· Announcements
· Why take this course?
o Understanding the modern world
Everything contains a computer
o You may supervise computer professionals
o You may use (Expensive!) computer consultants
o This is your Last course in computing
· Not Necessarily an Easy Course
Don't be lulled, especially if you've had a computer course in high school
· What This Course is Not
o Will not make you a programmer
o No Spread-sheets
o No Word Processing
o Not a Skills Course
· What kinds of questions should you be able to answer after taking this course?
o Vendor tries to sell you a system that will check all of your systems and procedures to see if they are correct. A good deal?
o Programmer tells you that to optimize the routing of your sales personnel is beyond the power of today's computers. Do you believe her?
o Computer consultant demonstrates complicated management system with test data including a handful of employees. Is the performance with this small set of data a good indicator of how the system will perform with all of your company data entered?
o Basically, how does a computer work?
o How do computers (and people using computers) communicate?
o How good a deal is that free software you can download?
o What kinds of things are computers good at?
o What kinds of things do computers do poorly?