The Daily Teaser — 8-4-2016: Language is a Virus …

Hmmm … 

Once again, it’s a Friday.

You’ve possibly noticed.

Once again, it’s a Friday: and once again, it’s payday.

And … ?   Once again, the Payment card I’ve ordered — that allows me to pay my Council Tax, in cash, at a PayPoint outlet — still hasn’t arrived.

Understandably, I’m not happy.

If it hasn’t arrived by Monday, though?

I can put into Brentwood Council to start asking pointed questions.

~≈fl≈~

But let’s move on, shall we?

Yesterday’s Teaser saw Olga* putting in her answers: scoring five out of five in the process.

Let’s see how everyone does with today’s questions, shall we?

Here they are, along with the How To, License and video …

Q1) 8th April saw a team led — in part — by Grace Hopper, start deveoping the computer language called COBOL.   COBOL is short for Common Business Oriented … what?

Q2) Development started in which year: 1958, 1959 or 1960?

Q3) Grace, herself was a computer scientist who held which military rank: Air Chief Commodore, Rear Admiral or Brigadier General?

Q4) Grace earned a nickname based on the title of a well known hymn: what WAS her nickname?

Q5) Like other computer languages, COBOL is/was supposed be used on many different computers.   In other words, it’s supposed to be what: portable, fixed or editable?

Q6) Like other such computer languages, COBOL is ‘high-level’: and needs to be translated for the computer to use.   This is called what: assembling, compiling or collating?

Q7) Grace provided us with the term ‘debugging’: the term describing the removal of glitches from a computer program.   She coined the term, after researchers found a what, fried onto a valve: a moth, an ant or a spider?

Q8) Languages like COBOL can be used to write computer programs.   Such programs are also called what: software, hardware or firmware?

Q9) Those of us who grew up in the 1980s computer boom will be familiar with a computer language called BASIC.   What did the B stand for, in BASIC?

Q10) Finally … which modern day computer language was named after a type of coffee?

Here’s yesterday’s questions and answers …

Q1) IBM announced its System 360: on 7th April, 1964.   The 360 was what: a mainframe, mini-computer or laptop?

A1) A mainframe.

Q2) 7th April, 1978, saw President Carter postpone US production of what: a nuclear powered submarine, a neutron bomb or an ICBM?

A2) A neutron bomb.

Q3) 7th April, 1969, is the usual date given for the birth of the Internet.   File sharing over the ’Net can be done with FTP: or File Transfer … what?

A3) File Transfer Protocol.

Q4) 7th April, 1891, saw the birth of Danish businessman, Ole Kirk Christiansen: the man who founded which toy company?

A4) Lego.

Q5) Finally … 7th April, 1986, saw Sir Clive Sinclair sell his computer business to Amstrad.   Name any of the three ZX computers his company sold.

A5) The ZX80, ZX81 or ZX Spectrum.

I’ll leave you with this thought …

“From then on, when anything went wrong with a computer, we said it had bugs in it.”

Grace Hopper, December 9, 1906 – January 1, 1992.

And this tune … 

Have a nice day … 

*        Yeah, I HAD wondered what happened, Olga: it looks like Google’s eaten your answers … !   At ANY rate … ?   I’ve got the appointment booked up for early May: the soonest they could organise it.