Computer Software

Computer Software

             Computer software, or just software, is a collection of computer programs and related date that provide the instructions for telling a computer what to do and how to do it. In other words, software is a conceptual entity which is set of computer programs, procedures, and associated documentation concerned with the operation of a date processing system. We can also say software refers to one or  more computer programs and data held in the storage of the computer for some purposes. In other words software is a set of programs, procedures, procedures, algorithms and its documentation. Program software performs the function of the program it implements, either by directly providing instructions to the computer hardware or by serving as input to another piece of software.

            Computer software is normally classified into broad categories:

Application Software:

             Application software or just 'application' is, for most people, where the fun starts. A application is the software bought to do common jobs such as play a game, allow people to speak to each other, record music and change it to new formats, view videos, play DVDs, scan books or listen to music-the list is endless.

Types of application software are:

• Word processing software: The main purpose of this software is to produce documents. MS-Word, Word Pad, Notepad and some other text editors are some of the examples of word processing software.
• Database Software: Database is a collection of data. The purpose of this software is to organize and manage data. The advantage of this software is that you can change way data is stored and displayed MS access, dBase, FoxPro, Paradox, and Oracle are some of the examples of database software.
• Spread sheet software: The spread sheet software is used to maintain budget, financial statements, grade sheets, and sales records. The purpose of this software is organizing numbers. It also allows the users to perform simple or complex calculations on the numbers entered in rows and columns. MS-Excel, Lotus 1-2-3, and Open Office cal are some of the examples of spreadsheet application software.
• Multimedia software: Media players and real players are the examples of multimedia software. This software will allow the user to create audio and videos. The different forms of multimedia software are audio converter, players, burners, video encoders and decoders.
• Presentation software: This software will be used to display the information in the form of slide show. The three main functions of presentation software is editing that allows insertion and  formatting of text, methods to include graphic in the text and  a functionality of executing the slide shows. The best example for this type of application software is Microsoft Power Point.

System Software

          System software is a program that manages and supports the computer resources and operations of a computer system while it executes various tasks such as processing data and information, controlling hardware components, and allowing users to use application software. That is, systems software functions as a bridge between computer system hardware and the application software. System software is made up of many control programs, including the operating system, communications software and database manager. There are many kinds of computers these days. Some of them are easier to learn than others. Some of them perform better than others. These differences may come from different systems software.

         System software can be further categorized into operating system, language processors and utility software.

Operating System

          An operating system is a collection of integrated computer programs that provide recurring services to other programs or to the user of a computer. These services consist of disk and file management, memory management, and device management. In other words, it manages CPU operations, input/output activities, storage resources, diverse support services, and controls various devices.

           Operating system is the most important program for computer system. Without an operating system, every computer program would have to contain instructions telling the hardware each step the hardware should take to do its job, such as storing a file on a disk. Because the operating system contains these instructions, any program can call on the operating system when a service is needed. There are some popular operating systems in the compute world. The are Ms-DOS (Disk Operating System), Windows, Linux, UNIX etc.

Language Processors

            Language processors are the programs that translate the program written in other language (source program) to the machine language program (object program). Some of the language processors are: Assembler, Compiler, Interpreter etc.

Utility Software

          Utility Software is a type of computer system software also referred to as service program, tool, service routine, or utility routine. Software Utilities are specifically designed to help the end-user manage and tune the computer hardware/Software, Operating system or application software and perform as single precise task as opposed to application software which performs multi-tasking. Utility software can be seen in may operating systems to day e.g. Windows XP, Windows Vista, Mac OS X etc. Examples of some of the commonly used utility software may include the following: Norton utilities, PC tools, WinZip etc.