Computer software is what enables people to do what they need to accomplish in their daily activities. A more complex definition of computer software is; Software is a program that enables a computer to perform a specific task, unlike the physical components of the system. The physical components of the system were what I talked about in the last post, the actual hardware that a person can physically touch.
The most common software that people know about is the operating system. The operating system is system software that allows other software of your choice to run properly. The operating system is the intermediary for interacting between hardware and other software. The software you want to install must be loaded onto a hard drive or RAM. Once the software is loaded on either of these two data platforms, the computer can run the software.
People have many different software that allow them to do many different tasks. For example, the Microsoft Word program allows you to write documents and create templates. It is a kind of software that you must have, because it allows you to complete more complex tasks in one place, instead of going to different places. This is what people have done back in the day, and it’s fun to watch software continue to transform today’s tech world. Software allows us to create an easier way of completing things and can be found in many of today’s technologies, and not just computers.
Computers are not just hardware equipment, it is something I will discuss today. There are many different types of computer hardware, and together the hardware you use makes up your entire working system. Some of the most common hardware that people are familiar with are the CD-ROM drive, which allows a computer to read specific information located on a CD, and the FLOPPY disk drive, which is much older hardware, allows people to just do the exactly the same as the CD, but in a less sufficient way. These two are best known to people because they are two pieces of hardware that people interact with the most.
Some of the other great pieces of hardware are hard drives, memory (RAM), motherboard, power supply, and central processing unit (CPU). The hard drive is a non-volatile memory device that allows you to save information whether it is on or off. You can permanently save information to a hard drive and then retrieve it whenever you want. Memory, also called RAM, is also there to store information both permanently and temporarily. RAM interacts with most of the operating system software that I will talk about later. The motherboard connects everything and allows all hardware to communicate in some way. The motherboard is the foundation of the computer and is a vital piece in making the computer work. It takes power from the power supply and powers the CPU and other components like RAM.
The computer consists of more things, but these are some of the most important that I felt you should know about. Next time I will talk about computer software.
