By: Shees Ahmed SiddiquiClass: 9th

Exploring Computer Software

Defining Categories Of Software:-

HARDWARE SOFTWARE

Hardware denotes the physical components of a computer.

Software denotes the logical components of a computer.

Hardware is a tangible entity that can be seen and touched.

Software is an intangible entity that can be only seen, but not touched.

For example: Input and output devices, CPU, floppy disk, hard disc, CD and DVD.

For example: Operating system, word processors, device drivers and language processors.

Understanding software

Software is a general term for the various kinds of programs used to operate computers and related devices. Software can be thought of as the variable part of a computer and hardware the invariable part. Software is often divided into application software (programs that do work users are directly interested in) and system software (which includes operating systems and any program that supports application software).

An application software (app or application for short) is a computer program designed to perform a group of coordinated functions, tasks, or activities for the benefit of the user. Examples of an application include a word processor, a spreadsheet, a web browser, a media player, a console game or a photo editor.Application software is classified into three categories-General purpose software, specific purpose software and customized software.

Application Software

General Purpose Software

General-purpose software refers to computer applications that are not designed for a particular business, industry or department. These applications may, therefore, be adopted and applied by many professionals, including engineers, security analysts, accountants, chemists, medical officers and attorneys. according to Wikipedia, general-purpose software is widespread and popular because of its horizontal application. Teach-ICT reveals that general-purpose applications are preferred because they are cheap, easily available, have user support and are tested for bugs. They include spreadsheets, word processors, bookkeeping applications, statistics software, graphics packages, communication programs, desktop publishing applications, web-design applications and presentation software.

Special purpose application software is a type of software created to execute one specific task. For example a camera application on your phone will only allow you to take and share pictures. Another example would be a chess game, it would only allow you to play chess. Other examples of special purpose application software are web browsers, calculators, media players, calendar programs etc.

Specific Purpose Software

Customized software is a computer program or web application that is specifically designed for a particular purpose, department or company. The software is owned by the customer and can incorporate features from other software programs. Customized software is written and designed to meet the client's specific business processes. With customized software, the customer owns the rights and the license to the product. The client can resell the software to other interested parties. Customized software can combine features from other existing software with features that a company needs. Many companies choose customized software in order to eliminate repetitive tasks, enhance the maintenance of precise data, improve sharing of information and get real-time results.

Customized Software

System software is computer software designed to operate and control the computer hardware as well as to run application software, such as web browsers, media players and office suites. System software is divided into four categories: language processor, device drives, operating systems and utility software. The operating system allows certain parts of a computer to work together so as to perform tasks such as the transfer and storage of data. It contains system files such as system services, libraries of functions, and drivers for printers. The system software also includes software development tools such as system utilities, compilers, assemblers, file management tools and system utilities.

System Software

The operating system (OS) is the most important program that runs on a computer. Every general-purpose computer must have an operating system to run other programs and applications. Computer operating systems perform basic tasks, such as recognizing input from the keyboard, sending output to the display screen, keeping track of files and directories on the disk, and controlling peripheral devices such as printers.

For large systems, the operating system has even greater responsibilities and powers. It is like a traffic cop -- it makes sure that different programs and users running at the same time do not interfere with each other. The operating system is also responsible for security, ensuring that unauthorized users do not access the system.

Operating System

A language processor is a special type of a computer software that has the capacity of translator the source code or program codes into machine codes. The following are different types of language processors are: Compiler Assembler Interpreter

Compiler: A compiler is a language processor which translate source code from high level language into binary machine code .

Assembler: An assembler translates from a low level language to binary machine code. The assembler produces one machine instruction for each source instruction . The assemblers are generally used in assembling the source code or program code written in assembly language .

Interpreter: An interpreter is different from compiler and assembler . It does not convert program into machine code format instead it directs the CPU to obey each program statement . That means interpreter translate and executes each statement of instruction simultaneously.

Language Processor

A device driver is a program that controls a particular type of device that is attached to your computer. There are device drivers for printers, displays, CD-ROM readers, diskette drives, and so on. When you buy an operating system, many device drivers are built into the product. However, if you later buy a new type of device that the operating system didn't anticipate, you'll have to install the new device driver. A device driver essentially converts the more general input/output instructions of the operating system to messages that the device type can understand. Some Windows programs are virtual device drivers. These programs interface with the Windows Virtual Machine Manager. There is a virtual device driver for each main hardware device in the system, including the hard disk drive controller, keyboard, and serial and parallel ports. They're used to maintain the status of a hardware device that has changeable settings. Virtual device drivers handle software interrupts from the system rather than hardware interrupts.

Device Drivers

A program that performs a very specific task, usually related to managing system resources. Operating systems contain a number of utilities for managing disk drives, printers, and other devices.Utilities differ from applications mostly in terms of size, complexity and function. For example, word processors, spreadsheet programs, and database applications are considered applications because they are large programs that perform a variety of functions not directly related to managing computer resources. Utilities are sometimes installed as memory-resident programs. On DOS systems, such utilities are called TSRs.

Utility Software

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