Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

Computers still have three basic parts: (1) processor, (2) memory, and (3) input/output (I/O). The latest addition to the I/O is the camera.

This post is a little late – several years late, but better late…and so on.

In the early 1970s, I was introduced to the computer. There were and still are three basic parts to a computer:

1. the processor
2. the memory
3. the input/output or I/O

There have been many advances since that time long ago. The area with additions not just advances is the I/O. New media types (remember the Zip drive cartridge and the 8″ floppy disk?) come and go.

Something that has come is the camera. If someone once said, “I want a new computer because it has a better camera,” we would have carted them away. A better camera? Computers don’t have cameras, do they?

Yes, computers have cameras.

Just last night I was sitting at a table at an event. The speaker gave everyone a piece of paper as a handout. (Yes, he is old.) We didn’t cover all the material on the piece of paper. He told us to hang onto the paper until next week.

Do what? Hang on to a piece of paper for a week?

I took a photo of the piece of paper with my pocket computer, a.k.a., my iPhone. Next week, or whenever, when we talk about the piece of paper, I will look at the image on my pocket computer.

That is all because one of the better I/O devices for that computer is the camera.