Help.

[Bornice]

Hie... i was browsing through the net trying to get information on my term paper when I came across your site. I need help, please, plenty of it.
I am a university student and for my exam we've been asked to write a paper on computer architecture advancements and how it has affected programming....I need help from you guys since you seem to know much about computers...
Help may be inform of... "What area do I look at? Computer memory? Processor? Input/ output devices.....??? Anything shall be gratefully accepted.. thanx!!!

[Killer42]

Hie... i was browsing through the net trying to get information on my term paper when I came across your site. I need help, please, plenty of it.
I am a university student and for my exam we've been asked to write a paper on computer architecture advancements and how it has affected programming....I need help from you guys since you seem to know much about computers...
Help may be inform of... "What area do I look at? Computer memory? Processor? Input/ output devices.....??? Anything shall be gratefully accepted.. thanx!!!

Memory and CPU architecture seem to be two big areas of change. For instance, once upon a time the programmer had to work within 64KB chunks (um... "segments" I mean) of memory. Working on anything larger meant switching between segments all the time, plus I think you also had to keep track of stack pointers, and so on. Compare that with VB, for instance, where I don't know or care about memory allocation. (Oh alright, I care - but I don't have to).
CPU architecture has had a huge impact on programming. You certainly couldn't run Windows XP on an old 80286 processor (as far as I know). In fact, the 80386 was probably the first big leap forward, though others may disagree. That was when "386 enhanced mode" memory management allowed Windows, for example, to go from being a very expensive (in terms of processing and memory) menu system to a multi-tasking OS.