Types of Softwares

1.Application Softwares

Types of application Softwares are Desktop Application (Software), Web Application (Website), Embedded Application (Electronic Device), and Mobile Application(Mobile Apps).

•Desktop application

Desktop applications run on a local computer. It includes all necessary functionality and does not need to be connected to a network. This type of application will install on each device.

Example: Microsoft Office, Paint, Notepad, Calculator, Audio Player, Video Player, Browser, Photoshop, Tally, Libre Office, Gedit, Terminal.

•Web Applications

Web application stored on a server. It can be accessed by users via URL(https://www.adscbe.com). Users need a browser to access the web applications.

Example: facebook, Twitter, Gmail, Yahoo mail, Website(Govt, Educational Institutions, Blogs, Social Media, Bank, News, Online Examination, Hospitals).

•Embedded Application

Embedded Application that control and manage hardware devices.

Example: Calculator, TV Remote, AC Remote, Washing Machine, Radio, Television, Mobile, Induction Stove, Smart Watch, Traffic Signals, Printers, Automatic door sensors .

•Mobile Applications

Mobile application runs on a mobile device.

Example : Calculator, Radio, Phone, Gallery, SMS, Games, Audio Player, Video Player, Clock, Camera, Flash Light, Browsers, Bank, Mobile network, Social Media, Docs, Sheets, .

2.System software

System software aids the user and the hardware to function and interact with each other. It is a software to manage computer hardware behavior. It provides basic functionalities that are required by the user. System software is an intermediary between the user and the hardware. When you first turn on the computer, it is the system software that gets initialized and gets loaded in the memory of the system. The system software runs in the background and is not used by the end-users. This is the reason why system software is also known as ‘low-level software’. Some common system software examples are: Operating System, Device Drivers, Firmware, utility, Programming language Translators.

3•Operating System

It is the most prominent example of System Software. It is a collection of software that handles resources and provides general services for the other applications that run over them. Although each Operating System is different, most of them provide a Graphical User Interface through which a user can manage the files and folders and perform other tasks. Every device, whether a desktop, laptop or mobile phone requires an operating system to provide the basic functionality to it. As an OS essentially determines how a user interacts with the system, therefore many users prefer to use one specific OS for their device. There are various types of operating systems such as real-time, embedded, distributed, multi user, single-user, internet, mobile, and many more. It is important to consider the hardware specifications before choosing an operating system.

Examples : Microsoft Windows, Ubuntu, Android, CentOS, iOS, Linux, Mac OS

•Device Drivers

It is a type of software that controls particular hardware which is attached to the system. Hardware devices that need a driver to connect to a system include displays, sound cards, printers, mice and hard disks. Further, there are two types of device drivers: Kernel Device Drivers and User Device Drivers.

Examples of device drivers: BIOS Driver, Display Drivers, Motherboard Drivers, Printer Drivers, ROM Drivers, Sound card Drivers, USB Drivers, VGA Drivers, Virtual Device Drivers.

•Firmware

Firmware is the permanent software that is embedded into a read-only memory. It is a set of instructions permanently stored on a hardware device. It provides essential information regarding how the device interacts with other hardware. Firmware can be considered as ‘semi-permanent’ as it remains permanent unless it is updated using a firmware updater.

Some examples of firmware are: BIOS, Computer Peripherals, Consumer Applications, Embedded Systems, UEFI

•Programming Language Translators

These are mediator programs on which software programs rely to translate high-level language code to simpler machine-level code.

Examples of Programming Language Translators are Interpreter, Compiler and Assemblers.

•Utility

Utility software is designed to aid in analyzing, optimizing, configuring and maintaining a computer system. It supports the computer infrastructure. This software focuses on how an OS functions and then accordingly it decides its trajectory to smoothen the functioning of the system. Softwares like antiviruses, disk cleanup & management tools, compression tools, defragmenters, etc are all utility tools.

Some examples of utility tools are: Antivirus, CCleaner, Windows File Explorer, WinRAR, WinZip.