Daily Practice · GCSE Computer Science

November 1968 5-a-day

Every sheet in November 1968

The same date always regenerates the same five questions, so a sheet you print today is the sheet a classmate prints tomorrow.

  1. 1st November 1968Define the term 'primary key' as used in a database table.
  2. 2nd November 1968What type of utility software reorganises files on a hard disk so fragmented parts are stored closer together?
  3. 3rd November 1968Calculate the maximum number of comparisons required by a binary search on a sorted list of 512 items.
  4. 4th November 1968Given P = 0 and Q = 1, state the value of P OR Q.
  5. 5th November 1968Convert the 8-bit binary number 10110100 directly to hexadecimal by splitting it into nibbles.
  6. 6th November 1968A network administrator is connecting 10 computers in a server room. Calculate the number of cables needed for a full mesh topology, and state the number needed for a star topology with one central switch.
  7. 7th November 1968Give one advantage and one disadvantage of using a compiler.
  8. 8th November 1968Convert the 4-bit binary number 1101 to denary.
  9. 9th November 1968Two CPUs are compared for a task optimised for multiple cores: CPU A has 2 cores at 4.2 GHz; CPU B has 6 cores at 3.0 GHz. Explain which CPU is likely to perform better for this task.
  10. 10th November 1968State why an organisation might employ penetration testers to test its network.
  11. 11th November 1968Write a loop in pseudocode that outputs every element of a 1D array named names of length 6.
  12. 12th November 1968State one example of a file format that commonly uses lossy compression.
  13. 13th November 1968State how many bits are in one byte, and how many bytes are in one kibibyte (KiB).
  14. 14th November 1968State whether the source code of proprietary (closed source) software is normally available for the public to view.
  15. 15th November 1968Write one line of pseudocode that converts the string stored in heightInput into a real number and stores it in a variable called height.
  16. 16th November 1968A function is defined as: FUNCTION addTax(price) RETURN price x 1.2 ENDFUNCTION. Another line of code runs: total <- addTax(20) + addTax(30). Trace both function calls and state the final value of total.
  17. 17th November 1968Order these units of data from smallest to largest: megabyte, byte, gigabyte, kilobyte.
  18. 18th November 1968A user reads the same email on a phone and a tablet, and deleting it on one deletes it on the other. Which protocol is in use and why?
  19. 19th November 1968Give one example of erroneous test data for a field that only accepts whole numbers from 1 to 10.
  20. 20th November 1968A table called staff has fields staffId, name, department and salary, storing these records: staffId | name | department | salary, 1 | Ben | Sales | 24000, 2 | Chloe | IT | 31000, 3 | Dan | Sales | 27000. State which staffId(s) would be returned by: SELECT staffId FROM staff WHERE department = 'Sales' AND salary > 25000;
  21. 21st November 1968Each pair from the previous question is stored using 2 bytes. Calculate the compression ratio achieved, given the uncompressed row (1 byte per pixel) uses 8 bytes.
  22. 22nd November 1968Which flowchart symbol shape is used to represent a decision point (e.g. a yes/no branch)?
  23. 23rd November 1968State the two values a Boolean data type can hold.
  24. 24th November 1968Convert the 8-bit binary number 01011010 to denary.
  25. 25th November 1968Calculate the number of cables needed to connect 8 computers in a full mesh topology, where every computer connects directly to every other computer.
  26. 26th November 1968Name the translator used for assembly language and describe how it differs from a compiler.
  27. 27th November 1968Convert the hexadecimal number 1A to denary.
  28. 28th November 1968Convert the denary number 156 to an 8 bit binary number.
  29. 29th November 1968Which type of malware can replicate itself and spread across a network without attaching to another program or needing a user to run it?
  30. 30th November 1968Explain what happens if a program tries to read index 5 of an array declared with 5 elements.