Computing
Originally, the word computing was synonymous with counting and calculating, and a science that deals with the original sense of computing mathematical calculations.
The following definition of computing is given in the ACM report Computing As a Discipline:
The discipline of computing is the systematic study of algorithmic processes that describe and transform information: their theory, analysis, design, efficiency, implementation, and application. The fundamental question underlying all the computing is 'What can be (efficiently) automated?'
Science and theory
- Computer science
- Theory of computation
- Computational models
- DBLP, as of October 2005, now lists over 675 000 bibliographic entries on computer science and several thousand links to the home pages of computer scientists
- Scientific computing
Hardware
See information processor for a high-level block diagram.
- Computer hardware
- Computer Hardware Design
- Computer network
- Computer system
- History of computing hardware
Instruction-level taxonomies
After the commoditization of memory, attention turned to optimizing CPU performance at the instruction level. Various methods of speeding up the fetch-execute cycle include:
- designing instruction set architectures with simpler, faster instructions: RISC as opposed to CISC
- Superscalar instruction execution
- VLIW architectures, which make parallelism explicit
Software
History of computing
- History of computing hardware from the tally stick to the quantum computer
- Punch Card
- Unit record equipment
- IBM 700/7000 series
- IBM 1400 series
- System/360
- Early IBM disk storage
Business computing
- Accounting software
- Computer-aided design
- Computer-aided manufacturing
- Computer-assisted dispatch
- Customer relationship management
- Data warehouse
- Decision support system
- Electronic data processing
- Enterprise resource planning
- Geographic information system
- Management information system
- Material requirements planning
- Strategic enterprise management
- Supply chain management
- Product Lifecycle Management
- Utility Computing
Human factors
Computer security
- Cryptology - cryptography - information theory
- Cracking - demon dialing - Hacking - war dialing - war driving
- Social engineering - Dumpster diving
- Physical security - Black bag job
- Computer insecurity
- Computer surveillance
- defensive programming
- malware
- security engineering
Data
Numeric data
- integral data types - bit, byte, etc.
- real data types:
- Decimal
- Binary-coded decimal (BCD)
- Excess-3 BCD (XS-3)
- Biquinary-coded decimal
- representation: Binary - Octal - Decimal - Hexadecimal (hex)
- Computer mathematics - Computer numbering formats -
Character data
- storage: Character - String - Text - Plain text
- representation: ASCII - Unicode - Multibyte - EBCDIC (Widecharacter, Multicharacter) - Fieldata - Baudot
Other data topics
Mechatronics
Classes of computers
- Analog computer
- Calculator
- Desktop computer
- Desknote
- Digital computer
- Embedded computer
- Home computer
- Laptop
- Mainframe
- Minicomputer
- Microcomputer
- Personal computer
- Personal digital assistant (aka PDA, or Handheld computer)
- Server
- Supercomputer
- Tablet PC
- Video game console
- Workstation
Companies - current
- Apple Computer
- Avaya
- Dell
- Fujitsu
- Gateway Computers
- Groupe Bull
- Hewlett-Packard
- Hitachi, Ltd.
- IBM
- Microsoft
- NEC Corporation
- Novell
- Red Hat
- Silicon Graphics
- Sun Microsystems
- Unisys
Companies - historic
- Acorn, bought by Olivetti
- Bendix Corporation
- Burroughs, merged with UNIVAC to become Unisys
- Compaq, bought by Hewlett-Packard
- Control Data
- Cray
- Data General
- DEC, bought by Compaq, in turn bought by Hewlett-Packard
- Digital Research - a software company for the early microprocessor-based computers
- English Electric
- Ferranti
- General Electric, computer division bought by Honeywell, then Bull
- Honeywell, computer division bought by Bull and
- ICL
- Leo
- Lisp Machines, Inc.
- Marconi
- Nixdorf, bought by Siemens
- Olivetti
- Osborne
- Packard Bell
- Raytheon
- Royal McBee
- RCA
- Scientific Data Systems, sold to Xerox
- Siemens
- Sinclair Research, created the ZX Spectrum, ZX80 and ZX81
- Symbolics
- UNIVAC, merged with Burroughs to become Unisys
- Varian
- Wang
Professional organizations
- Association for Computing Machinery (ACM)
- British Computer Society (BCS)
- Association for Survey Computing (ASC)
- Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), in particular the IEEE Computer Society
- Institution of Electrical Engineers
- International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC)
==Standards organizations and consortia== (see also standardization)
- International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC)
- International Organization for Standardization (ISO)
- Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
- Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF)
- World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)