovakian typewriters unprofitable. Stung twice by the source, Gould suggested that Tramiel travel to Japan to learn why they were able to outcompete North Americans in their own local markets. It was during this trip that Tramiel saw the first digital calculators, when Commodore released its first calculators, combining an LED display from Bowmar and an integrated circuit from Texas Instruments, it found a ready market. However, after realizing the size of the market, TI decided to cut Commodore out of the middle. When their lead designer, Chuck Peddle, told Tramiel that calculators were an end and computers were the future. Peddle responded with the Commodore PET, based on his companys MOS Technology 6502 processor and it was first shown, privately, at the Chicago Consumer Electronics Show in 1977, and soon the company was receiving 50 calls a day from dealers wanting to sell the computer. The PET became a success—especially in the field, where its all-in-one design was a major advantage. Much of their success with the PET came from the decision to sell directly to large customers. The first PET computers were sold primarily in Europe, where Commodore had also introduced the first wave of digital handheld calculators, Commodore responded with the VIC-20, and then the Commodore 64, which became the best-selling home computer of all time
38.
National Semiconductor
–
National Semiconductor was an American semiconductor manufacturer which specialized in analog devices and subsystems, formerly with headquarters in Santa Clara, California, United States. The company produced power management integrated circuits, display drivers, audio and operational amplifiers, communication interface products, Nationals key markets included wireless handsets, displays and a variety of broad electronics markets, including medical, automotive, industrial and test and measurement applications. On September 23,2011, the company became part of Texas Instruments as the Silicon Valley division. The founding of the new company was followed by Sperry Rand filing a lawsuit against National Semiconductor for patent infringement, by 1965, as it was reaching the courts, the preliminaries of the lawsuit had caused the stock value of National to be depressed. The depressed stock values allowed Peter J Sprague to invest heavily in the company with Spragues family funds, Sprague also relied on further financial backing from a pair of west coast investment firms and a New York underwriter to take control as the Chairman of National Semiconductor. At that time Sprague was 27 years old, young characterised the era as the beginning of venture capitalism. That same year National Semiconductor acquired Molectro, Molectro was founded in 1962, in Santa Clara, California by J. Nall and D. Spittlehouse, who were formerly employed at Fairchild Camera and Instrument Corporation. The acquisition also brought to National Semiconductor two experts in linear semiconductor technologies, Robert Widlar and Dave Talbert, who were formerly employed at Fairchild. The acquisition of Molectro provided National with the technology to itself in the fabrication. In 1967, Sprague hired five top executives away from Fairchild, among whom were Charles E. Sporck, at the time of Sporcks hiring, Robert Noyce was de facto head of semiconductor operations at Fairchild and Sporck was his operations manager. Sporck was appointed President and CEO of National, to make the deal better for Sporcks hiring and appointment for half his former salary at Fairchild, Sporck was allotted a substantial share of Nationals stock. In essence, Sporck took four of his personnel from Fairchild with him as well as three others from TI, Perkin-Elmer and Hewlett Packard to form a new eight man team at National Semiconductor. Incidentally, Sporck had been Widlars superior at Fairchild before Widlar left Fairchild to join Molectro due to a dispute with Sporck. In 1968, National shifted its headquarters from Danbury, Connecticut to Santa Clara, however, like many companies, National retained its registration as a Delaware corporation, for legal and financial expediency. Over the years National Semiconductor acquired several companies like Fairchild Semiconductor, however, over time National Semiconductor spun off these acquisitions. Fairchild Semiconductor became a company again in 1997 and the Cyrix microprocessors division was sold to VIA Technologies of Taiwan in 1999. Based largely on the success of the WebPad National formed the Information Appliance division in 1998, the Information Appliance Division was sold to AMD in 2003. Immediately after becoming CEO, Sporck started a price war among semiconductor companies
39.
