Uysforever

In fifteen years, computers changed from clunky boxes to multimedia marvels. However, they are still expensive and somewhat difficult to use. According to a survey conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the most important invention for American people was the car. Only 8 percent of the people mentioned the PC. “Simplicity is the key,” says Bill Gates, founder of MicrosoftCorporation. “Do you want to devote your life to reading the user’s manual?” asks David Gelernter, professor of computer science at Yale University. “As a heavy user of computers, I hate them. As a computer science person, I admire the quality of the software”. “People are very aware that they are working on a computer, “thinks Andrew Sears, professor at DePaul University in Chicago. “My best computeris my car’s braking system,” says Randy Paush, professor of computer science at the University of Virginia. “I jam on the pedal and the computer makes thousands of decisions for me and saves my life.” “The rudest thing about computers is that they only do what we tell them to do,” says Nathan Myhrvold, Microsoft’s research director. What do you think?

COMPUTERS OF THE FUTURE.
Thetechnological revolution is producing an explosive change in computers’ hardware and software. PCs are now coming in different shapes, sizes and prices: the desktop or classical computer ( with separate monitor, keyboard, CPU and mouse) and portable designs such as the ultrafast notebooks, the ultrathin laptops and the ultrasmall palmtops. Also, the variety of software is infinite: there are programmes foreducation, entertainment, business, professions and every field you can imagine. What about the future? The computers of the future will interact with us because they will recognize our voices, handwriting and faces. They will also understand our gestures. Also, they will predict situations and look for solutions. How? They will learn by trial and error and adjust their own programming. They willalso learn by simulation: They will simulate weather conditions, environmental dangers, traffic jams, health risks and many other circumstances. In less than ten years, PCs will include interactive television, telephone and video transmission. Scientists see a world with no limits to storage space, processing power and transmission capacity.

DID YOU KNOW…?
1. Researchers are hiding computerseverywhere: in walls, toys or the heel of a Nike sneaker. They are creating these “invisible” machines far from keyboards and mice.
2. Microcomputers will organize people’s work and personal affairs before 2008.
3. Computers will have medical applications. They will diagnose and dispense prescriptions. There will be portable computers for self-care in less than ten years.
4. Computerscientists are developing translation software. These programmes understand different languages, but they are slow and not precise. In the future, computers will translate with the speed and precision necessary for good communications.

The Internet is the printing press of the Technology era. Advances in telecommunication are becoming a part of our daily lives: Net phones, Net TV sets, NetPagers, Net cars… yes, Net world. Tomorrow, technology will store almost any human creation or experience automatically and will transmit it through the Internet. This incredible expansion was possible mostly thanks to a piece of software that put in order the chaos of the World Wide Web, a vital part of the Internet. We are speaking about the browser. This programme is a sort of remote control tofind information on the Web. It combines all the pieces of the Web-text, audio and images-into “pages” that appear on your computer screen. With browsers, it is very easy to navigate the Net: You just point at something on the screen, click on it, and the Net instantly links you to the information that you want: the seven o’clock news, a weather map or perhaps your e-mail. Ehere will the Internet...