Computers
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99 free Computers trivia questions with answers — technology quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
18 free computer trivia questions with answers. Are you a computer enthusiast or tech expert? Our engaging 99-question computer trivia quiz will test your knowledge across hardware, software, internet history, and modern technology. Whether you're a casual user or IT professional, see how well you understand the machines that power our world.
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Q 01Which daughter of the poet Lord Byron is often called the first computer programmer for her notes on Babbage's Analytical Engine?
Ada Lovelace
Ada Lovelace's notes described how Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine could go beyond simple calculation to perform a sequence of operations, which is why she is called the first programmer.
Q 02What does the acronym RAM stand for in computing?
Random Access Memory
RAM stands for Random Access Memory: any location can be read or written in about the same time regardless of where it physically sits, unlike sequential tape.
Q 03Which 1977 personal computer was one of the first highly successful mass-produced microcomputers?
Apple II
The Apple II, released in 1977, was a groundbreaking personal computer that achieved significant commercial success and helped popularize home computing.
Q 04What is the full form of CPU in the context of computer hardware?
Central Processing Unit
CPU stands for Central Processing Unit, the circuitry that carries out a program's arithmetic, logic, control and input/output instructions.
Q 05What software manages hardware and resources and provides common services for programs?
Operating System
An operating system (OS) is system software that manages computer hardware and software resources and provides common services for computer programs.
Q 06Who is credited with inventing the World Wide Web?
Tim Berners-Lee
Tim Berners-Lee, a CERN scientist, proposed the Web in March 1989 and by the end of 1990 had written the first browser, web server, HTML and HTTP.
Q 07What network security system controls incoming and outgoing traffic based on predetermined rules?
Firewall
A firewall is a network security system that monitors and controls incoming and outgoing network traffic based on predetermined security rules, establishing a barrier between a trusted internal network and untrusted external networks.
Q 08What is the primary function of a Graphics Processing Unit (GPU)?
Accelerating image rendering
A GPU's primary job is accelerating image rendering: thousands of small cores process pixels and vertices in parallel, a design later adopted for training AI models.
Q 09What is the smallest unit of data in computing, holding a single 0 or 1?
Bit
A bit, a portmanteau of 'binary digit', is the smallest unit of data in computing, representing either a 0 or a 1.
Q 10In computing, what is a 'byte' composed of?
8 bits
A byte is 8 bits, the de facto standard since IBM's System/360 in 1964; six-bit and nine-bit bytes were common on earlier machines.
Q 11What is an IDE in the context of software development?
Integrated Development Environment
An Integrated Development Environment (IDE) is a software application that provides comprehensive facilities to computer programmers for software development, typically including a source code editor, build automation tools, and a debugger.
Q 12What does VPN stand for?
Virtual Private Network
VPN stands for Virtual Private Network: traffic is wrapped in an encrypted tunnelling protocol so a remote user appears to be plugged straight into the private network.
Q 13In computing, what is a 'daemon'?
A background process
Q 21Which Charles Babbage design did London's Science Museum finally build from his plans in 1991?
The Difference Engine
The Difference Engine No. 2 was built by the Science Museum from Babbage's 1840s drawings, completed in 1991 for his bicentenary; it tabulates polynomials by the method of finite differences.
Q 22Alan Turing's portrait appears on which Bank of England banknote, first issued on his birthday in 2021?
The £50 note
The polymer £50 note bearing Turing entered circulation on 23 June 2021, his 109th birthday; he had received a royal pardon in 2013.
Q 23During World War II, Alan Turing worked at which British codebreaking centre?
Bletchley Park
A daemon is a background process that runs without user interaction; by Unix convention their names end in the letter d, as in syslogd or sshd.
Q 14Which programming paradigm builds software from entities that bundle data together with the functions that act on it?
Object-Oriented Programming
Object-Oriented Programming is based on objects, software entities that encapsulate data and the code that operates on it.
Q 15Which kind of integrated circuit is built to be configured by the customer or designer after it leaves the factory?
Field-Programmable Gate Array (FPGA)
A Field-Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) can be programmed again and again after manufacture, unlike an ASIC, whose logic is fixed when the chip is made.
Q 16What term describes data sets characterized by the 'three Vs' of volume, velocity and variety?
Big Data
Big Data means data sets too large or complex for traditional data-processing software, typically described by high volume, velocity and variety.
Q 17What type of cyberattack exploits leaked information such as timing, power use or electromagnetic emissions?
Side-channel attack
A side-channel attack is a security exploit that leverages information inadvertently leaked by a system—such as timing, power consumption, or electromagnetic or acoustic emissions—to gain unauthorized access to sensitive information.
Q 18In cryptography, what maps data of arbitrary size to fixed-size values, used for integrity checks and password storage?
Hash function
A hash function is any function that can be used to map data of arbitrary size to fixed-size values (hash values or digests), commonly used for data integrity, digital signatures, and password storage.
Q 19ENIAC, completed in 1945, was originally built to calculate what for the US Army?
Artillery firing tables
ENIAC was built to compute artillery firing tables for the Army's Ballistic Research Laboratory; designed by Mauchly and Eckert, it cost about $487,000 and the press dubbed it a 'Giant Brain'.
Q 20Where was ENIAC formally dedicated in February 1946?
Penn
It had already been put to practical work at the University of Pennsylvania the previous December.
Turing worked at Bletchley Park, wartime home of the Government Code and Cypher School, where he developed the bombe from the Polish bomba to find Enigma settings.
Q 24The first working transistor was invented in 1947 at which research laboratory?
Bell Labs
The point-contact transistor was demonstrated at Bell Labs in December 1947; Bardeen, Brattain and Shockley shared the 1956 Nobel Prize in Physics for it.
Q 25Jack Kilby demonstrated the first working integrated circuit in 1958 while working for which company?
Texas Instruments
Kilby built his germanium integrated circuit at Texas Instruments in September 1958 and shared the 2000 Nobel Prize in Physics for it; his version still used external gold-wire connections.
Q 26In 1975 Gordon Moore revised his forecast to say transistors per chip would double roughly how often?
Every two years
In 1975 Moore revised his 1965 'doubling every year' observation to a doubling every two years, which works out to about 41% compound annual growth.
Q 27Steve Jobs secured the Apple-1's first order, for 50 machines, from which retailer?
The Byte Shop
Paul Terrell's Byte Shop in Mountain View ordered 50 Apple-1s at $500 each after Jobs pitched it; Wozniak had demonstrated the prototype at the Homebrew Computer Club.
Q 28The original IBM Personal Computer, model 5150, was powered by which processor?
Intel 8088
The IBM PC 5150 ran a 4.77 MHz Intel 8088; released on 12 August 1981, its open architecture spawned the PC-compatible industry.
Q 29The team that created the IBM PC worked in which Florida city?
Boca Raton
The IBM PC was developed by a small team at IBM's Boca Raton, Florida site, led by William C. Lowe and then Philip 'Don' Estridge.
Q 30Windows 1.0, released in November 1985, was originally developed under what working name?
Interface Manager
Microsoft developed Windows 1.0 under the working name Interface Manager before announcing it as Windows in 1983; it was a graphical shell running on top of MS-DOS.