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SUBJECT CODE PAPER

CENTRE NUMBER NUMBER
REGIONAL MOCK EXAMINATION 0795 2

CANDIDATE NAME: ……………………………………… SUBJECT TITLE

CANDIDATE NUMBER: …………………………………… COMPUTER SCIENCES
CENTRE NUMBER: …………………………………………

ADVANCED LEVEL DATE: MODAY /31/MARCH/2025

Two and a half hours (2½ hrs)

Answer any SIX Questions.
All questions carry 17 marks each. For your guidance, the approximate mark for each part of a question is indicated in
brackets.
You will be marked on your ability to use good English, to organize information clearly and to use specialist
vocabulary where appropriate.
In calculations, you are advised to show all the steps in your working, giving your answer at each stage.
Calculators are allowed.

Where an imperative programming language is required to write program code, either standard (ISO) Pascal or the
standard (ANSI C) programming language may be used.

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1. (a) The system stores floating point numbers in normalized form using 2’s complement, with an
8-bit mantissa and a 4-bit exponent as follows.

Mantissa Exponent

(i) State the value of 1011 1110 0100 in denary if it represents a two’s complement floating point number. (2 marks)
(ii) This floating-point number is said to be normalised. How does the bit pattern indicate that this number is normalised?
(2 marks)

(b) (i) How many 32K x 1 RAM chips are needed to provide a memory capacity of 256 K bytes? (2 marks)
(ii) A computer memory is composed of 16 chips, each of size 4K x 8.

 How many memory locations are there in this memory? (2 marks)

 How many address bits are needed to address this memory? (2 marks)
(c) IBM wants to build a computer chip that compares English Language words to see if they are the same. To begin with, they
would like to build a smaller one that bit-wise compares two characters. Each character is coded in 8 bits. The principle they
follow here is that in bit wise comparisons, a 1 (one) is generated if the two corresponding bits are the same otherwise a 0
(zero) is generated.
(i) Give the truth table for the comparison of two bits. (2 marks)
(ii) From the table generate a Boolean expression for the comparison of two bits x and y giving as result. (2 marks)

(iii) Draw a digital circuit diagram for this comparison with r as the output. (2 marks)
(iv) What logic gate is been described here? (1 mark)

2 (i) A computer design company has been asked to produce a design for an elementary computer to be used to teach
students about machine architecture, machine operations and the design of an instruction set. The current instruction register
has a length of 16 bits. The accumulator has a length of 16 bits. The size of each memory location is 16 bits. The current
instruction register is designed to hold one machine instruction at a time. A machine instruction is 16 bits in length. The most
significant eight bits of a machine instruction denote the machine operation. The least significant eight bits denote an operand
or an address of an operand. Main memory stores both instructions and data. The structure of a machine instruction is as
follows:

Operation code field Operand field

Bit no. 15 8 7 0

Basic machine operations Addressing mode

(a) Define the term instruction set. (1 mark)

(b) Name the two main parts of an instruction. (2 marks)
(c) Define the term addressing mode. Give an example of a non-memory addressing mode. (2 marks)
(d) With 8 bits reserved for the operation code part of an instruction, what is the maximum number of
different operation codes the designer may provide? (2 marks)

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 (e) With 6 bits of the operation code reserved to denote basic machine operations, how many different basic
machine operations may be coded? (2 marks)
(ii) (a) What is a binary half adder? Design a binary half adding logic circuit for bit A and B whose output is S. (3 marks)

(b) What do you understand by universal logic gate? Give two examples. (3 marks)

(c) Using NAND gates only, give the logic circuit that represents ̅ (2 marks)

3. (i) (a) Define scheduling policy in operating systems. (1 mark)

(b) What is the "starvation" phenomenon in process scheduling? Which scheduling policies might lead to starvation?
(2 marks)

(c) Consider the following set of processes, assumed to have arrived at time 0 in the order P1, P2, P3, P4, & P5, with the length
of the CPU burst given in milliseconds. The execution of these processes is done using a combination of Round-Robin and
priority scheduling in such a way that the system executes the highest-priority process and runs processes with the same priority
using round-robin scheduling.

Process Burst Priority

Time
P1 4 3
P2 5 2
P3 8 2
P4 7 1
P5 3 3

Using priority scheduling (a smaller priority number implies a higher priority) with round-robin (time quantum of 2 milliseconds)
for processes with equal priority;

 Draw a Gantt chart for these processes. (2 marks)

 Calculate the average waiting time and average turnaround time for these processes. (4 marks)
 Calculate the throughput of the operating system (1 mark)
(ii) (a) State two functions of operating systems in managing memory allocation. (2 marks)

(b) Differentiate between logical addresses and physical addresses. (2 marks)

(c) Explain how virtual memory allows multiple applications to run simultaneously on a system with limited physical memory.

