Comptia ITF

Study for Comptia ITF Exam.

Types of Operating systems for Desktop

• Linux - a free open-source operating system that derives from Unix

• Mac OS - a proprietary operating system that introduced the first common GUI and considered the best for graphical programs (Photo/video editing/coding)

• Windows - the most widely used workstation OS in the entire world

• ChromeOS - usually a cloud-based operating system for Chromebooks

Three main functions of a computer

1. Input

2. Processing

3. Output

Form Factor

The size and layout of the case

Computer Case

1. Holds internal components

2. Should match the power supply and motherboard

Power Supply Unit (PSU)

Must give enough voltage to all components in a computer

What are the standardized names for the motherboard?

ATX or ITX are standardized names for the size of motherboard

What does the power supply do?

convert AC power from the wall into DC

What are the different form factors?

DIP, PGA, LGA, ARM

Dual Inline CPU (DIP)

Can’t be standalone, has to be attached to a printed circuit board

Pin Grid Array CPU (PGA)

Has Pins

Land Grind Array (LGA)

Completely Flat

Advanced RISC Machine (ARM)

Found in phones

What are the two types of CPU architecture?

1. 32-bit also known as x86

2. 64-bit also known as x64 is backwards compatible with 32-bit

Manufacturers of CPUs

1. Intel manufactures caters LGA

2. AMG manufatures caters PGA

Hard disk drive (HDD)

a magnetic storage that stores data on a platter. Has higher data storage than SSD. Prone to damage.

Solid state drives (SSDs)

does not have moving parts, which results in faster access to data, higher reliability, and reduced power usage.

LAN (Local Area Network)

Share resources with your network

NAS (Network Attached Storage)

a preconfigured device that stores and shares data for multiple computers that can be accessed remotely with minimal setup.

File Server

a computer-dedicated hardware intended to share files. More powerful than NAS.

Server

is a computer with a dedicated task.

Cloud Storage

enables access to files through a collection of offsite servers.

Volatile memory

needs electricity to work will erase otherwise.

VGA (Visual Graphic Array)

video standard years ago carry analog video signals DB-15 has 15 connectors (Only Video)

HDMI (High Digital Multimedia Interface)

carries digital video and audio signals. (Audio and Video)

Displayport

is the interface for digital display. Great for high definition video and sound (Audio and Video)

DVI (Digital Visual Interface)

has high picture quality but CANNOT transfer SOUND.

What are the types of DVI?

1. DVI-D carries digital

2. DVI-A carries analog

3. DVI-I  carries both digital and analog

Bluetooth standard

is for a short range wireless interconnection of devices. Usually range 30ft (10 m).

NFC (Near field Communication) standard

for exchanging data between devices maximum of 6 inches. Data mostly transfers via touch or haptic feedback such as Apple Pay.

Drivers

software that allows for that hardware to properly function and communicate with the operating system.

Plug & Play

refers to a device that automatically works with your system by simply plugging it in. Does not need manual installation to work.

Dedicated server

is your organizations own and only contains your data and software. (Privately own) it only does one thing.

Non-dedicated server

is “hosted” in a shared environment. Handles more than one thing.

Workstation

is a computer that is used by standard (regular) to do daily work. Also known as clients and usually rely on servers to give resources.

Docking Station

are specific to laptops. Are hardware devices that provides laptops with additional ports, power, and drive bay.

Internet of Things (IoT)

allows practically any device to be connected to the internet.

Operating systems functions

• Coordinate user and hardware

• Provide an environment for software to function

• Provide structure for data management 

• Monitoring system health and functionality

Virtualization

is the process of using software known as the hypervisor to allocate hardware for more efficient usage of the operating system. Allow for multiple OSs to run concurrently on one physical machine and for multiple virtual images to be deployed.

Type 1 or Bare-metal hypervisor

is a layer of software we install directly on top of a physical server and its underlying hardware (USED IN SERVERS).

Type 2 or Hosted hypervisor

sits on an existing OS which relies on the host machine’s preexisting OS to mange calls to CPU, memory, storage and network resources (USED IN WORKSTATIONS/CLIENT PC).

• Has to run on top of a device that has an OS

Embedded OS

are operating systems that are designed to be small and efficient, often responsible for a single task.

