Computational Methods Flashcards
What is meant by a computable problem
A problem that can be solved using an algorithm
Give three limiting factors to computable problems
- Processing Power
- Processor Speed
- Computer Memory
- Time
State two factors which may be considered during the Problem Definition phase
- Strengths and weaknesses of current solution
- Volume
- Type
- Frequency
- Nature of Input
Outputs
Stored Data
What is the name given to the process in which problems are continually broken down until each subproblem can be represented as a subroutine
Problem decomposition
State two purposes of problem decomposition
- Identify sections which can make use of pre-coded modules or libraries
- Save timecoding
- Simplify project management
- Simplify testing and maintenance
- Faster project delivery
- Develop sections in parallel
Describe how the divide and conquer technique works
The problem size is halved with every iteration. Each individual subproblem is then solved recursively. The solution to the subproblems are then recombined to form the final solution to the problem.
Give two applications of divide and conquer
- Merge sort
- Binary search
- Quick sort
Which programming construct do many problems solved using Divide and Conquer use
Recursion
What is representational abstraction
AA computational technique in which excessive details are removed to simplify a problem.
What type of abstraction is used to group together sections of the problem based on their functionality
Abstraction by generalisation
State two problem solving techniques
- Backtracking
- Data mining
- Abstraction
- Divide and conquer
- Visualisation
- Performance modelling
- Pipelining
- Visualisation
Describe how backtracking works
The backtracking algorithm works by methodically visiting each path and building a solution based on the paths found to be correct. If a path is found to be invalid at any point, it backtracks to the previous stage and visits an alternative path.
When might heuristics be used in problem-solving?
When the standard way to solve the problem is unreasonably time-consuming or resource-intensive
State two advantages of using performance modelling
- Safe
- Relatively inexpensive
- Less time-consuming
What is pipelining?
When ones processes output is another processes input.
What is the name given to the technique used to identify patterns and trends in large sets of data?
Data mining
What is the name given to the technique used to identify patterns and trends in large sets of data?
Data mining
Evaluate how you can use data mining to inform future changes to improve a circus game. (Knowledge)
Data mining is a technique used to identify patterns or outliers in large sets of data
Evaluate how you can use data mining to inform future changes to improve a circus game. (Application)
- sets of data can be checked to see how long people are spending on certain things on the game to see what people are liking and disliking, this would be a great way to see what to work on next.
Evaluate how you can use data mining to inform future changes to improve a circus game. (Evaluation)
As its data mining a game the data set is going to be large which is needed for datamining. Datamining allows the business to reliable information which can be used to:
- Add new features
- Advertisement focus
etc.
what is an advantage of pipelining?
reduces the processor’s cycle time
what is an drawback of pipelining?
Designing of the pipelined processor is complex.
how can pipelining suite a program?
It can improve a programs performance by increasing its processing speed.
Pipelining splits a programs tasks into smaller sub-tasks and executes them in parallel, allowing for efficient utilization of the processing resources and overall reducing execution times.
Explain why pipelining can improve the performance of the processor
The processor is more efficiently utilizised as, as one instruction is being fetched one is being decoded etc.
