102 / 298
GAZETTE
APRIL 1981
IN WHAT AREAS CAN
A COMPUTER HELP -
Now?
Accounts:
Time
Recording:
Management
Information:
Debt
Collecting:
Provide a superior accounting system (main-
taining ledger cards, if required).
Process your time records and assist you in
calculating charges (processing time records
manually can be a herculean task).
Provide information, not only on the com-
parative profitability of various areas and
individual cases, but also on cases which are
unbilled or have been overlooked.
Ensure that the various steps in the process
are taken at the correct time and keep track of
all the monies involved.
In the Near Future?
In house
Keep track of the nature of the information
retrieval:
contained in your files, both current and non-
current.
Diary and
Keep you from missing that date of the
Reminder
hearing, or the last day for issuing
Systems:
Proceedings.
What Cant a Computer Do For You?
1. Turn an unsystematic office into a systematic one;
intelligent use of a computer requires a disciplined
office.
2. Sort out the problems of an overworked or under-
manned Accounts Department; a manual accounting
system has to be in apple-pie order before it can be
transferred to the computer. Remember the maxim
"garbage in — garbage out."
3. Work
without
an
appropriate
programme;
programmes are usually not interchangeable, many
being designed for one make of computer only.
4. Work beyond its capacity; a bottom-of-the-market
computer will have limited storage capacity and
won't handle the accounts of the average office.
A Glossary of
Computer Terms
Computer:
A
processor
of
information
stored
electronically, either in an in-built or attached
memory store.
Word
Processor:
Word
Processing:
102
Usually a machine which will store, retrieve
and process text. The processing usually in
volves editing and amending the stored
material.
Has no special technical meaning. Includes, at
its broadest, dictating equipment, and type
writers but is now used primarily where words
are stored by an electronic process on tape,
card or disc, from which they can be auto-
matically retrieved.
Bit:
One character of information.
Byte:
A collection, usually of eight, bits - a
"word".
K:
A thousand bytes.
Floppy Discs:Very similar to forty-five R.P.M. records,
used for the storage of information which is
picked up from any part of the disc by a
moving arm.
Hard Discs:
(Winchester
Discs)
Hardware:
Software:
Memory:
Modem:
The equivalent of long-playing records, on
which information is similarly stored and from
which it is similarly extracted.
The actual equipment. In the context of word
processing or computerised accounting in a
Solicitors office, hardware will comprise a
V.D.U./Keyboard, a Central Processing Unit
and a highspeed printer. Two or more of these
peripherals may be included in a composite
piece of equipment.
The programmes which control the operations
of the computer; they may be "built-in" or
"wired-in" to the equipment in some cases.
As in the human being, where the information
is stored. Not necessarily in the computer
itself — can be on tape or on disc.
A device attached to a computer or V.D.U. in
the nature of a socket for a telephone hand-
set, which converts the computer's signals into
telephone-compatible signals.
Stand alone Only designed for one process, e.g. word
Systems:
processing, with the software built in.
Incapable of linking with other systems.
Shared
Involves a common memory, and common set
Resource
of system programmes with terminals
System:
dedicated (i.e. only capable of one function)
one to word processing one to data process-
ing (e.g. accounts) one to information re-
trieval.
Shared Logic Usually a larger operation, with shared
System:
memory store and shared processor, each
terminal being capable of being used simul-
taneously or different tasks.
Programme: A linked series of commands that causes the
computer to take certain action — carry out
calculations or re-order stored material.