NS320xx
–
The 320xx or NS32000 was a series of microprocessors from National Semiconductor. They were likely the first 32-bit general-purpose microprocessors on the market, the 320xx series was also used as the basis of the Swordfish microcontroller. It was replaced by the CompactRISC architecture in mid-1990s, the instruction set was very much in the CISC model, with 2-operand instructions, memory-to-memory operations, flexible addressing modes, and variable-length byte-aligned instruction encoding. Addressing modes could involve up to two displacements and two memory indirections per operand as well as scaled indexing, making the longest conceivable instruction 23 bytes, the actual number of instructions was much lower than that of contemporary RISC processors. Unlike some other processors, autoincrement of the register was not provided. Uniquely, the size of the displacement was encoded in its most significant bits,0,10 and 11 preceded 7-, 14-, general-purpose operands were specified using a 5-bit field. To this could be added an index byte, and up to 2 variable-length displacements per operand, the original 32016 had a 16-bit external databus, a 24-bit external address bus, and a full 32-bit instruction set. It also included a coprocessor interface, allowing coprocessors such as FPUs and MMUs to be attached as peers to the main processor, again, the Series 32000 approach has become the standard behavior. The first chip in the series was originally called 16032, later renamed 32016 to emphasize its 32-bit internals and it became available in 1982, and may have been the first 32-bit chip to reach mass production and sale. The 16032 would do 32-bit instructions as fast as 16-bit instructions, the Z language was similar to todays Verilog and VHDL, but had a Pascal-like syntax and was optimized for two-phase clock designs. The instruction set resembled, but was not compatible with, that of the popular DEC VAX minicomputer and it was extremely complex but mostly regular, with a large set of addressing modes. The 32016 was by some considered to be similar to the Motorola 68000. This was rejected by NSC employees, one of the key marketing phrases of the time was Elegance is Everything, comparing the highly orthogonal Series 32000 to the kludge. One key difference was the Motorolas use of register and data registers. The Series 32000 had general-purpose registers, the original intention of National Semiconductor was to design a VAX-11 on a chip, and National took DEC to court in California to ensure the legality of the design. When DEC managed to get the lawsuit moved to Massachusetts, the lawsuit was dropped, the 32032 was introduced in 1984. It was almost completely compatible, but featured a 32-bit data bus for somewhat faster performance, the 32032 was also renamed at the same time as the 16032, and the new name was 32032. There was also a 32008, a 32016 with a data bus cut down to 8-bits wide for low-cost applications and it was philosophically similar to the MC68008, and equally unpopular
40.
Commodore 64
–
The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, C-64, C=64, or occasionally CBM64 or VIC-64 in Sweden, is an 8-bit home computer introduced in January 1982 by Commodore International. It is listed in the Guinness World Records as the single computer model of all time. Volume production started in early 1982, marketing in August for US$595, preceded by the Commodore VIC-20 and Commodore PET, the C64 took its name from its 64 kilobytes of RAM. It had superior sound and graphical specifications compared to earlier systems such as the Apple II and Atari 800, with multi-color sprites. The C64 dominated the low-end computer market for most of the 1980s. Sam Tramiel, a later Atari president and the son of Commodores founder, said in a 1989 interview, When I was at Commodore we were building 400,000 C64s a month for a couple of years. In the UK market, the C64 faced competition from the BBC Micro and the ZX Spectrum, part of the Commodore 64s success was its sale in regular retail stores instead of only electronics and/or computer hobbyist specialty stores. Commodore produced many of its parts in-house to control costs, including custom integrated circuit chips from MOS Technology and it has been compared to the Ford Model T automobile for its role in bringing a new technology to middle-class households via creative and affordable mass-production. Approximately 10,000 commercial software titles have made for the Commodore 64 including development tools, office productivity applications. C64 emulators allow anyone with a computer, or a compatible video game console. The C64 is also credited with popularizing the computer demoscene and is used today by some computer hobbyists. In 2008,17 years after it was taken off the market, in January 1981, MOS Technology, Inc. Commodores integrated circuit design subsidiary, initiated a project to design the graphic, Design work for the chips, named MOS Technology VIC-II and MOS Technology SID, was completed in November 1981. Commodore then began a game console project that would use the new chips—called the Ultimax or the Commodore MAX Machine and this project was eventually cancelled after just a few machines were manufactured for the Japanese market. At the same time, Robert Bob Russell and Robert Bob Yannes were critical of the current product line-up at Commodore, with the support of Al Charpentier and Charles Winterble, they proposed to Commodore CEO Jack Tramiel a true low-cost sequel to the VIC-20. Tramiel dictated that the machine should have 64 KB of random-access memory, although 64-Kbit dynamic random-access memory chips cost over US$100 at the time, he knew that DRAM prices were falling, and would drop to an acceptable level before full production was reached. The product was named the VIC-40 as the successor to the popular VIC-20. The team that constructed it consisted of Yash Terakura, Bob Russell, Bob Yannes, the design, prototypes and some sample software were finished in time for the show, after the team had worked tirelessly over both Thanksgiving and Christmas weekends
41.
