Computer literacy is defined as the knowledge and ability to use computers and related technology efficiently, with skill levels ranging from elementary use to computer programming and advanced problem solving. Computer literacy can also refer to the comfort level someone has with using computer programs and applications. Another valuable component is understanding how computers work and operate. Computer literacy may be distinguished from computer programming, which primarily focuses on the design and coding of computer programs rather than the familiarity and skill in their use.
Computer programming or coding is the composition of sequences of instructions, called programs, that computers can follow to perform tasks.[1][2] It involves designing and implementing algorithms, step-by-step specifications of procedures, by writing code in one or more programming languages. Programmers typically use high-level programming languages that are more easily intelligible to humans than machine code, which is directly executed by the central processing unit. Proficient programming usually requires expertise in several different subjects, including knowledge of the application domain, details of programming languages and generic code libraries, specialized algorithms, and formal logic.
Auxiliary tasks accompanying and related to programming include analyzing requirements, testing, debugging (investigating and fixing problems), implementation of build systems, and management of derived artifacts, such as programs’ machine code. While these are sometimes considered programming, often the term software development is used for this larger overall process – with the terms programming, implementation, and coding reserved for the writing and editing of code per se. Sometimes software development is known as software engineering, especially when it employs formal methods or follows an engineering design process.
- Reliability: how often the results of a program are correct. This depends on conceptual correctness of algorithms and minimization of programming mistakes, such as mistakes in resource management (e.g., buffer overflows and race conditions) and logic errors (such as division by zero or off-by-one errors).
- Robustness: how well a program anticipates problems due to errors (not bugs). This includes situations such as incorrect, inappropriate or corrupt data, unavailability of needed resources such as memory, operating system services, and network connections, user error, and unexpected power outages.
- Usability: the ergonomics of a program: the ease with which a person can use the program for its intended purpose or in some cases even unanticipated purposes. Such issues can make or break its success even regardless of other issues. This involves a wide range of textual, graphical, and sometimes hardware elements that improve the clarity, intuitiveness, cohesiveness, and completeness of a program’s user interface.
- Portability: the range of computer hardware and operating system platforms on which the source code of a program can be compiled/interpreted and run. This depends on differences in the programming facilities provided by the different platforms, including hardware and operating system resources, expected behavior of the hardware and operating system, and availability of platform-specific compilers (and sometimes libraries) for the language of the source code.
- Maintainability: the ease with which a program can be modified by its present or future developers in order to make improvements or to customize, fix bugs and security holes, or adapt it to new environments. Good practices[19] during initial development make the difference in this regard. This quality may not be directly apparent to the end user but it can significantly affect the fate of a program over the long term.
- Efficiency/performance: Measure of system resources a program consumes (processor time, memory space, slow devices such as disks, network bandwidth and to some extent even user interaction): the less, the better. This also includes careful management of resources, for example cleaning up temporary files and eliminating memory leaks. This is often discussed under the shadow of a chosen programming language. Although the language certainly affects performance, even slower languages, such as Python, can execute programs instantly from a human perspective. Speed, resource usage, and performance are important for programs that bottleneck the system, but efficient use of programmer time is also important and is related to cost: more hardware may be cheaper.
Using automated tests and fitness functions can help to maintain some of the aforementioned attributes.
Technology is the application of conceptual knowledge to achieve practical goals, especially in a reproducible way.The word technology can also mean the products resulting from such efforts, including both tangible tools such as utensils or machines, and intangible ones such as software. Technology plays a critical role in science, engineering, and everyday life.
Technological advancements have led to significant changes in society. The earliest known technology is the stone tool, used during prehistory, followed by the control of fire—which in turn contributed to the growth of the human brain and the development of language during the Ice Age, according to the cooking hypothesis.The invention of the wheel allowed greater travel and the creation of more complex machines. More recent technological inventions, including the printing press, telephone, and the Internet, have lowered barriers to communication and ushered in the knowledge economy.
While technology contributes to economic development and improves human prosperity, it can also have negative impacts like pollution and resource depletion, and can cause social harms like technological unemployment resulting from automation. As a result, philosophical and political debates about the role and use of technology, the ethics of technology, and ways to mitigate its downsides are ongoing.
Application software is any computer program that is intended for end-user use – not operating, administering or programming the computer. An application (app, application program, software application) is any program that can be categorized as application software. Common types of applications include word processor, media player and accounting software.
The term application software refers to all applications collectively and can be used to differentiate from system and utility software.
Applications may be bundled with the computer and its system software or published separately. Applications may be proprietary or open-source.
The short term app from 80s became popular with the 00s introduction of the iOS App Store, to refer to applications for mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets. Later, with introduction of the Mac App Store and Windows Store, the term was extended in popular use to include desktop applications.
