ABSTRACT
Computers play an integral part in daily life. A process computer makes plant automation more feasible than before, but often additional instruments, especially analytical instruments, must be purchased and installed to fully utilize the increased capability. Computers are being increasingly used in education, which has resulted in much greater familiarity with concepts that were known only to computer specialists. To control a process effectively an in-depth understanding of the process is required. The chemical and petrochemical process industry in particular will have to adjust to this situation by producing a larger variety of products at lower volumes with increased quality. Modern computer systems are characterized by distributed data processing. The heart of a computer is a central processing unit with main memory. The main memory is usually a combination of random access and read-only memory. The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.
