Computational Methods

Question 1

What is meant by a computable problem

Answer 1

A problem that can be solved using an algorithm

Question 2

Give three limiting factors to computable problems

Answer 2

• Processing Power
• Processor Speed
• Computer Memory
• Time

Question 3

State two factors which may be considered during the Problem Definition phase

Answer 3

• Strengths and weaknesses of current solution
• Volume
• Type
• Frequency
• Nature of Input
  Outputs
  Stored Data

Question 4

What is the name given to the process in which problems are continually broken down until each subproblem can be represented as a subroutine

Answer 4

Problem decomposition

Question 5

State two purposes of problem decomposition

Answer 5

• 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

Question 6

Describe how the divide and conquer technique works

Answer 6

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.

Question 7

Give two applications of divide and conquer

Answer 7

• Merge sort
• Binary search
• Quick sort

Question 8

Which programming construct do many problems solved using Divide and Conquer use

Answer 8

Recursion

Question 9

What is representational abstraction

Answer 9

AA computational technique in which excessive details are removed to simplify a problem.

Question 10

What type of abstraction is used to group together sections of the problem based on their functionality

Answer 10

Abstraction by generalisation

Question 11

State two problem solving techniques

Answer 11

• Backtracking
• Data mining
• Abstraction
• Divide and conquer
• Visualisation
• Performance modelling
• Pipelining
• Visualisation

Question 12

Describe how backtracking works

Answer 12

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.

Question 13

When might heuristics be used in problem-solving?

Answer 13

When the standard way to solve the problem is unreasonably time-consuming or resource-intensive

Question 14

State two advantages of using performance modelling

Answer 14

• Safe
• Relatively inexpensive
• Less time-consuming

Question 15

What is pipelining?

Answer 15

When ones processes output is another processes input.

Question 16

What is the name given to the technique used to identify patterns and trends in large sets of data?

Answer 16

Data mining

Question 17

What is the name given to the technique used to identify patterns and trends in large sets of data?

Answer 17

Data mining

Question 18

Evaluate how you can use data mining to inform future changes to improve a circus game. (Knowledge)

Answer 18

Data mining is a technique used to identify patterns or outliers in large sets of data

Question 19

Evaluate how you can use data mining to inform future changes to improve a circus game. (Application)

Answer 19

• 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.

Question 20

Evaluate how you can use data mining to inform future changes to improve a circus game. (Evaluation)

Answer 20

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.

Question 21

what is an advantage of pipelining?

Answer 21

reduces the processor’s cycle time

Question 22

what is an drawback of pipelining?

Answer 22

Designing of the pipelined processor is complex.

Question 23

how can pipelining suite a program?

Answer 23

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.

Question 24

Explain why pipelining can improve the performance of the processor

Answer 24

The processor is more efficiently utilizised as, as one instruction is being fetched one is being decoded etc.