All is Information

One of the most powerfull resources in the world is information, the one who has the information has the power the say. However, sometimes we don't know anything about this remarkable concept and it's time to dig a little bit in the area.

Today we are going to interact with the concept of document and data, but first of all, let's define some concepts:

Computer Science: The study of complex systems, information and computation using applied mathematics, electrical engineering and software engineering techniques.

Cybernetics: The science that studies the mechanisms of communication andautomatic control of living beings and machines.

· Robotics: A set of studies and techniques to build systems capable of performing motor and intellectual functions in place of man, doing his job purely automatic.

· Computing: A set of scientific knowledge and techniques that enable automatic processing of information by computer.

· Office Automation: Equipment used to generate, store, process or communicate information in an office environment which can generate, transmit and copy manually, electrically or electronically.

· Telematics: Set of technical services and associated telecommunications and computing, offering possibilities for communication and information.

Raw data (sometimes called source data or atomic data) is data that has not been processed for use. A distinction is sometimes made between data and information to the effect that information is the end product of data processing. Raw data that has undergone processing is sometimes referred to as cooked data.

Although raw data has the potential to become "information," it requires selective extraction, organization, and sometimes analysis and formatting for presentation. For example, a point-of-sale terminal (POS terminal) in a busy supermarket collects huge volumes of raw data each day, but that data doesn't yield much information until it is processed. Once processed, the data may indicate the particular items that each customer buys, when they buy them, and at what price. Such information can be further subjected to predictive technology analysis to help the owner plan future marketing campaigns.

As a result of processing, raw data sometimes ends up in a database, which enables the data to become accessible for further processing and analysis in a number of different ways.

Importing data is the process of retrieving data from sources external to Microsoft® SQL Server™ (for example, an ASCII text file) and inserting it into SQL Server tables. Exporting data is the process of extracting data from an instance of SQL Server into some user-specified format (for example, copying the contents of a SQL Server table to a Microsoft Access database).