CLASS IX
CHAPTER-2 TYPES OF SOFTWARE
Question: What is
Software?
Answer:
Software written in a machine language is known as "machine code".
Software is usually written in high-level
programming languages that are easier and more efficient for humans
to use than machine language. High-level languages are translated, using compilation or interpretation
or a combination of the two, into machine language. Software may also be
written in a low-level assembly language,
essentially, a vaguely mnemonic
representation of a machine language using a natural language alphabet.
Assembly language is translated into machine code using an assembler.
Question: What is System Software?
Answer:
System software is computer software designed to operate and control
the computer hardware
and to provide a platform for running application software.
System software can be separated into two different categories, operating
systems and utility software.
- The operating system (prominent examples being z/OS, Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X and Linux), allows the parts of a computer to work together by performing tasks like transferring data between memory and disks or rendering output onto a display device. It also provides a platform to run high-level system software and application software.
- A kernel is the core part of the operating system that defines an API for applications programs (including some system software) and an interface to device drivers. On some systems the kernel may be called "nucleus" or "hardcore".
- Device drivers such as computer BIOS and device firmware provide basic functionality to operate and control the hardware connected to or built into the computer.
- A User Interface "allows users to interact with a computer." Since the 1980s the graphical user interface (GUI) has been perhaps the most common user interface technology. The command-line interface is still a commonly used alternative.
- Utility software helps to analyze, configure, optimize and maintain the computer, such as virus protection.
Question:
What is Application Software?
Answer:
Application software is a set of
computer programs
designed to permit the user to perform a group of coordinated functions, tasks,
or activities. Application software cannot run on itself but is dependent on
system software to execute. Examples of an application include a word
processor, a spreadsheet design and management system, an aeronautical flight
simulator, a console game, a drawing, painting, and illustrating system, or a
library management system, accounting software,
media
players, and office suites.
Many application programs deal principally with documents.
Applications may be bundled with
the computer and its system software or published separately, and may be coded
as e.g. proprietary, open-source or university projects.
Question:
What is the purpose of Application software?
Answer:
Purpose of application software is:
Word
processing: A word
processor is an electronic device or computer software
application, that performs the task of composition, editing,
formatting, and sometimes printing of documents.
Spreadsheet:
A spreadsheet is a table of values arranged in rows and columns.
Each value can have a predefined relationship to the other values. If you
change one value, therefore, you may need to change other values as well.
Presentation:
A presentation
program, such as Microsoft
PowerPoint, Apple
Keynote, OpenOffice.org
Impress, is often used to generate the presentation content. Modern
internet-based presentation software, such as the presentation application in Google Docs, Slide Rocket and emaze
also allow presentations to be developed collaboratively by geographically
disparate collaborators. Presentation viewers can be used to combine content
from different presentation programs into one presentation.
Data base management: software that
handles the storage, retrieval, and updating of data in a computer system.
· Accounting management: it
is the practical application of management techniques to control
and report on the financial health of the organization. This involves the
analysis, planning, implementation, and control of programs designed to provide
financial data reporting for managerial decision making.
·
Reservation system: computer
reservations system or central reservation system (CRS) is a
computerized system used to
store and retrieve information and conduct transactions related to air travel,
hotels, car rental, or activities. Originally designed and operated by
airlines, CRSes were later extended for the use of travel agencies.
·
HR Management: A
Human Resources Management System
(HRMS) is a software application that combines many human resources functions, including benefits administration,
payroll, recruiting and training, and performance analysis and review into one
package.
·
Attendance system:
Attendance management is important to
every single organization; it can determine whether or not a business will be successful in the future.
Businesses will have to keep a track of employees, this being their main concern and
a lot of other things. Monitoring attendance helps in the long term for a
business, as an employer will be able
to tell which employees arrive early, which arrive late and who has the most
absences without any valid reason.
·
Payroll system: A
payroll system is software which
organizes all the tasks of employee payment and the filing of employee taxes.
These tasks can include keeping tracking of hours, calculating wages,
withholding taxes and deductions, printing and delivering checks and paying
employment taxes to the government.
·
Inventory control system: An
inventory control system or a
computerized inventory system
is a process for managing and locating objects or materials. In common usage,
the term may also refer to just the software components.
·
Billing system: Billing system
is very complex starting from network elements that generate usage to the billing system to usage collection,
mediation, rating, and invoicing.
Question: What is Utility Software?
Answer: Utility software is system software designed to help analyze,
configure, optimize or maintain a computer. Utility software, along with operating system software, is a type of system software used to support the computer
infrastructure, distinguishing it from application software
which is aimed at directly performing tasks that benefit ordinary users.
Utility software
- Anti-virus utilities scan for computer viruses.
- Archivers output a stream or a single file when provided with a directory or a set of files. Archive utilities, unlike archive suites, usually do not include compression or encryption capabilities. Some archive utilities may even have a separate un-archive utility for the reverse operation.
- Backup software can make copies of all information stored on a disk and restore either the entire disk (e.g. in an event of disk failure) or selected files (e.g. in an event of accidental deletion).
- Clipboard managers expand the clipboard functionality of an operating system.
- Cryptographic utilities encrypt and decrypt streams and files.
- Data compression utilities output a shorter stream or a smaller file when provided with a stream or file.
- Data synchronization utilities establish consistency among data from a source to a target data storage and vice versa. There are several branches of this type of utility:
- File synchronization utilities maintain consistency between two sources. They may be used to create redundancy or backup copies but are also used to help users carry their digital music, photos and video in their mobile devices.
- Revision control utilities are intended to deal with situations where more than one user attempts to simultaneously modify the same file.
- Debuggers are used to test and "debug" other programs, mainly to solve programming errors. Also utilized for reverse engineering of software or systems.
- Disk checkers can scan operating hard drive.
- Disk cleaners can find files that are unnecessary to computer operation, or take up considerable amounts of space. Disk cleaner helps the user to decide what to delete when their hard disk is full.
- Disk compression utilities can transparently compress/uncompress the contents of a disk, increasing the capacity of the disk.
- Disk defragmenters can detect computer files whose contents are scattered across several locations on the hard disk, and move the fragments to one location to increase efficiency.
- Disk partitions can divide an individual drive into multiple logical drives, each with its own file system which can be mounted by the operating system and treated as an individual drive.
- Disk space analyzers for the visualization of disk space usage by getting the size for each folder (including sub folders) & files in folder or drive. Showing the distribution of the used space.
- Disk storage utilities
- File managers provide a convenient method of performing routine data management, email recovery and management tasks, such as deleting, renaming, cataloging, uncataloging, moving, copying, merging, generating and modifying data sets.
- Hex editors directly modify the text or data of a file. These files could be data or an actual program.
- Memory testers check for memory failures.
- Network utilities analyze the computer's network connectivity, configure network settings, check data transfer or log events.
- Package managers are used to configure, install or keep up to date other software on a computer.
- Registry cleaners clean and optimize the Windows Registry by removing old registry keys that are no longer in use.
- Screensavers were desired to prevent phosphor burn-in on CRT and plasma computer monitors by blanking the screen or filling it with moving images or patterns when the computer is not in use. Contemporary screensavers are used primarily for entertainment or security.
- System monitors for monitoring resources and performance in a computer system.
- System profilers provide detailed information about the software installed and hardware attached to the computer.
