介绍:
We all climbed aboard the MSB --- except for Arnold. He volunteered to stay behind in case Mr.Ruhle showed up early.When we all started to shrink, I began to think Arnold had a good idea.
So this is where the floppies go! To the drive-in disk-o!
A diskette, a diskette ,the bus all turn into a floppy disk if we ask it!” sang Ms.Frizzle. I’ll bet you can guess what happened next:
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Inside the disk drive, a motor started spinning us around fast.Then something look like a long metal toothbrush began sliding along the disk.
“ What’s with the toothbrush thing ?” Carlos asked.
That’s with the read/write head. It’s reading instructions and other information stored on the floppy disk,” Ms.Frizzle explained.
“ In my old school we read, but we never got read!”
It will change the information on the disk into electrical signals and send it to the main part of the computer.”
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The read/write was getting awfully close, when the Friz said,”OK, bus,do your stuff!” Just in time, the bus turned into a teeny blimp ---- with us in it! Now we had a really good view of the inside of the computer,but we couldn’t see Mikey anywhere.
“ Wait!said Wanda. “ Mikey was going to find out what happened to his instructions, right ? And instructions are information,right ? And the information is in those flashing signals,right? So if we follow the signals--- we find Mikey!”
“Right,Wanda!Let’s follow the yellow-lit road!”
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Would you believe that panels in the ceiling of the bus opened,
and skateboards came down for all of us? If you’ve ever been in Ms.Frizzle’s class, you can believe anything!
Next thing we knew, we were skateboarding through the inside of the computer.
“ Time to skateboard to the motherboard!”
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“ The information goes Electricity Express!”
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“ Wow! Where are we ?” asked Wanda.
“ You’re skating on the cables that run from the disk drive to the motherboard. The motherboard is the heart of the computer!” shouted Ms.Frizzle from the blimp.
The motherboard was full of wires. And the wires were carrying electrical signals like the ones coming in from our floppy disk.
“ This must be how information travels around the computer.”said Ralphie.
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Next the information led us to a big square thing in the middle of the motherboard.But still no Mikey.
“What’s going on in there,anyway?” wondered Wanda. “It’s all wires and lights.”
Ms. Frizzle explained that the square thing was the part of the computer that’s in charge of everything that happens inside.
“It handles every bit of information that comes in---and goes out, ” she said. “That’s why it’s called the central processing unit---or the CPU for short.
“ So Mikey must have come into the CPU…
…AND THEN GONE OUT! ”
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Little did I know that Mikey was right nearby ,listening to a guided tour through his earphones. Hers’s what it said: You have just entered the computer’s random access memory---also know as RAM. A computer can’t follow a list of instructions if it can’t remember them. These RAM chips hold the instructions …”
…while the CPU follows them,Cool!
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Meawhile,back at school,the computer was still doing our jobs over and over and over and over and…Well,let’s put it this way:Arnold was not having a good day. Make that ditto for Mr.McLean.
But what could we do?We still could’t find Mikey.
“Wait,wait,wait,” said Wanda. “ Mikey said he stored his instructins permanently, remember ?So where does information get stored?”
“ In the hard drive! ”called Ms.Frizzle from the blimp.It’s over that-a-way!”
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There he is ! It looks like he’s going for a spin!
Mikey couldn’t hear us because his earphones, but we could hear what Mikey’s tour guide was saying: “ Welcome to the hard drive,where disks are hard drive,where disks are hard instead of floppy. This is where information is stored so it can be used over and over again.”
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“Mikey!” shouted Dorothy Ann. “ You gotta help us. Something’s wrong with the computer!”
“Wrong? said Micky,who had finally taken off his headphones.“ I checked everything out,and it’s working great. Information’s coming from the keyboard and the floppy disk and getting changed into electrical signals just like it’s supposed to.And the CPU’s deciding what to do with “em.”
Everything ‘s A-ok in here.
Well,it’s not A-OK out there.
The computer ‘s doing our jobs over and over!
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We’ve got to get out of here!”yelled Wanda.
“No sweat!” said Mikey. Computers sent informations as well as bring it in. We’ll just go out with the output.
“Look!”shouted Ms.Frizzle from the blimp.
“There’s some information on its way to the printer now.Just go with the flow!”
Don’t ask me how,but the whole blimp turned into the bunch of skateboards,and we followed the information to the printer. The Friz joined us and soon we were on our way out.
In my old school we printed,but we never got printed!
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Boy,was Arnold ever happy to see us popping out of the printer!
Mikey went straight to the computer,while Ms.Frizzle explained to us that computer isn’t really smart.It’s just a machine.
“A computer needs it can understand to tell it what to do and how to do it ,”she said.“Those instructions are called a program.”
“And if there’s even one teeny-weeny mistake in the program.”
“And if there’s even one teeny-weeny mistake in the program,”added Mikey,
Everything goes kaflooey!”
I guess there’s a first time for everything!
And anyone can make a mistake – even Mikey!
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Mikey printed out his program so we could check it out. “Let’s see,” he said.” “Bell,doors,flag,greeting,sprinklers, coffee, attendance sheets…”
It says “repeat every minute”instead of every day!
No wonder everything is happening again and again,”said Micky.
“The computer’s doing just what I told it to do!”
“Which is all computers ever do,”chimed in the Friz.
Mikey changed the word minute to day, stored the new and improved program in the hard drive,and we were up and running!
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Just in time,too.Because Mr.Ruhle was on his way to our classroom!
“What’s going on here?”he asked.”The school seems to be getting ready by itself!”
When we explained that the computer was doing our jobs for us,Mr.Ruhle looked mad.He said he had told us to set up the computer,not program it.
“Am I supposed to be pleased?”he asked.
Well,I’m not!
I’m thrilled!
I warned you about the crazy things that happen in Ms.Frizzle’s class.Do you believe me now?
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