Computer & IT Questions & Answers

The original was a quotation by Wordsworth, inscribed into the logo: “Newton – a mind forever voyaging through strange seas of thought”. That was changed by designer Rob Janoff into a multi-coloured bitten apple – the “rainbow apple” – to commemorate the discoveries of gravity (the apple) and separation of light (colours) done by Isaac Newton. Besides, Alan Turing, the …

Pharming involves rerouting the traffic of a particular website to a bogus one. This is done by exploiting the weaknesses of the site’s Domain Name System (DNS) server. Pharming poses major concerns to corporates and e-commerce sites. Anti-pharming measures are required to safeguard sites.

Bloatware, also called junkware, adware and demoware, refers to preinstalled software and trial software that come with Windows computers. While it’s a ploy to get consumers to buy the software, most users regard it as junk and get confused by various icons or toolbars that pop up on their computers. Bloatware can also clog up the system and slow it …

Dumping refers to the cleaning of stored data from the core memory area of a computer into trash or somewhere else in an unorganized manner. Dumping may be done in the event of a system failure or as part of maintenance work. The reason for dumping, in most cases, is that the data has lost its value over time and …

Widget, literally, is a blend of window and gadget, coined by George S Kaufman in his play ‘Beggar on Horseback’. It is a hypothetical manufactured good or product. In computing, the term has become frequently used to refer to objects on a computer screen the user interacts with. A widget is anything that can be embedded within a HTML page. …

The Webby Awards honour websites on the internet. The awards were first given away in 1996 by the now defunct magazine ‘The Web’. Private investors now own the award. A Webby tradition is that the acceptance speech of the winner shouldn’t exceed five words.

Google groups are online communities whose interaction is facilitated by Google, which has revolutionized the world of networking. This facility helps people who share common interests to form groups. Google offers access to the happenings and calendars of these networking groups from across the world. The groups are split broadly into art and entertainment, university, computer, home, news, business, recreation …

Codd’s Rules that are 12 in number specify what a database must support in order to be relational. The rules were defined by Edgar F Codd in a paper published in 1985. Hence, they are known as Codd’s Rules. For example, data are represented only one way; as values within columns and rows. Every value can be assessed by providing …

An applet is a little application. Prior to the World Wide Web, the built-in writing and drawing programmes that came with Windows were sometimes called applets. On the Web, using Java language, an applet is a small programme that can be sent along with a Web page to a user. Java applets can perform interactive animations, immediate calculations, or other …

Security experts say passwords for more than 2 million Facebook, Google and other accounts have been compromised and circulated online, just the latest example of breaches involving leading Internet companies. Some services including Twitter have responded by disabling the affected passwords. But there are several things you can do to minimize further threats – even if your account isn’t among …