I can’t find this answer anywhere.
I understand that voltage runs through gates that output values 1 or 0, then what? Well those values are stored somewhere? But how, how do you store voltage in memory? Also, how does the computer interpret those voltages in a way that it can display something on the screen, for example this web page?
October 12th, 2010 on 8:18 am
You need a B Sc in computer science to understand that stuff. Even then, unless you are a specialist in say graphics cards, then you won’t know it all on that subject.
A good place to start might be the local book store.Computing for Dummies or something like that will really help you to know more.
Learning to write simple programs in Basic will also give you insight.
To give you an idea of the gap you are facing, the business of gates and stuff is just simple Boolean logic. It doesn’t have an active component that can do anything beyond basic and or nor. Going beyond that you need a processor consisting of millions of transistors. Designing those makes careers for many thousands of folks. Then you need an operating system such as Windows, Linux, or Mac OS. This OS just gets the computer up and running and gives it certain basic functions like reading your keyboard, outputting to screen, managing files. That alone can need millions of lines of code written by hundred of programmers. Windows 7 uses perhaps 50 million lines of programming code.
Next step is the real software, say Microsoft Office. That’s a biggie But even simple programs can need thousands of lines of code and take years to perfect.
The 1s and Os are stored in chips called RAM or DRAM while the computer is switched on. Any information that is needed for the next time the machine is switched on, your emails for example, is held on the hard disk.
The computer does not need to know the voltages. It works purely with 1′s and 0s. The Operating System, the software, and the graphics card all must work together to generate the image in 1s and 0s and put it on your screen. It is a horrendously complex process, and often goes wrong due to small programming errors or hardware failure. that is when it crashes. Fortunately, modern operating systems are pretty crash resistant. Otherwise you’d be rebooting every 10 seconds or less!
Have fun finding out more. Like I said, the books are a good place to start, When you understand everything in detail you will be 975.463 years old. Come back then and explain it all to me!