1. Match the words or phrases (1-6) to the definitions (a-f).

1. chat room

2. e-commerce

3. joystick

4. cyberspace

5. desktop

6. multitasking

a. the ability of a computer to run several programmes at once;

b. the screen you see after you’ve switched your computer;

c. an area on the Internet where people can communicate with each other in ‘real time’;

d. the business of buying and selling goods and services in the Internet;

e. a sick which helps to move in computer games;

f. the imaginary place where electronic messages, information pictures, etc. exist when they are sent from one computer to another.

Text 2.9 Security — Is Your Privacy Protected

Pre-Reading Task:

1. Is security protection important for keeping your privacy?

2. Read the text “Security — Is Your Privacy Protected?” and discuss the following questions in group:

- do you think your information is protected when you use the Internet? Is it safe to share confident information through the Internet? Share your opinion with your group-mates.

- choose any topics you like on the given problem ”Internet” and discuss it in group.

- write a composition giving your own opinion on the topic “The World Wide Web”.

Another key concern is confidentiality. For example, your e-mail message should be seen only by your intended recipient. While the letter is in transit, however, a clever and possibly unscrupulous person or group could intercept or monitor your correspondence. To protect messages, some people use e-mail software products to scramble their letter's sensitive contents before mailing it. At the other end, the receiving party may need similar software for unscrambling the message.

Recently, much discussion has focused on the exchange of credit-card and other sensitive information for commercial use on the Internet. Although substantial innovations are expected to strengthen security, the noted American computer security analyst Dorothy Denning states: "Completely secure systems are not possible, but the risk can be reduced considerably, probably to a level commensurate with the value of the information stored on the systems and the threat posed by both hackers and insiders. Absolute security is not realizable in any computer system, whether connected to the Internet or not.

3 Science

Text 3.1

Pre-Reading Task:

1. What can you say about modern science development?

2. Why is science so important in the modern world?

3. Read the text “Science” and discuss the following questions in group:

-how does science help to keep peace in the world?

- how can science solve the energy program?

- what proves that the study of science is important to understand natural world?

Science is important to most people living in the modern world for a number of reasons. In particular, science is important to world peace and understanding, to the understanding of technology, and to our understanding of the world.

Science is important to world peace in many ways. On one hand, scientists have helped to develop many of the modern tools of war. On the other hand, they have also helped to keep the peace through research which has improved life for people. Scientists have helped us to understand the problem of supplying the world with enough energy; they have begun to develop a number of solutions to the energy problem - for example, using energy from the sun and from the atom. Scientists have also analyzed the world's resources. We can begin learning to share the resources with the knowledge provided to us by science. Science studies the Universe and how to use its possibilities for the benefit of men.

Science is also important to everyone who is affected by modern technology. Many of the things that make our lives easier and better are the results of advances in technology and, if the present patterns continue, technology will affect us even more in the future than it does now. In some cases, such as technology for taking salt out of ocean water, technology may be essential for our lives on the Earth.

The study of science also provides people with an understanding of natural world. Scientists are learning to predict earthquakes, are continuing to study many other natural events such as storms. Scientists are also studying various aspects of human biology and the origin and developments of the human race. The study of the natural world may help to improve life for many people, all over the world.

A basic knowledge of science is essential for everyone. It helps people to find their way in the changing world.

Text 3.2 Science and Technology

Pre-Reading Task:

1. What role have scientific and technological developments played in human's life?

2. What proves that science and technology are closely related today?

3. Read the text “Science and Technology” and discuss the following questions in group:

4. What does the term «technology» refer to?

5. What does the term «industrial technology» mean?

6. How is scientific activity in the 1970s estimated?

7 What facts prove that the scientific revolution in the 16th century was the time that science and technology began to work together?

In recent years, scientific and technological developments have drastically changed life on our planet as well as our views both of us as individuals in society and of the Universe as a whole.

Today, science and technology are closely related. Many modem technologies such as nuclear power and space flights depend on science and the application of scientific knowledge and principles. Each advance in pure science creates new opportunities for the development of new ways of making things to be used in daily life. In turn, technology provides science with new and more accurate instruments for its investigation and research.

Technology refers to the ways in which people use discoveries to satisfy needs and desires, to alter the environment, to improve their lives. Throughout human history, men and women have invented tools, machines, materials and techniques, to make their lives easier. Of course, when we speak of technology today, we are looking at it in a much narrower sense. Generally, we mean industrial technology, or the technology that began about 200 years ago with the development of power-driven machines, growth of the factory system, and mass production of goods that has created the basis for our modern society. Today we often say that we live in an age of science and technology. According to one estimate, 90 % of all the scientists who ever lived, were alive and active in the 1970-s. This increased scientific activity has brought new ideas, processes, and inventions in ever-growing amount.

