Supercomputer

Author: Michael Coleman
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-03-01
Features: Earlier, computers greatly improved people's calculation speed, but they weighed 30 tons! Later, with the advancement of technology, a new electronic computer was born. With the emergence of microchips, the size became smaller, the speed of operation faster, and the storage capacity larger. Computers swiftly occupied every corner of the world! You need to quickly find shortcuts for surfing the internet and make full use of the various super functions of the internet. Computers can now imitate every detail of your life in the virtual world, and computers are becoming smarter and smarter. What should you do? Super Computer has a few tricks up its sleeve! You are told that you are responsible for sending instructions to the computer controlling the Russian aircraft flying to Mars. What would you do?
a. Learn Russian.
b. Learn to type accurately.
c. Study astronomy.
Answer: b. When the operator entered a command to change the spacecraft's direction, he accidentally pressed the wrong key. As a result, the computer began spinning the spacecraft, and the solar panels of the spacecraft no longer faced the sun. When the error was discovered, the spacecraft's batteries were already depleted, and it could no longer be controlled. The spacecraft was lost.
Emergency 11992: In 1992, you are an ambulance driver in London. A new computer system has been introduced in the ambulance, which will tell you which route to take to reach a destination. However, you know there is a shortcut that can get you there faster. What should you do?
a. Follow the computer's instructions.
b. Take your own shortcut.
c. Ask the police for the best route.
Answer: a. Follow the computer's instructions. This way, it will know where your ambulance is, so it can dispatch you to the place that needs emergency assistance. Unfortunately, many drivers chose b. They often made mistakes when reporting their location. Even worse, the equipment and software were riddled with errors. In the end, the computer map became a complete mess, making it impossible to determine the location of anything. As it struggled to self-adjust, the system was overloaded, and even emergency calls couldn't get through. Chaos!
At 1:26 AM on June 3, 1980, you are in the command center of the Strategic Air Command in the United States, located near Omaha, Nebraska. Suddenly, your monitor flashes a warning: two missiles are heading toward your base! What should you do?
a. Tell your artillery to prepare and be ready to launch your own missiles.
b. Wait a moment to see what happens.
Answer: b. The problem is, a little later, the signal on the monitor changes, and more missiles are approaching. What should you do then?
a. Tell your artillery to prepare and be ready to launch your own missiles.
b. Wait a little longer to see what happens.
Answer: a. But when everyone is ready, the monitor changes the signal again, this time saying that no missiles have been detected at all! What should you do?
a. Panic and start World War III.
b. Crouch under the table and cover your ears.
c. Find an engineer to check the computer.
Answer: It could be a, it could be b, but c is the most likely. The panicked roundtable meeting of senior generals concluded that the computer's alarm was false. And indeed, it was. They breathed a sigh of relief. When the engineer arrived, he found a faulty chip that was displaying random test data! Who was at fault? Why did the computer break and make mistakes? Wasn't it tested beforehand? Yes, it was. But sometimes it's not the program's error, but the user's.