software

software

Instructions that tell a computer what to do. Software is the entire set of programs, procedures, and routines associated with the operation of a computer system, including the operating system. The term differentiates these features from hardware, the physical components of a computer system. Two main types of software are system software, which controls a computer's internal functioning, and application software, which directs the computer to execute commands that solve practical problems. A third category is network software, which coordinates communication between computers linked in a network. Software is written by programmers in any number of programming languages. This information, the source code, must then be translated by means of a compiler into machine language, which the computer can understand and act on.

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software

Instructions for the computer. A series of instructions that performs a particular task is called a "program." The two major categories of software are "system software" and "application software." System software is made up of control programs such as the operating system and database management system (DBMS). Application software is any program that processes data for the user (inventory, payroll, spreadsheet, word processor, etc.). See system software and application software.

A common misconception is that software is data. It is not. Software tells the hardware how to process the data.

Software is "run."

Data are "processed."

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software

1. Computing the programs that can be used with a particular computer system

2. video cassettes and discs for use with a particular video system

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software [′sȯf‚wer]

(computer science)

The totality of programs usable on a particular kind of computer, together with the documentation associated with a computer or program, such as manuals, diagrams, and operating instructions.

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Software

A set of instructions that cause a computer to perform one or more tasks. The set of instructions is often called a program or, if the set is particularly large and complex, a system. Computers cannot do any useful work without instructions from software; thus a combination of software and hardware (the computer) is necessary to do any computerized work. A program must tell the computer each of a set of minuscule tasks to perform, in a framework of logic, such that the computer knows exactly what to do and when to do it. See Computer programming

Programs are written in programming languages, especially designed to facilitate the creation of software. In the 1950s, programming languages were numerical languages easily understood by computer hardware; often, programmers said they were writing such programs in machine language.

Machine language was cumbersome, error-prone, and hard to change. In the latter 1950s, assembler (or assembly) language was invented. Assembler language was nearly the same as machine language, except that symbolic (instead of numerical) operations and symbolic addresses were used, making the code considerably easier to change.

The programmable aspects of computer hardware have not changed much since the 1950s. Computers still have numerical operations, and numerical addresses by which data may be accessed. However, programmers now use high-level languages, which look much more like English than a string of numbers or operation codes. See Numerical representation (computers), Programming languages

Well-known programming languages include Basic, Java, and C. Basic has been modified into Visual Basic, a language useful for writing the portion of a program that the user “talks to” (i.e., the user interface or graphical user interface or GUI). Java is especially useful for creating software that runs on a network of computers. C and C++ are powerful but complex languages for writing such software as systems software and games. See Human-computer interaction, Local-area networks, Wide-area networks

Packaged software such as word processors, spreadsheets, graphics and drawing tools, email systems, and games are widely available and used. Some software packages are enormous; for example, enterprise resource planning (ERP) software can be used by companies to perform almost all of their so-called backoffice software work. See Computer graphics, Electronic mail

Systems software is necessary to support the running of an application program. Operating systems are needed to link the machine-dependent needs of a program with the capabilities of the machine on which it runs. Compilers translate programs from high-level languages into machine languages. Database programs keep track of where and how data are stored on the various storage facilities of a typical computer, and simplify the task of entering data into those facilities or retrieving the data. Networking software provides the support necessary for computers to interact with each other, and with data storage facilities, in a situation where multiple computers are necessary to perform a task, or when software is running on a network of computers (such as the Internet or the World Wide Web). See Database management system, Internet, Operating system

Business applications software processes transactions, produces paychecks, and does the myriad of other tasks that are essential to running any business. Roughly two-thirds of software applications are in the business area.

Scientific and engineering software satisfies the needs of a scientific or engineering user to perform enterprise-specific tasks. Because scientific and engineering tasks tend to be very enterprise-specific, there has been no generalization of this application area analogous to the that of the ERP for backoffice business systems. The scientific-engineering application usually is considered to be in second place only to business software in terms of software products built.

Edutainment software instructs (educates) or plays games with (entertains) the user. Such software often employs elaborate graphics and complex logic. This is one of the most rapidly growing software application areas, and includes software to produce special effects for movies and television programs.

Real-time software operates in a time-compressed, real-world environment. Although most software is in some sense real-time, since the users of modern software are usually interacting with it via a GUI, real-time software typically has much shorter time constraints. For example, software that controls a nuclear reactor must make decisions and react to its environment in minuscule fractions of a second.

With the advent of multiple program portions, software development has become considerably more complicated. Whereas it was formerly considered sensible to develop all of a software system in the same programming language, now the different portions are often developed in entirely different languages. The relatively complex GUI, for example, can most conveniently be developed in one of the so-called visual languages, since those languages contain powerful facilities for creating it. The server software, on the other hand, will likely be built using a database package and the database language SQL (a Structured Query Language, for inquiring into the contents of a database). If the server software is also responsible for interacting with a network such as the Internet, it may also be coded in a network-support language such as Java. An object-oriented approach may be adopted in its development, since the software will need to manipulate objects on the Internet. See Computer programming, Object-oriented programming, Software engineering

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(programming)

software - (Or "computer program", "program", "code") The instructions executed by a computer, as opposed to the physical device on which they run (the "hardware"). The term was coined by the eminent statistician, John Tukey. Programs stored on non-volatile storage built from integrated circuits (e.g. ROM or PROM) are usually called firmware. Software can be split into two main types - system software and application software or application programs. System software is any software required to support the production or execution of application programs but which is not specific to any particular application. Examples of system software would include the operating system, compilers, editors and sorting programs. Examples of application programs would include an accounts package or a CAD program. Other broad classes of application software include real-time software, business software, scientific and engineering software, embedded software, personal computer software and artificial intelligence software. Software includes both source code written by humans and executable machine code produced by assemblers or compilers. It does not usually include the data processed by programs unless this is in a format such as multimedia which depends on the use of computers for its presentation. This distinction becomes unclear in cases such as spread sheets which can contain both instructions (formulae and macros) and data. There are also various intermediate compiled or semi-compiled, forms of software such as library files and byte-code. Some claim that documentation (both paper and electronic) is also software. Others go further and define software to be programs plus documentation though this does not correspond with common usage. The noun "program" describes a single, complete and more-or-less self-contained list of instructions, often stored in a single file, whereas "code" and "software" are uncountable nouns describing some number of instructions which may constitute one or more programs or part thereof. Most programs, however, rely heavily on various kinds of operating system software for their execution. The nounds "code" and "software" both refer to the same thing but "code" tends to suggest an interest in the implementation details whereas "software" is more of a user's term.