(2 marks)

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 4. (i) A retail database uses a hash function to manage product records. The function is defined as:

RecordKey = ProductID mod 512

(a) In database terminology, what is a record? (1 mark)

(b) Identify the type of file organization used for product records and provide two advantages of this organization. (3 marks)

(c) Calculate the RecordKey values for the following ProductIDs: 1023, 2048, and 3071. (3 marks)

(ii) Consider the database schema below:

tblEmployees(employeeId, employeeName, position)

tblDepartments(departmentId, departmentName)

tblAssignments(employeeId, departmentId, startDate)

(a) Provide an SQL DDL definition for the table tblAssignments. (4 marks)

(b) Define referential integrity in the context of databases. (2 marks)

(c) Identify one referential integrity constraint present in the DDL definition. (1 mark)

(d) Present one sample row of data for tblEmployees and two sample rows for tblDepartments and tblAssignments.

(3 marks)

5. (i) Consider a sorting algorithm described below to sort elements in ascending:

o Step 1: Compare consecutive elements in pairs.
o Step 2: Swap them if they are out of order.
o Step 3: Repeat until the list is fully sorted.

(a) Apply this algorithm to sort the list: [22, 15, 30, 5]. Show all steps. (4 marks)

(b) Identify the sorting algorithm implemented above. (2 marks)

(b) Count the total number of comparisons and swaps performed. (2 marks)

(c) Deduce the complexity of this algorithm. (1 mark)

(ii) (a) Define software testing and its importance. (1 mark)

(b) List two reasons why software testing is critical in development. (2 marks)

(c) Describe three types of test data that should be included in a testing strategy. (3 marks)

(d) Differentiate between alpha and beta testing. (3 marks)

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 6. (i) (a) What is an IPv6 address, and how does it differ from an IPv4 address? (3 marks)

(b) Provide examples of an IPv4 address, one from Class C and one from Class D. (2 marks)

(ii) The data byte 11010110 is to be transmitted using synchronous serial data transmission.

(a) What do you understand by synchronous data transmission. (2 marks)

(b) Distinguish between parallel and serial data transmission methods. (2 marks)

(c) A parity bit will be appended. Explain its purpose and determine the value if even parity is used. (2 marks)

(iii) Describe the function of the following network devices:

(a) Router (2 marks)

(b) Repeater (2 marks)
(c) Firewall (2 marks)

7. (i) (a) Explain the concept of a pointer in programming. What is a null pointer, and why is it important in programming?
(3 marks)

(b) Why is it important for a program to identify the data type of each variable? (2 marks)

(c) What kind of error arises from failing to declare a variable? (1 mark)

(ii) Study the following flowchart and answer the questions that follow:

a) Give a trace table of the values for the variables X, Y, T and N at the point where N>0 is tested, where N is
initially 8. Hence, determine the output of this algorithm for N=8 (3 marks)
b) From your table in (a) above, deduce the computation that is performed by the above algorithm. Write a mathematical
formula for this computation (2 marks)
c) Give an equivalent pseudocode representation of the flowchart above. (3 marks)

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 (iii) Differentiate between the following as used in programming:
a) Local and Global variables (1 mark)
b) Functions and Procedures (1 mark)
c) Formal parameters and actual parameters (1 mark)

8. You have just taken the job of programmer for GCE Solutions, in a large software development company. The software
company has a project to develop a web application for a school. You are the lead developer for this project.
The school principal has some ideas about the appearance of the web application but is unclear about all the details of the
solution.

i) The principal would like to see an initial version of the web application.

a) Identify a life cycle model that would be appropriate in this case. Give a reasons for your choice. (2 marks)
b) Analysis is one stage of a software development life cycle. Explain one document that may be produced from the analysis
stage of the school web application project. (2 marks)
c) The web application project has progressed to the design stage. Explain two (2) activities that will take place during the design
stage of the software development life cycle. (2 marks)
ii) Modular programming technique was used in the development of this school web application.
a) Define modular programming. (2 marks)
b) Several testing strategies are required when using the above technique during software development. State and explain one (1)
type of testing that could be used during the web application development. (2 marks)
iii) Consider the arithmetic expression F=A-(B*C/D)+E.
a) Draw an expression tree for F. (3 marks)
b) Explain how you can obtain the RPN of F, using the tree in (a) above. (2 marks)
c) Give the RPN of F. (1 mark)
d) State one advantage of using RPN over infix (1 mark)

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