two IB questions

3. Soon, many television stations will change from broadcasting on analogue airwaves to begin broadcasting only in digital. Digital broadcasting will allow stations to offer high resolution pictures and better sound quality as well as additional channels.
With digital TV, sounds and pictures from the broadcaster are converted into binary digits (bits) and sent though an aerial, satellite, telephone lone or cable. This digital signal is then turned back into sounds and pictures by a digital box or a digital TV set.

Some digital boxes have special access features such as subtitles, signing and audio description from people with hearing or sigh problems

However, recent improvements in Internet bandwidth and the increased availability of video through web sites such as youtube, have led to questions being raised about the need for additional digital channels.

a) Define the term resolutions- the degree of sharpness on a computer generator image as measured by the number of dots per linear inch in a hard – copy print out or the number of pixels across and down on a display screen.

b) Digital TV broadcasters are able to provide interactive serves. Describe two interactive services that could be provided with digital TV. -Two interactive services that could be provided with digital TV is that the person controlling the TV can pause and rewind live TV.

c)Explain two ways in which a domestic installation such as a digital TV can communicate with the digital provider- Two ways in which a domestic installation such as a digital TV can communicate with the digital provider is one, if you have commcast, for example, you could -purchase netflix over your digital TV. Another would be that ordering movies over your TV, not netflix, like what is provided for your digital TV company.

d) To what extent is the growth of video clips on the internet overtaking the need for digital TV.
To a great extent the growth of video clips on the internet is overtaking the need for digital TV. People no longer feel the need to have digital TV's if they can easily access a movie, for free, on their laptop or their computer at home. Sine laptops are brought everywhere by some people they could easily watch a movie by doing other work and not use a television. Since televisions cost money each month and wifi does not people have a greater chance of watching video clips on the internet then on digital tv.


4. A biotechnology company has been commissioned to develop a database to store genetic data on all citizens in Iceland for the purpose of medical research. The country was chosen because of its isolation and small population resulting in a small gene pool.

Citizens are required to give a blood sample which is processed to provide a genetic profile. The profile can then be matched with details such as age, weight, and medical history to predict potential future health issues that may be linked to the genetic backgrounds of individuals.

Data is made anonymous by replacing personal details with an ID number. This is used as a key field in the database. Some citizen have expressed concern about the collection of this data and have challenged its legality in court.

a) Define the term key field- Key field is a field in a record that holds unique data which identifies that record from all the other records in the file or database. Account number, product code and customer name are typical key fields. As an identifier, each key value must be unique in each record.

b) Describe the process used to create a query which would produce an alphabetical list of all the citizens who have suffered from diabetes, were born after 1990 and do not smoke. - The process use to create a query which would produce an alphabetical list of all the citizens who have suffered from diabetes, were born after 1990 and do not smoke would be that there would need to be a database. There would need to be a collection of all names, and how old they are, and if they do not smoke. All of this information would go into a database. If there needed to be a query of all the people who suffer from diabetes, were born after 1990 and do not smoke the person making the query would need to put this information into the database and then the query would spit out this information.

c)Explain the difference between data matching and data mining with reference to the icelandic database- Data mining- The process using sophisticated data search capability’s and statistical antilogarithms to discover patters and correlations in large, pre existing, databases while data matching.
Data matching- is comparing records in two different databases to find matches that answer a specif question.
These two have differences because while data ming processes sophisticated data matching compares records in two different databases.

d)To what extent do the advantages to medical research outweigh the concerns of some icelandic citizens about storage of their genetic data.
To a great extent does the advantages to medical research outweigh the concerns of some icelandic citizens about storage of their data because the database will have so much information of the icelandic citizens about their genetic data. This outweighs their concerns because they will know that they are safe and have all of their information stored onto a database and that if the government has any questions they will be able to pull up the database and answer those questions.