Amiga 1000
–
The Commodore Amiga 1000, also known as the A1000 and originally simply as the Amiga, is the first personal computer released by Commodore International in the Amiga line. The primary memory can be expanded internally with a manufacturer supplied 256 kB module for a total of 512 kB of DRAM, using the external slot the primary memory can be expanded up to 8.5 MB. The A1000s case was designed by Howard Stolz, as Senior Industrial Designer at Commodore, Stolz was the mechanical lead and primary interface with Sanyo in Japan, the contract manufacturer for the A1000 casing. The Amiga 1000 was manufactured in two variations, One uses the NTSC television standard and the uses the PAL television standard. The NTSC variant was the initial model manufactured and sold in North America, the later PAL model was manufactured in Germany and sold in countries using the PAL television standard. The first NTSC systems lacks the EHB video mode which is present in all later Amiga models, because AmigaOS was rather buggy at the time of the A1000s release, the OS was not placed in ROM then. Instead, the A1000 includes a daughterboard with 256 kB of RAM, dubbed the writable control store, the WCS is write-protected after loading, and system resets do not require a reload of the WCS. In Europe, the WCS was often referred to as WOM, the preproduction Amiga released to developers in early 1985 contained 128 kB of RAM with an option to expand it to 256 kB. Commodore later increased the memory to 256 kB due to objections by the Amiga development team. The names of the chips were different, Denise and Paula were called Daphne. The casing of the preproduction Amiga was almost identical to the production version and it did not have the developer signatures or the carry handle. The Amiga 1000 has a Motorola 68000 CPU running at 7.15909 MHz or 7.09379 MHz, the system clock timings are derived from the video frequency, which simplifies glue logic and allows the Amiga 1000 to make do with a single crystal. In keeping with its game heritage, the chipset was designed to synchronize CPU memory access. The A1000 also has a TV MOD output, into which an RF Modulator can be plugged, the original 68000 CPU can be directly replaced with a Motorola 68010, which can execute instructions slightly faster than the 68000 but also introduces a small degree of software incompatibility. Third-party CPU upgrades, which fit in the CPU socket, use faster 68020/68881 or 68030/68882 microprocessors. Such upgrades often have the option to revert to 68000 mode for full compatibility, some boards have a socket to seat the original 68000, whereas the 68030 cards typically come with an on-board 68000. The original Amiga 1000 is the model to have 256 kB of Amiga Chip RAM. RAM may also be upgraded via official and third-party upgrades, with an upper limit of about 9 MB of fast RAM due to the 68000s 24-bit address bus
42.
Microsoft
–
Its best known software products are the Microsoft Windows line of operating systems, Microsoft Office office suite, and Internet Explorer and Edge web browsers. Its flagship hardware products are the Xbox video game consoles and the Microsoft Surface tablet lineup, as of 2016, it was the worlds largest software maker by revenue, and one of the worlds most valuable companies. Microsoft was founded by Paul Allen and Bill Gates on April 4,1975, to develop and it rose to dominate the personal computer operating system market with MS-DOS in the mid-1980s, followed by Microsoft Windows. The companys 1986 initial public offering, and subsequent rise in its share price, since the 1990s, it has increasingly diversified from the operating system market and has made a number of corporate acquisitions. In May 2011, Microsoft acquired Skype Technologies for $8.5 billion, in June 2012, Microsoft entered the personal computer production market for the first time, with the launch of the Microsoft Surface, a line of tablet computers. The word Microsoft is a portmanteau of microcomputer and software, Paul Allen and Bill Gates, childhood friends with a passion for computer programming, sought to make a successful business utilizing their shared skills. In 1972 they founded their first company, named Traf-O-Data, which offered a computer that tracked and analyzed automobile traffic data. Allen went on to pursue a degree in science at Washington State University. The January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics featured Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systemss Altair 8800 microcomputer, Allen suggested that they could program a BASIC interpreter for the device, after a call from Gates claiming to have a working interpreter, MITS requested a demonstration. Since they didnt actually have one, Allen worked on a simulator for the Altair while Gates developed the interpreter and they officially established Microsoft on April 4,1975, with Gates as the CEO. Allen came up with the name of Micro-Soft, as recounted in a 1995 Fortune magazine article. In August 1977 the company formed an agreement with ASCII Magazine in Japan, resulting in its first international office, the company moved to a new home in Bellevue, Washington in January 1979. Microsoft entered the OS business in 1980 with its own version of Unix, however, it was MS-DOS that solidified the companys dominance. For this deal, Microsoft purchased a CP/M clone called 86-DOS from Seattle Computer Products, branding it as MS-DOS, following the release of the IBM PC in August 1981, Microsoft retained ownership of MS-DOS. Since IBM copyrighted the IBM PC BIOS, other companies had to engineer it in order for non-IBM hardware to run as IBM PC compatibles. Due to various factors, such as MS-DOSs available software selection, the company expanded into new markets with the release of the Microsoft Mouse in 1983, as well as with a publishing division named Microsoft Press. Paul Allen resigned from Microsoft in 1983 after developing Hodgkins disease, while jointly developing a new OS with IBM in 1984, OS/2, Microsoft released Microsoft Windows, a graphical extension for MS-DOS, on November 20,1985. Once Microsoft informed IBM of NT, the OS/2 partnership deteriorated, in 1990, Microsoft introduced its office suite, Microsoft Office