The scientific revolution that started in the 16th century was the first time that science and technology began to work together. Thus, Galileo who made revolutionary discoveries in astronomy and physics also built an improved telescope and patented a system of lifting water. However, it was not until the 19th century that technology truly was based on science and inventors began to build on the work of scientists. For example, Thomas Edison built on the early experiments of Faraday and Henry in his invention of the first practical system of electrical lighting. Edison carried on his investigations until he found the carbon filament for the electric bulb in a research laboratory. This was the first true modern technological research.

In a sense, the history of science and technology is the history of all humankind.

Text 3.3 Miniature Radios and computers. Pocket Radios.

Pre-Reading Task:

1. You are going to read four texts about pocket radios and miniature computers. Divide into groups and discuss the main idea of the texts.

2. What other types of miniature computers and radios do you know?

3. Do you know what the word “wireless” means?

The transistor's compactness and low power requirements also brought a new day in a host of simpler devices. Radio receivers hardly larger than a package of cigarettes were on a reality.

In 1956-58 the transistor found one of the most spectacular applications. It helped Russian and American specialists to launch the first satellites and to open the space age. Only a few of the biggest satellites have been able to carry vacuum-tube equipment. Most satellites have appended on transistors not only for reporting back to the earth but for operating the instruments with which the satellites explored the mysterious regions around the earth.

But the most striking aspect of the transistor is not the host of devices it made possible. More important was its effect on a new branch of science and technology which may be called “solids-state electronics”.

Pocket-size TV Camera

The ultra-miniature TV camera was made possible by a new design approach, which combines transistors, specially developed transistor circuitry and a new half-inch vidicon camera tube.

The pocket-size TV camera (JTV-1) weighs less than, pound and measures only 1 7/8 ths by 2 3/8 ths by 4 1/2 inches. It can be operated in the palm of the hand, used with an attachable pistol-grip handle, bolted to wall or floor, or mounted on a tripod.

It is the first TV camera of its type to incorporate a photoelectric control, which enables the camera to accommodate changes in the order of 100 to 1 in scene lighting. Made rugged for military airborne, mobile, and field requirements the pocket-size camera has high resistance to shock and vibration.

Simple in design and operation, the camera can be operated by non-technical personnel.

Molecular Computer

A small computer with molecular blocks as its "brain" is being developed.

The new device, called a Mol-E-Com, will weigh 14 pounds and occupy less than one-third of a cubic foot. A solid semiconductor crystal with its internal structure rearranged as a functional electronic block replaces the tubes, transistors, and resistors in conventional miniaturized circuitry.

Mol-E-Com is expected to have the same capabilities as a transistorized computer ten times its size and weight, making it useful for rockets

Miniature Computer is size of Bread Loaf.

A compact electronic computer about the size of a loaf of bread, yet capable of working as fast as a room size computer, has been demonstrated successfully.

The baby computer, is called Maddam, a name derived from Macro-Module and Digital Differential Analyzer Machine.

The scientists indicate that the Maddam is a special purpose computer to be used only for military requirements as they develop. The working model was built to show that existing electronic components can be used in shrinking a commercial computer from a room size to size of a desk, and that military electronic equipment can be compressed to a convenient size for aircraft, spacecraft, and missiles.

The computer has 5,500 components housed in a space measuring three inches by six inches by 11 inches, and a component density of 69,000 components per cubic foot. It weighs 12 pound and can perform 33,000 mathematical calculations per second.

Text 3.4 What is a Microprocessor?

Pre-reading task:

1. Read the first part of the text ‘What is a Microprocessor”?

2. Study the definition of terms given below the text.

3. Discuss the following questions in group:

4. What is a microprocessor? Try to give your own definition of this term.

5. What is a microcomputer based on?

Part I

A microprocessor¹ is a programmable logic device. That is, the function of logical operation that the device accomplishes may be altered by applying instructional "words" at its input.

The above definition, although correct, is somewhat broad. Technically, the term microprocessor has come to mean the central processing unit (CPU)² of a small computer system. By itself, the microprocessor cannot function; but when it is combined with a relatively small number of support circuits, it has most of the characteristics included in the classic definition of a computer. The microprocessor has traded the greater speed and word length of a computer for compact size and low cost.

A microcomputer is a fully operational system based upon a microprocessor chip³ which in itself contains a large percentage of the computer capability. The system possesses all of the minimum requirements of a computer:

It can input and output data⁴, usually in digital form. This data can be exchanged between the microcomputer⁵ and several common input/output devices such as teletype, CRT displays, paper tape reader, floppy disk⁶ memories, magnetic tapes⁷, cassette⁸ tapes and laboratory instruments.

It contains an ALU (arithmetic logic unit) which performs arithmetic and/or logical operations such as add, subtract, compare, rotate left or right, AND, OR, NEGATE, EXCLUSIVE, OR.

It contains memory⁹ which is directly addressable and may contain both data and instructional words.

It is programmable. That is, the data and programmed instructions may be arranged in any desired order, in contrast to a pocket calculator, which is usually fixed in its capabilities and requires a precise keyboard sequence that cannot be altered.