Systems Software

Question	Answer
Systems Software	Controls the operation of hardware in a computer. Provides a platform for applications software.
Applications Software	The everyday programs that we use to create documents and perform tasks
Hardware	The physical parts of a computer
Device Driver	A program that controls a particular device connected to a computer system
Utility Software	helps manage, maintain and control the computer's resources.
What is an operating system?	An OS controls the operations of the hardware in a computer system and manages all the other software. Provides with the ability to interact with a computer system. Provides important functions: - User Interface - - Memory Management - - Multitasking - - Peripheral Management - - Drivers - - User Management - - File Management -
User Interface	One of the ways we interact with a computer system.
Graphical User Interface (GUI)	The most common, its on most of our devices from desktop PCs to mobile phones. Has lots of guidance and clear items for us to interact with, no need for typing in commands.
Command-line Interface (CLI)	No icons, it requires users to type in the program commands for the tasks that they want to perform. This was used before GUI was available. Gives freedom to control the computer rather than pre-programmed commands.
Natural-language Interface (NLI)	The user controls the Natural language interface through the use of linguistic commands. They are potentially able to be a very quick and easy way of giving commands to a computer system. However, in practice, the ability of an NLI to understand most commands can be limited.
Memory Management	Memory management refers to the managing of the computer's primary memory. It is done by the OS. It keeps track of each and every memory location to see whether it is in use or available to be used in a process. It checks how much memory needs to be allocated to a process and decides which process will get memory allocated at any one time. If the operating system does not manage the memory effectively, this will slow down the computer's ability to perform tasks.
Multitasking	The OS allows the computer to run many applications at a time. Multitasking is the process the OS goes through to manage all the programmes allocating them processing power.
Peripheral Management and Drivers	The operating system controls the computer's interaction with all the peripheral devices that are linked to the computer system. The OS handles the inputs from and outputs to each of the peripheral devices. Peripheral devices come with drivers that are software routines that manage the interaction between the computer system and the device. Drivers are often preloaded into devices and downloaded onto a computer system when the device is first plugged in.
User Management	User management function of an OS allows multiple users to be able to log on to a computer system. It allows them to create a username and password to do so. The OS also manages what the users have access to, on the computer.
File Management	File management function of the OS is used to organise and keep track of files stored on a computer system. It allows the user to view the data in secondary storage in the form of structured files and folders rather than just blocks of data.
What is Utility Software	Utility software is a type of systems software. It helps to manage, maintain and control the computer's resources. Some are built into the OS but other options are available if the user wishes to use a separate program.
Encryption Software	Encryption software is used to encrypt data. It turn Plain Text into Cipher Text using an encryption algorithm and an encryption key to scramble ther plain text. Cipher text can then be decrypted into plain text using the correct encryption key.
Symmetric Encryption	The same encryption key is used to encrypt and decrypt the data. This is the fastest from of encryption. However it poses secuirty threats as the key would need to be sent to the recipient to decrypt the data.
Asymmetric Encryption	in asymmetric encryption a different key is used to encrypt and decrypt the data. The message is encrypted using the recipients public key, which everyone can see, to be decrypted with a private key which only the recipient has access to.
Defragmentation	Data is reordered in the hard drive. Data is often fragmented on the hardrive as it breaks up the data to fit it in the available spaces on the hard drive. Defragmentaion software reorders the data so data is stored in fill in continous lines.
Data Compression	When we compress data we reduce the number of bits needed to store the file. Compression software uses a compression algorythm to reduce file size. There are two types of compression algorythms: Lossy and Lossless.
Lossy Compression	Lossy compression permanently removes data that is deemed to be redundant or that would make only a small difference to the quality of the file if it was removed. These losses cannot be restrored after compression. This is often used to reduce the size of ausio, video and image files when streaming or transmitting them.
Lossless Compression	This type of compression does not remove any of the original data from the file. The file can be restored to its original form. There are many different lossless compression algorithms that work in different ways.
Methods of Backup	1. Full backups - in a full back up every file and folder is selected for backup will be backed up. This takes a long time when their are many files to back up. 2. Incremental backups - in an incremental backup only the files that have changed since the last backup will be backed up.

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	Created by James Buttle about 6 years ago