Section 2.1 Using the Problem-Solving Model Some problems are simply waiting for a practical solution. In 1965, a student at Yale University saw a need for faster delivery of time-sensitive items. d Medicines, computer equipment, and other items were often needed in a short amount of time, even overnight. These shipments had to travel by airplanes. There were airfreight companies. However, these used passenger airline routes. Sometimes packages needed to be sent to where passenger service did not go. Frederick W. Smith was the Yale student. He thought of a solution to this problem. Smith wrote a term paper on his solution. His teacher did not think his idea was remarkable and gave the paper an average grade. Eventually, Smith was able to put his solution to the test. He bought a small airline, renamed the company Federal Express, and moved its headquarters to Memphis, TN. He chose Memphis because its airport is centrally located in the middle and eastern parts of the United States. Also, it was rarely closed due to bad weather and was willing to make additional hangar space available. Each day around the country, packages would be picked up by trucks and taken to local airports. From these locations, Smith’s planes flew to Memphis in the evening. At the Memphis airport, the packages were sorted and placed on different planes. Early the next morning, planes would fly out to local airports. There, trucks picked up the packages and quickly delivered them. On the first night of operation in 1973, 14 small aircraft took off from Memphis to deliver 182 packages to 25 US cities. Federal Express is now known as FedEx, as shown in Figure 2-1. The company set the standards of speed and reliability for delivery of letters and packages. Today, each package is numbered. Then, all package numbers are entered into a database. As the package moves along the delivery route, its location is updated in the database. Thanks to its computer algorithms, FedEx knows the location of each package wherever it is in the world. The problem-solving model is a process by which a solution can be l found. There are four main phases of the problem-solving model: 1. Understand the problem. 2. Devise a plan. 3. Carry out the plan. 4. Review and reflect. These steps can help decide if a computer can be used to find a solution. EQRoy/Shutterstock.com Figure 2-1. FedEx was created because somebody thought of a solution for a problem. Copyright Goodheart-Willcox Co., Inc. 24 Introduction to Computer Science: Coding