Q 01/05

Douglas Engelbart's first computer mouse, which rolled on two metal wheels, had a shell made of which material?

A) Plastic

B) Wood

C) Steel

D) Brass

Answer · why

B) Wood

Wood formed the shell of the first prototype, which Bill English helped Engelbart build in 1964. The nickname mouse likely came from the cord, which l...

Q 02/05

Which outdated storage medium still appears as the save icon in many programs, long after computers stopped using it?

A) Cassette tape

B) Punched card

C) Floppy disk

D) Compact disc

Answer · why

C) Floppy disk

Floppy disk icons are a classic of skeuomorphic design, where an on-screen symbol copies a physical object. IBM made the first ones in 1971, a full 8 ...

Q 03/05

The world's first webcam, set up at the University of Cambridge in 1991, kept watch on which everyday object?

A) A fish tank

B) A bird feeder

C) A bike rack

D) A coffee pot

Answer · why

D) A coffee pot

A coffee pot in the Trojan Room was put on camera so researchers could check it was full before walking over. One of the machines seen on the feed lat...

Q 04/05

Which term for the smallest controllable dot on a screen blends a slang word for pictures with the word 'element'?

A) Voxel

B) Bezel

C) Pixel

D) Texel

Answer · why

C) Pixel

Pixel combines 'pix', a slang shortening of pictures, with the first syllable of 'element', and first appeared in print in 1965. Voxel and texel were ...

Q 05/05

Which element, the second most abundant in Earth's crust after oxygen, is the base material of most computer chips?

A) Silicon

B) Germanium

C) Carbon

D) Aluminium

Answer · why

A) Silicon

Silicon makes up about 28% of Earth's crust, though chipmakers use only a highly purified fraction of it. The very first integrated circuit, built by ...