neco 2020 computer_studies | Essay
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Question 1
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Discuss the evolution of computers from the first generation to the third generation. In your answer, identify the key technological developments that characterised each generation and evaluate the impact of these developments on society and everyday life.
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Question 2
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A small office is setting up a workstation with the following components and their typical power consumptions:
- CPU (Intel i5) : 65 W
- RAM : 2 sticks of 8 GB DDR4, each 5 W
- Hard Disk Drive (1 TB) : 8 W
- Solid‑State Drive (256 GB) : 3 W
- Graphics Card (mid‑range) : 120 W
- Motherboard : 30 W
- DVD Optical Drive : 5 W
The workstation will be powered by a 500 W power‑supply unit (PSU). Answer the following questions.
a) Calculate the total power consumption of the workstation.
b) Determine whether the 500 W PSU is sufficient, considering a 20 % safety margin. Justify your answer.
c) The workstation will be placed in a closed room of volume 20 m³. Assuming all electrical power is converted to heat, estimate the rise in temperature of the room after one hour if no cooling is provided. (Use specific heat capacity of air = 1.005 kJ·kg⁻¹·K⁻¹, density of air = 1.2 kg·m⁻³.)
i) Compute the total heat energy produced in one hour.
ii) Calculate the temperature increase in degrees Celsius.
d) Recommend an appropriate cooling solution (type and capacity) for the workstation based on the heat generated.
e) Briefly explain how the choice of system bus (e.g., PCIe versus the older ISA bus) influences overall system performance.
Question Parts
(a)
Calculate the total power consumption of the workstation.
(b)
Determine whether the 500 W PSU is sufficient, considering a 20 % safety margin. Justify your answer.
(c)
Estimate the rise in temperature of the room after one hour if no cooling is provided.
(d)
Recommend an appropriate cooling solution (type and capacity) for the workstation based on the heat generated.
(e)
Briefly explain how the choice of system bus (e.g., PCIe versus the older ISA bus) influences overall system performance.
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Question 3
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A secondary school intends to develop a simple computer‑based grading system that records each student's scores in three subjects and automatically generates a final grade (A, B, C, D or F). The system will be written in a high‑level programming language and will be used by teachers on a standard desktop computer.
Question Parts
(a)
Outline the appropriate stages of the Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) for this project and briefly describe the key activities that should be carried out in each stage.
(b)
The following pseudocode is intended to calculate the final grade for a student. Identify any logical errors and rewrite the pseudocode correctly.
```
READ maths, english, science
TOTAL = maths + english + science
AVERAGE = TOTAL / 3
IF AVERAGE >= 70 THEN
GRADE = "A"
ELSE IF AVERAGE >= 60 THEN
GRADE = "B"
ELSE IF AVERAGE >= 50 THEN
GRADE = "C"
ELSE IF AVERAGE >= 40 THEN
GRADE = "D"
ELSE
GRADE = "F"
END IF
PRINT GRADE
```
(c)
Draw a flowchart that represents the corrected algorithm described in part (b). Include start, input, processing, decision (for grade selection) and stop symbols.
(d)
Discuss two advantages and two disadvantages of using a high‑level programming language (such as Python) to develop this grading system.
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Question 4
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A small company keeps its employee information in a computer system. Each employee record contains the following fields:
- Employee ID (a 4‑digit numeric code, e.g., 0234)
- Name (stored as ASCII characters, maximum 20 characters)
- Salary (stored as a 32‑bit signed integer representing Naira per month)
The system is being upgraded to improve storage efficiency.
Answer the questions below.
Question Parts
(a)
Convert the decimal number 156 to an 8‑bit binary number. Show each step of the conversion process.
(b)
The character ‘A’ is stored using the ASCII code. Provide its 8‑bit binary representation and explain how it would be stored in the Name field of the employee record.
(c)
Determine the minimum number of bits required to store any possible 4‑digit employee ID (0000 to 9999) without using a sign bit. Show the calculation.
(d)
The company is considering using Huffman coding to compress the employee names field. Briefly describe the principle of Huffman coding and give one advantage and one limitation of applying it to this field.
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Question 5
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A secondary school is planning to upgrade its computer laboratory. The lab currently has 30 desktop computers, each equipped with a 500 GB hard disk drive. The school intends to replace the hard drives with solid‑state drives (SSDs) of 256 GB each and to add a central network‑attached storage (NAS) device that will provide a total of 8 TB of shared storage for students' projects. The school also wants to ensure that all data are backed up daily to an external USB‑hard drive of 2 TB capacity.
