SOFTWARES
Collection of programs or bunch of programs called as software. Softwares are of two types:
1. APPLICATION SOFTWARE:
This is that software, which serves specific purposes and allow the user to create applications which are for a given purpose like financial accounting, payroll, examinations, human resources management etc. These software can be further classified, depending upon the source of development as well the users.
I. PRE-WRITTEN APPLICATION SOFTWARE:
These are those software packages, which are developed by group of people or an individual to used by others. The most commonly available pre-
written application software are:
a). Word Processing Software: These are those software, which usually automate the day to day documentation work of an organization. t helps in creating texts, manipulating, formatting and printing of the text, so that the drafting, redrafting, typing again and again manually now becomes easy and less paper wastage as well the time taken also is reduced a lot. Wordstar, wordperfect, microsoft word etc. are some of the available wordprocessors.
b). Electronic Spread Sheets: Electronic spread sheets are like sheets of paper with rows and columns. ESS allow numbers, characters, formulae and all other types of data which has to be entered in tabular form into rows or columns. Usage of ESS gives significant advantages and benefits over using paper spread sheets. Some of the most commonly available and used spread sheets are lotus 1-2-3, MS-Excel, supercalc etc.
c). Data Base Management System: Data base is an organized collection of data, which is logically related. The data has to be managed so that the retrieval of information is effective and easy. Managing data involves creating, deleting, updating, adding, modifying data in databases. Along with these querying are printing reports also comes as DBM. DBMS is a software package that allows a user to perform above functions. It also allows multiple computers sharing the data files. Some of the DBMS Packages commonly used by people are Dbase, FoxPro, Clipper, Paradox etc.
This DBMS technology has been subjected to many improvements and advanced DBM software has been evolved which are called RDBMS (Relational Data Base Management Systems), ORDBMS (Object-oriented RDBMS) etc. Oracle, Ingress, Sql server, Informix, Sybase, Db2 etc. are the some examples.
2. SYSTEM SOFTWARE:
This is that software which is used for developing or running a computer system. This software controls all processing activities and makes sure that the resources and the power of the computer are used in most efficient manner. Systems software consists of following softwares.
a). Operating Systems: Operating system is set of programs that control and support hardware and provide various services which are used for better operating performance of the computer. The major functions of any operating system are:
1. It assigns processors to tasks
2. It manages memory and other storage areas.
3. It act as a command interpreter.
4. File management.
5. Input - Output management.
6. Establishing data security & integrity.
7. Maintains account of processor time for billing purposes.
8. Provides data and time services etc.
The operating system can be classified as single user and multy user depending on the number of users working on it at a given point of time.
DOS is a good example of single user operating system and UNIX, Windows -NT, LINUX etc. are some of the common multy user operating system.
b). Language Processors: As a digital computer accepts digits and characters as input, however this input is not understandable;e by the computer. To make the computer understand it, the input has to be conversed into machine language. The software which makes this conversion and increases the productivity of the programmer are called language processors or translators. There are two basic types of translators.
1. Compiler: Compiler is a software that will accept the totalprogram code as input and then converts it into machine code, that means converts source code into object code.Ex: COBOL, C.
2. Interpreters: Interpreter also does the same task of compilerbut it does in a different manner. The interpreter takes the program code (source code) line by line and converts it into machine (object code).
c).Utility Tools : These utilities are those software programs are provided by the manufacturer of various hardwares to perform specific tasks commonly used to all data processing installations. Device drivers, directory and file management utilities are the some examples.
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