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Reworking the Way We Work™ Overcoming Technophobia in Five Minutes Flat By Jeff Berner
You aren't "computer-illiterate." The computer industry, their ad agencies and technical writers are often "people-illiterate." Computing is an awesome story of miniaturization, problem-solving and the promise of a revolution in the way we live and work. But from the mouths of salespeople it comes out RAMs and "megs." You don't have to know much jargon to use what the French call the microordinateur-"organizing tool"-successfully. If you go to buy a car and all you hear is compression ratios and torque ratings, you'd wonder what they're trying to hide. Of course, if you know what those terms mean, you'll be in a better position to measure the engine's capability and to evaluate the car. You want a vehicle that will get you to your destinations dependably. You want your computer be an information vehicle of that takes you places, too. First, think of what you had for breakfast this morning. Got it in mind? Okay, that's your RAM at work-your Random Access Memory. You pointed your attention at the part of your memory that contains what you wanted to find, and scanned the information stored there. It then "displays" your breakfast memory in your mind's eye (or on your taste buds). Computers have little RAM chips where memories are stored only while the computer is turned on. "Random" doesn't mean like a roulette wheel. It means that you can point at random to any item in memory and display it on the computer screen or printer. You don't have to start at the beginning and recall each item in turn. If you didn't have this kind of memory, you'd have to start at your birth and remember every experience until you got to this morning's breakfast! The other kind of computer memory is the ROM chip. ROM stands for Read Only Memory, which means that only the computer reads the program; you can't fiddle with it or change it. ROM chips contain instructions a little like your autonomic nervous system, which you don't think about but that does the "housekeeping" chores of your body, such as breathing and growing hair. The ROM chip is the network of circuits that is always in place to make the computer work for you. You use the RAM to put in your information, such as word processing, accounting, or anything else. You can write or rewrite what's in this kind of memory if you wish. You then "save" your work that's dancing around in RAM, onto your hard drive or onto floppy disks. You can turn off the computer, RAM dies, but the work is safely stored. Hard drives are the "turntables" that store much more information than those floppy diskettes that geeks carry in their shirt pockets. Peripheral devices are things you add to your computer system, such as a modem to connect the computer with another computer or to the internet over phone lines, or a printer, or a scanner-they're peripherals. The hardware is, of course, anything that tugs against gravity or goes bump on the way through a door: the computer, the printer, and so on. The software is the program, the commands that make a dumb machine into a "smart" word processor, or into an accounting machine, a telecommunications system, or the "brains" behind a robot. Floppy diskettes are the magnetic disks used in most personal and small business computers to store information. They are simply "pancaked" versions of the tape cassettes you are already using with your car or home stereo. An interface cable connects two pieces of hardware, such as your computer and your printer. Interfacing software is a program that lets one computer talk to another computer or another device, such as a scanner. So suddenly you know the basics! If you want to accelerate your reading, writing and communication powers, look into getting a computer. The new Apple iMac is a totally user-friendly machine that won't bite, and can be driven around the world with very little manual-reading. I've used Macintoshes since 1984, and it's still a love affair. (c) 2001 by Jeff Berner Also read: Three-Minute Guide to Becoming a Free Agent/Consultant Jack/Jane of All Trades -- Master/Mistress of None? Are You Ready to Work From Home?
Copyright 2001 2Young2Retire.com, All Rights Reserved
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Marketing communications consultant and
home-office pioneer and workshop leader Jeff Berner has been an independent since
1965. He was the name branding facilitator for Sun Microsystems' "Java"
and "Hot Java" internet software, and his clients in the United States and
Europe include Office Depot, Apple Computer and Nikon USA. He has presented his
"Making a Life While Making a Living" seminar at Macworld Expo annually for a
decade. Jeff's columns have appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle, and on the websites
iVillage; ThirdAge.com, and MyPrimeTime.com. He is the author of a dozen books, including