Answer the following questions:
Question Parts
(a)
Calculate the total storage capacity (in gigabytes) that will be available after the SSD upgrade, excluding the NAS device.
(b)
Express the total storage capacity obtained in part (a) in bits. (Use 1 byte = 8 bits and 1 GB = 2^30 bytes.)
(c)
Discuss two advantages of using SSDs instead of HDDs in the laboratory, focusing on performance and reliability.
(d)
Propose a simple daily backup routine that uses the external 2 TB USB‑hard drive to protect the data on the NAS. Include at least three steps and explain why each step is important.
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Question 6
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A small business has recently experienced several security incidents, including phishing emails, ransomware attempts, and unauthorized access to its internal network. The management wants to develop a comprehensive security policy that addresses technical controls, employee behaviour, and ethical considerations.
Answer the following:
Question Parts
(a)
Identify and briefly describe three common security threats that could affect the business, giving one real‑world example for each.
(b)
Propose a layered (defence‑in‑depth) security approach for the business. List at least four distinct layers and explain the purpose of each layer.
(c)
Discuss two ethical issues that arise when the business decides to monitor employee e‑mail communications for security purposes.
(d)
Outline the key steps the business should follow in responding to a ransomware attack, from detection to recovery.
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Question 7
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A secondary school plans to install a Local Area Network (LAN) that will connect 120 desktop computers distributed among three departments: Administration (30 computers), Science (50 computers) and Arts (40 computers). The computers in each department will be connected to a departmental switch, and the three switches will be linked to a central server room where the main file server, printer server and Internet router are located.
The school wants the network to be reliable, easy to manage and to allow each department to be isolated for security and administrative purposes. The distance from the server room to each departmental switch is 30 metres. The switches will be interconnected in a star configuration using a backbone cable of 80 metres.
Answer the following questions:
Question Parts
(a)
Recommend the most suitable LAN topology for the above scenario. State at least two advantages and two disadvantages of the chosen topology compared with the other two basic topologies (bus and ring).
(b)
Using the private Class C address 192.168.10.0/24, design a subnetting scheme that creates three sub‑nets – one for each department – each capable of supporting at least 30 usable host addresses. Show the subnet mask, network address, first usable address and broadcast address for each sub‑net.
(c)
Calculate the total length of cable required for the backbone of the network (the inter‑switch links and the links from each switch to the server room). Assume the backbone cable between the three switches is a single 80‑metre cable that runs in a star pattern from a central patch panel in the server room.
(d)
Suggest two network‑layer security measures that the school can implement to keep each department’s traffic separate and protect the internal resources from external threats.
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Question 8
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A teacher wants to keep a record of her class’s performance using a simple Python program.
The program must read a text file named "scores.txt". Each line of the file contains a student’s name and their score (an integer between 0 and 100) separated by a comma, for example:
John Doe,78
Jane Smith,85
...
The program should:
1. Compute the class average.
2. Identify the highest and lowest scores together with the corresponding student names.
3. Assign a grade to each student using the following scale:
70‑100 = A, 60‑69 = B, 50‑59 = C, 40‑49 = D, below 40 = F.
4. Write a new file "report.txt" that lists each student’s name, score, grade and, on the last line, the class average.
Below is a draft of the program written by a student. It contains two logical errors.
```python
with open('scores.txt', 'r') as f:
lines = f.readlines()
total = 0
count = 0
high = 0
low = 101
for line in lines:
name, sc = line.split(',')
score = int(sc)
total += score
count += 1
if score > high:
high = score
if score < low:
low = score
average = total / count
with open('report.txt', 'w') as f:
for line in lines:
name, sc = line.split(',')
score = int(sc)
if score >= 70:
grade = 'A'
elif score >= 60:
grade = 'B'
elif score >= 50:
grade = 'C'
elif score >= 40:
grade = 'D'
else:
grade = 'F'
f.write(f"{name},{score},{grade}\n")
f.write(f"Class Average: {average}\n")
```
Answer the following questions:
Question Parts
(a)
Write a correct version of the program that fulfills all four requirements. You may show the algorithm in pseudocode and then provide the final Python code (the code must be syntactically correct).
(b)
Identify the two logical errors in the draft program above and provide the corrected code fragments for each error.
(c)
State the time complexity of the algorithm (in Big‑O notation) in terms of the number of students n, and justify your answer.
(d)
Suggest one modification that would allow the program to also read a second file "extra.txt" containing additional student records and merge them with the original data before processing.
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