ICT Systems and Components 2.1

What is ICT?
Information Communication Technology = ICT
The use of technology for input, process, storage, transfer and output of information.

What is a system?
A system always involves the process of:
INPUT - PROCESS - OUTPUT
1. Data is entered into the system using an input device (e.g keyboard)
2. Data is processed by the computer (e.g calculations, queries, sorting)
3. The information is then sent to an output device (e.g printer)

Photographs from a camera -> Crop and edit them -> Edited photos are displayed on page

What is an ICT system?
These are systems where the output goes directly to a human being or another computer system.

People, Data, Procedures, Software, Hardware, Information

1. People - no system can work without people being involved somewhere. People are needed to enter the data into the system most of the time.

2. Data - 'data is raw facts and figures or a set of values, it has no meaning until it is processed and given a purpose'
(data can be entered by; keyboard, barcode reader, scanner, digital camera, microphone)

3. Procedures - these are needed in order for the data to be processed into information

4. Software - this is needed in order for the computer to be able to run programs to edit and store the data
(e.g word processing, desktop publishing)

5. Hardware - needed for the computer to work and for output and processing
(input devices, processors, output devices, ports and cables, storage devices)

6. Information - this is the final output once the data has been processed