不管是大型電腦或個人電腦都需具有「中央處理單元」(central process unit,簡稱 CPU)。CPU 是電腦的「腦」,其電子電路負責處理所有軟體正確運作所需的所有任務,如算術、邏輯、控制、輸入和輸出操作等等。雖然早期的設計即可以讓一個指令同時做兩、三件不同的工作;但為了簡單化,我們在這裡所談的工作將只是執行算術和邏輯運算的工作(arithmetic and logic unit,簡稱 ALU),如將兩個數加在一起。在這一簡化的定義下,CPU 在任何一個時刻均只能執行一件工作而已。
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在個人電腦剛出現只能用於一般事物的處理時,CPU 均能非常勝任地完成任務。但電腦圖形和動畫的出現帶來了第一批運算密集型工作負載後,CPU 開始顯示心有餘而力不足:例如電玩動畫需要應用程式處理數以萬計的像素(pixel),每個像素都有自己的顏色、光強度、和運動等, 使得 CPU 根本沒辦法在短時間內完成這些工作。於是出現了主機板上之「顯示插卡」來支援補助 CPU。
許曉東,《中國古代琥珀藝術》 (Zhongguo gu dai hu po yi shu/Chinese Ancient Amber Art) (Beijing, 2011), p. 6.
Laufer, Historical Jottings, p. 219.
同上,p. 242.
這個英文譯本來自約翰.雅各布.韋克(Johann Jacob Wecker),Eighteen Books of the Secrets of Art and Nature (London, 1660), p. 233.
Laufer, Historical Jottings, p. 218.
‘Refashioning the Renaissance Team, Imittion Amber and Imitation Leopard Fur’, www.aalto.fi, accessed 19 September 2021; Sophie Pitman, ‘Una corona di ambra falsa: Imitating Amber Using Early Modern Recipes’, www.refashioningrenaissance.eu, 30 April 2020.
Johann Heinrich Zedler, Grosses vollständiges Universal Lexicon aller Wissenschafften und Künste (Halle and Leipzig, 1733), vol. III, col. 1401.
Johann Christian Kundmann, Rariora naturae (Wrocław and Leipzig, 1726), pp. 219–26.
John Houghton, A Collection for the Improvement of Husbandry and Trade (London, 1727), vol. II, p. 64.
Hugh Plat, The Jewell House of Art and Nature (London, 1594), pp. 67–8.
關於這些資料來源的進一步細節, 參考 Rachel King, ‘To Counterfeit Such Precious Stones as You Desire: Amber and Amber Imitations in Early Modern Europe’, in Fälschung, Plagiat, Kopie: künstlerische Praktiken in der Vormoderne, ed. Birgit Ulrike Münch (Petersburg, 2014), pp. 87–97.
Stanislaus Reinhard Acxtelmeier, Hokus-pokeria, oder, Die Verfälschungen der Waaren im Handel und Wandel (Ulm, 1703), p. 24.
D.R.S. Shackleton Bailey, trans., Martial: Epigrams, 3rd edn (Cambridge and London 1993), vol. I, bk III, epi. 65.
M. C. Bandy and J. A. Bandy, trans., Georgius Agricola: De natura fossilium (Textbook of Mineralogy) (New York, 1955), p. 77.
Adrian Christ, ‘The Baltic Amber Trade, c. 1500–1800: The Effects and Ramifications of a Global Counterflow Commodity’, MA thesis, University of Alberta, 2018, p. 112.
John M. Riddle, ‘Amber: An Historical-Etymological Problem’, in Laudatores temporis acti: Studies in Memoryof Wallace Everett Caldwell, ed. Gyles Mary Francis and Davis Eugene Wood (Chapel Hill, NC, 1964), pp. 110–20.
Joseph Browne, A Practical Treatise of the Plague, and All Pestilential Infections That Have Happen’d in This Island for the Last Century, 2nd edn (London, 1720), p. 50.
Berlin, Geheimes Staatsarchiv Preussischer Kulturbesitz, XX Hauptabteilung, Etatsministerium 16a 5, ‘Abhandlung von Gregor Duncker über den Ursprung des Bernsteins als Arznei’ (Treatise by Gregor Duncker on the Beginnings of Amber as a Medicine, c. 1538), ff. 2r–4v.
Giuseppe Donzelli, Teatro farmaceutico, dogmatico, e spagirico, 3rd edn (Rome, 1677), pp. 399–400. 作者的翻譯。
Aurifaber, Succini historia, unpaginated; Johann Wigand, Vera historia de succino Borussica (Jena, 1590); andJohn Bate, The Mysteries of Nature and Art: In Four Severall Parts, 3rd edn (London, 1654), p. 217.
Sarah Kettley, Designing with Smart Textiles (London and New York, 2016), p. 12.
Aurifaber, Succini historia, unpaginated. 作者的翻譯。
John M. Riddle, ‘Pomum ambrae: Amber and Ambergris in Plague Remedies’, Sudhoffs Archiv für Geschichte der Medizin und der Naturwissenschaften, XLVIII/2 (1964), pp. 111–22.
A Collection of Very Valuable and Scarce Pieces Relating to the Last Plague in the Year 1665 (London, 1721), p. 85.