Server Operating System

Also known as network-based OP - used to control and maintain other computers on a network.

• Window Server 2016

• MacOS 11 (Server 5.11)

• Ubuntu Server

• Red Hat Enterprise Linux

Single Platform Software

application that is only able to be installed on one type of device or OP

• Ex. IoS devices use iCloud while Android uses Google Drive

Cross Platform Software

can be installed across OP

• Ex. Dropbox can be used across OS platform

Open Source

licensed software is usually free and has the source code available for the public to use. A license that is usually used across different operating systems.

Propriety

licenses are those that are most associated to a particular type of device or OP.

Subscription or Shareware

are software licenses that are usually free for a trial period and requires a fee after a time has been reached.

Concurrent software

used simultaneously by many users for a certain amount of time.

Disk Management

most operating systems will have its own form of it.

• Managing hard drives, optical drives, other storage media

• Creating and deleting partitions 

• Formatting partitions

Device Management

can be found within Windows Operating Systems

• Identifying hardware specs of a device

• Updating a driver 

• Rolling back a driver

• Uninstalling a driver

• Disabling a device

Process Management

is a utility that allows users the ability to do the following 

• Start, stop, and restart system processes

• Window uses a utility named Task Manger to mange 

Task Manager

offers users the ability to do 

• Start, Stop, and restart system processes

• Enable or Disable service 

• View a graphical chart of system resources 

Task Scheduling

is a utility that allows you to create automated task

• Allows OS functions and task to be completed faster than they would using manual access

File Systems

is what allows the ability to access, save and secure files in the operating system

• NTFS (New Technology File System) commonly found in Window OS

• FAT32 (File Allocation Table) An older file system more compatible in older OS than NTFS

• HFS (Hierarchal File System) Found within Mac OS

• Ext4 (Extended File System) Found within Linux (Ext3, NFS (Network File System)

Permission Consist of

• Read - Opening a file or folder

• Write - Adding information to a file or creating a file

• Modify - Read, Write, Excuse permission, along with the ability to Delete a file or folder

• Full Control - All of the above including setting additional permission

Application Tier Models

• Presentation Layer - is also known as client layer and is the layer that we see and interact with when we use software

• Application Layer - is also known as Business Logic Layer and controls an application’s functionality within detailed processing

• Data Layer - is where all the data is stored

One Tier Architecture Model (Client Tier)

the user has direct access to data since data is stored in the local system.

• Easy to implement

• Usually does not support remote access for data resources

• Not commonly used due to lack of redundancy and security issues

Two Tier Architecture Model

the communication takes place between the Client and the Server. The client system sends the request to the server system and the Server system processes the request and sends the data back to the Client system.

• requesting information on my account process

Three Tier Architecture Model

user logs into their computers and connects to an application server. The application server then accesses information from the databases, usually considering these three steps;

• Reinforces scalability

• Improves data integrity and security

• Can be complex

• None - n-tier can be considered any “tier” model higher than one

Productivity Software

is a category of application programs that is found in most work environments and is used to complete basic tasks such as producing documents, worksheets and presentations

• Word processing

• Collaboration software

• Document storage and sharing

Collaboration Software

is a category of application programs used to communicate and share resources with one another

• Email client software

• Conferencing software

• Online workspace

• Document storage and sharing

Business Software

is a category of application program used in a business setting. These applications are geared towards specific tasks

• Accounting Software

• Medical Software

• Business-Specific applications

Binary

computers process information through numbers.

• Base 2 system

• Represented by a string of 1s and 0s

• 1 = on

• 0 = off

Decimal Notation

Base 10 system

Hexadecimal

• Base 16 system

• Represented by a string of numbers (0-9) and characters (A-F)

Integer

any whole number no decimals 

• Ex.1 or -1000

Float

any number that contains a decimal point

• Ex. 3.14 or -1.000001

String

a composition of zero or more characters and is consider text even if that character is a number

• Ex. “My name is Joe.”

