Peter Waddell, Within These Walls

The Washington DC-based New Zealand artist Peter Waddell has just won the "Excellence in an Artistic Discipline" Award at the 25th Washington DC Mayor's Arts Awards. The prestigious awards are funded by the District of Columbia Commission on the Arts and Humanities and recognise artistic excellence and service.

Waddell has been based in Washington since 1995. He is currently artist-in-residence at Georgetown's Tudor Place Historic House and Garden and has executed paintings for many collections associated with the city including Mount Vernon, the Octagon in Washington DC as well as Belair Mansion in Bowie, Maryland.

Several of his works are currently included in the exhibition “The Initiated Eye: Secrets, Symbols, Freemasonry, and the Architecture of Washington DC." on view as part of the National Heritage Museum’s exhibition, The exhibition which is on until January next year features 21 oil paintings by Waddell based on the architecture of Washington DC, and the role that the founding fathers and prominent citizens – many of whom were Freemasons – played in establishing the layout and design of the city. The exhibition is supplemented with approximately forty objects from the National Heritage Museum’s collection.

The White House Historical Association has also commissioned the artist to produce 20 paintings showing interiors and exteriors of the White House in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. These paintings will form an exhibition at the White House Visitor's Centre as well as touring presidential libraries when completed.

Among the paintings are three which show the decoration of the public rooms at the White House by Louis Comfort Tiffany for President Arthur in 1882.

New Zealand artist the toast of Washington Pictures can be seen at the National Heritage Museum, Lexington, MA

Understanding Computers - Part 3 of 5

Introduction to Computers

The Processor and Memory: Data Manipulation

In a computer the processor is the center of activity. The processor, as we noted, is also called the central processing unit (CPU). The central processing unit consists of electronic circuits that interpret and execute program instructions, as well as communicate with the input, output, and storage devices.

It is the central processing unit that actually transforms data into information. Data is the raw material to be processed by a computer. Such material can be letters, numbers, or facts like grades in a class, baseball batting averages, or light and dark areas in a photograph. Processed data becomes information, data that is organized, meaningful, and useful. In school, for instance, an instructor could enter various student grades (data), which can be processed to produce final grades and perhaps a class average (information). Data that is perhaps uninteresting on its own may become very interesting once it is converted to information. The raw facts (data) about your finances, such as a paycheck or a donation to charity or a medical bill may not be captivating individually, but together, these and other acts can be processed to produce the refund or amount you owe on your income tax return (information).

Computer memory, also known as primary storage, is closely associated with the central processing unit but separate from it. Memory holds the data after it is input to the system and before it is processed; also, memory holds the data after it has been processed but before it has been released to the output device. In addition, memory holds the programs (computer instructions) needed by the central processing unit.

Output: What Comes Out

Figure 3: Monitor

Output, the result produced by the central processing unit, is a computer's whole reason for being. Output is usable information; that is, raw input data that has been processed by the computer into information. The most common forms of output are words, numbers, and graphics. Word output, for example, may be the letters and memos prepared by office people using word processing software. Other workers may be more interested in numbers, such as those found in formulas, schedules, and budgets. In many cases numbers can be understood more easily when output in the form of charts and graphics.

Figure 4: Printer

The most common output devices are computer screens (Figure 3)and printers (Figure 4). Screens can vary in their forms of display, producing text, numbers, symbols, art, photographs, and even video-in full color. Printers produce printed reports as instructed by a computer program, often in full color.

You can produce output from a computer in other ways, including film and voice output. We will examine all output methods in detail in a later chapter.

Secondary Storage

Secondary storage provides additional storage separate from memory. Secondary storage has several advantages. For instance, it would be unwise for a college registrar to try to keep the grades of all the students in the college in the computer's memory; if this were done, the computer would probably not have room to store anything else. Also, memory holds data and programs only temporarily. Secondary storage is needed for large volumes of data and also for data that must persist after the computer is turned off.

Figure 6: Hard Disk Pack

Figure 6: Hard Disk Pack

The two most common secondary storage mediums are magnetic disk and magnetic tape. A magnetic disk can be a diskette or a hard disk. A diskette is usually 3-1/2 inches in diameter (in some rare cases older disks are 5-1/4 inches). A diskette is removable so you can take your data with you. Hard disks, shown in Figure 5, have more storage capacity than diskettes and also offer faster access to the data they hold. Hard disks are often contained in disk packs shown in Figure 6 that is built into the computer so your data stays with the computer. Disk data is read by disk drives. Personal computer disk drives read diskettes; most personal computers also have hard disk drives. Modern personal computers are starting to come with removable storage media, like Zip disks. These disks are slightly larger than a diskette and can be inserted and removed like a diskette, but hold much more data than a diskette and are faster for the CPU to access than a diskette. Most modern computers also come with a CD-ROM drive. A CD is an optical disk, it uses a laser beam to read the disk. CD's are removable and store large volumes of data relatively inexpensively. Some CD drives are read only memory (ROM), which means that your computer can read programs from CD's, but you can not save data to the CD yourself. Recently CD-RW drives and disks have become widely available that allow you to create your own CDs by "writing" data such as music and photos to the CD. Magnetic tape, which comes on a reel or cartridge shown in Figure 7,

