If you’re a beginner, welcome to the world of computing! This text offers useful information in a clear, educational way, so you can soon understand the characteristics of the computing field.
If you’re a longtime enthusiast or already work in computing, you can use this text as a reference when preparing lessons for introductory computing courses.
The purpose of this text is to provide an overview of Information Technology through a mind map, supplemented with links organized according to the map’s structure (its keywords). I’ll update the text with new links based on suggestions in the comments or when I find interesting links to share.
Even if you don’t want to explore the topics in this text in depth, you should at least understand the importance of information technology in our daily lives. Today, computing is used in various fields of knowledge, for example:
- In medicine, to assist with diagnoses.
- To buy and sell products (e-commerce and Mercado Livre).
- To communicate between people or between departments in a business (email and instant messaging).
- In recruitment, whether by advertising jobs on Twitter or analyzing candidates’ profiles on social networks (Facebook).
These are only a few examples; computers have many other uses, all of which serve to make our lives easier in some way. We are surrounded by and very dependent on technology at school, at work, and at home. To act effectively in this technological age, you can’t stay on the sidelines. We must overcome our fear and take things one step at a time to acquire the technical skills we need. But here’s the challenge I’d like to offer: try to see technology as a toy, or as something you enjoy exploring. Technology doesn’t have to be boring. It complements our relationships and helps us. Learning about technology can be gradual and fun—why not?
So, whether you’re a beginner or a veteran, I hope you enjoy and have fun with the world of computing!
The central idea is that computing is generally divided into three areas: Software, Hardware, and PEOPLE. Software consists of computer programs. Hardware consists of the physical parts you can hold in your hands—the electronics. Finally, as you can see, I put PEOPLE in uppercase. I did this to make it clear that people are the most important of the three components. If the other two disappeared, people would find a way to recreate components and programs according to their needs.
Also, technical skill alone isn’t enough if we don’t know how to work with people. The biggest problems in institutions involve people. If a program or machine crashes, we can easily replace or repair it. But even when computer programs are running properly, people in their departments can create unnecessary bureaucracy and harm the institution if they don’t want to solve problems efficiently. Another harmful behavior is a professional who blames someone else instead of solving the problem.
Finally, we need to understand that, beyond the characteristics of the field, professionals who work with technology follow a set of principles that help them deal with adversity and with the changing job market. Some of these principles are:
- Initiative.
- Objectivity.
- Technical expertise. It is important, but on its own it does not produce satisfactory results.
- Understanding that people should come first in an institution.
- Seeing change as an opportunity; in most cases, it should be welcomed.
- Questioning and asking questions to find the real cause of a problem. Never stop at the first “why,” because the solution is almost never the answer to that first question.
- Trying to optimize the activities and processes you’re involved in, simplifying them and finding new ways to do the same things.
After this introduction to the personal qualities that are essential for entering the digital world on the right foot, here are the main keywords for exploring computing:
- PEOPLE
- Software
- Hardware
- History
- Classification
- PC characteristics
- Data representation
The rest of this text is a list of links organized by the topics above, along with a section of curiosities:
History
- Computing
- George Dyson on the beginning of the digital era
- George Dyson at the birth of the computer — TED Talk
- A brief history of the Internet by Walt Howe
Classification
Hardware
- How PCs work
- How microprocessors work
- How hard disks work
- How RAM works
- How BIOS works
- How the Nehalem microprocessor microarchitecture works
- How does the Internet work?