Char

single character that represents a single way that character is displayed

• Ex. The letter “A” or “a”

Boolean

True or False condition 

• Ex. On or off, yes or no, 1 or 0

Constant

a set or predefined value that, does not change

Variable

a value that can potentially change in the execution of the program either from the result of an output of another part of the program or as input from a user

Assembly Language

is considered the lowest level of code that humans can read and write, before CPU machine code CPU

• Faster than more complex programming languages

• Used to reverse engineer code

• Great for embedded systems, device drivers, and direct hardware   access

  • Intel X86, Arm, RISC-V

Compiled Languages

are converted directly into machine code that the processor can execute

• Is not cross-platform (programs are created for a single platform)

• Faster and more efficient to execute than interpreted languages

  • Java, C, C++, C#, Basic

Interpreted Language

utilize software, which reads through each line of code every time the program is executed. Has two types, markup and scripting.

Markup languages (Interpreted language)

are marked with tags to govern the display, formatting, and organization of text elements.

• Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), XML, CSS

Scripting Language (Interpreted language)

execute a list of task; such as obtaining data from a data set.

• JavaScript, PHP, .NET, Python

Query Languages

are specifically used to retriever input data’ which is sometimes described as asking a question

• Includes Structured Query Language (SQL) and Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP)

  • SELECT column_name

  • FROM table_name

  • WHERE condition

Conditional Statement

used for branching or program flow

• Commonly use Booleans to determine which path the program should choose

• Often shown using the words “if”, “then”, or “else”

Loops

useful when repeating a process until a condition or set of conditions are either met or not met depending on what the loop is intended for initially

Flowchart

visual representation of a program whereas boxes are used to represent the logic

Pseudocode

code not read by the processor but is intended for human reading, such as comments

Containers

units of software that packages up code (and its dependencies) so an app can run quickly and reliably.

Array

list of values of the same data type with a fixed predefined size

Vector

holds a list of values, but do not need to be of the same data type and are dynamic in size

Database

is the structured set of data held in a computer, especially one that is accessible in various ways.

• Stored locally, on a server, or the cloud

• Resembles spreadsheets but contain tables instead

• Flat files are two dimensional only contains rows and columns

Using a Database for?

• Multiple concurrent users

  • When we have multiple users attempting to access or manipulate data

• Scalability

  • Increased users and data to a flat file will slow down performance (ability to grow)

• Speed

  • Databases are faster at processing large amount of data

• Variety of Data

  • Databases contain text, numbers, images and some cases web pages

Relational Database

is structured to recognize relationships between stored items of information, known as datasets

• They are predictable and organized with tables containing columns and rows of text or numerical data

• SQL, Oracle, Sybase, Informix, MySQL

What are Relational Databases Management Systems (RDBMS) used for?

are software used to manage a database

• Add, remove, update records

• Retrieve data

• Cross-reference data in different tables

Relational DB Structure

• Schema - rules and structure of a database

• Records - the row in a table (horizontal)

• Attribute - the column in the table (vertical)

• Tables - look like a spreadsheet and contains data

• Fields; column; contain a single data type for all records (phone number, name, etc.).

• Forms - How data is entered

• Queries - How the data is found

• Marcos and Modules - Increases databases functionality (run reports at regular intervals, etc.).

• Reports - Generated to answer specific questions

Primary Key

is a unique identifier that helps you define a record (or content in a row)

Foreign Key

is a key or field in a table that is used to link two tables together

Non-Relational Databases

does not use the tabular schema of rows and columns

• Uses a storage model that is optimized for the specific requirements of the type of data being stored

• Also known as “NoSQL” databases

• Oracle NoSQL, Amazon, Microsoft Azure

Manual Access

going directly into tables to view or change data, suitable method for working with a database that is stored locally

Direct Access

accessing via a direct connection across a network suitable for LANs

Programming Access

accessing a database through a programming language

User Interface and Utility Access

using a graphical interface (GUI) such as a form or web page (MySQL Workbench)

Query/Report Builders

creating reports and visual aids such as pie charts

Data Manipulation

enables the ability to adjust the content/data in your table

What Does Data Manipulation Includes?

• Select - Allows to “select” or specific intended data

• Insert - Allows the ability to add contents into the table

• Delete - Allows the ability to remove contents of a table

• Update - Allows the changing or editing of contents in table. You are not deleting, only editing