Figure 7: Magnetic Tape

Figure 7: Magnetic Tape

is similar to tape that is played on a tape recorder. Magnetic tape reels are mounted on tape drives when the data on them needs to be read by the computer system or when new data is to be written on the tape. Magnetic tape is usually used for creating backup copies of large volumes of data because tape is very inexpensive compared to disks and CDs.

We will study storage media in a later part of the course. The Complete Hardware System

The hardware devices attached to the computer are called peripheral equipment. Peripheral equipment includes all input, output, and secondary storage devices. In the case of personal computers, some of the input, output, and storage devices are built into the same physical unit. In many personal computers, the CPU and disk drive are all contained in the same housing; the keyboard, mouse, and screen are separate.

In larger computer systems, however, the input, processing, output, and storage functions may be in separate rooms, separate buildings, or even separate countries. For example, data may be input on terminals at a branch bank and then transmitted to the central processing unit at the headquarters bank. The information produced by the central processing unit may then be transmitted to the international offices, where it is printed out. Meanwhile, disks with stored data may be kept in bank headquarters and duplicate data kept on disk or tape in a warehouse across town for safekeeping.

Although the equipment may vary widely, from the simplest computer to the most powerful, by and large the four elements of a computer system remain the same: input, processing, output, and storage. Now let us look at the way computers have been traditionally classified.

The bicyclists, from New Jersey to Texas, are in town for the three-day Cycle North Carolina Spring Ride, which ends Monday. Most were camped throughout town, including many along the waterfront when the storm came through about 3:30 a.m.

A pine tree in the middle of Colonial Waterfront Park on Edenton Bay split in two, barely missing two tents. "The wind started blowing and my tent started shaking," said Bonnie Shocky of Burnsville NC. The tree fell two feet from her, she said.

Her friend Darla Tiben-Rivera of Fayetteville NC said she thought a tornado was coming through as one side of her tent rolled over on top of her. "I was basically upside down when I got out," she said. Bill Sammler, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Wakefield VA said it was not a tornado. Damage was caused by the thunderstorm's straight-line winds, also known as a downburst. The high winds probably didn't last for more than 30 seconds to a minute, he said. "It doesn't take long for a gust of wind to have significant impact."

Worst hit was the John R Page Masonic Lodge, the only remaining fraternal lodge among a halfdozen built by blacks here between 1885 and 1927. The wind "basically blew it off its foundation," said Reid Thomas, a restoration specialist with the North Carolina State Historic Preservation office in Greenville. An engineer told Thomas the structure, which is still in use, might be able to be saved.

Town Manager Anne-Marie Knighton said she has asked the Museum of the Albemarle in Elizabeth City to help with recovery efforts if historic documents and furniture were damaged.

Part of one of four chimneys at the 1782 Barker House collapsed, said Robbie Laughton, director of the Edenton Parks and Recreation Department. The roof and facade of an 1894 building housing the Chowan Herald newspaper on Broad Street was damaged. A large tree also fell across Broad Street, missing bicyclists who were in tents on the grounds of the historic Cupola House,” he said.

He was a fearless leader and he quickly earned the respect of his men. General Morgan operated mainly in the Western theater under Major General Joseph Wheeler. He was famous for his raids into Tennessee and Kentucky. In July of 1862 General Morgan and his men began raids in Kentucky that lasted three weeks while being chased by Federal troops, but were never captured. In July of 1863 General Morgan and his men took part in their final raid, during a twenty-four day ride into Southern Indiana and Ohio, which ended when General Morgan was captured. Morgan was sent to the Ohio Penitentiary, where he escaped. General John Hunt Morgan was shot and killed in a surprise attack by Federal cavalry at Greeneville, Tennessee on September 3, 1864. General Morgan is buried in Lexington Cemetery in Lexington, Kentucky.

In July 1863, Confederate raiders rode into Versailles, Indiana, capturing the local militia and stealing the county treasury. The next day, General John Morgan, learned that his men had also made off with the jewels of the local Masonic Lodge. They were returned the following day to the Lodge.

Brother John Hunt Morgan was a member of Daviess Lodge #22, Lexington, Kentucky.