Alibata - Ada is a structured, statically typed, imperative, and object-oriented high-level computer programming language. It was originally designed by a team led by Jean Ichbiah of CII Honeywell Bull under contract to the United States Department of Defense during 1977–1983 to supersede the hundreds of programming languages then used by the US Department of Defense (DoD). Ada addresses some of the same tasks as C or C++, but Ada is strongly typed (even for integer-range), and compilers are validated for reliability in mission-critical applications, such as avionics software. Ada is an international standard; the current version (known as Ada 2005) is defined by joint ISO/ANSI standard (ISO-8652:1995), combined with major Amendment ISO/IEC 8652:1995/Amd 1:2007.
Alibata - Ada was named after Ada Lovelace (1815–1852), who is often credited with inventing computer programming.
Alibata - Ada's dynamic memory management is high-level and type-explicit, requiring explicit instantiation of the Unchecked_Deallocation package to explicitly free allocated memory. The specification does not require any particular implementation. Though the semantics of the language allow automatic garbage collection of inaccessible objects, most implementations do not support it. Ada does support a limited form of region-based storage management. Invalid accesses can always be detected at run time (unless of course the check is turned off) and sometimes at compile time.
Alibata Work has continued on improving and updating the technical content of the Ada programming language. A Technical Corrigendum to Ada 95 was published in October 2001, and a major Amendment, ISO/IEC 8652:1995/Amd 1:2007, was published on March 9, 2007.
Assembly language
An assembly language is a low-level language for programming computers. It implements a symbolic representation of the numeric machine codes and other constants needed to program a particular CPU architecture. This representation is usually defined by the hardware manufacturer, and is based on abbreviations (called mnemonics) that help the programmer remember individual instructions, registers, etc. An assembly language is thus specific to a certain physical or virtual computer architecture (as opposed to most high-level languages, which are portable).
Assembly languages were first developed in the 1950s, when they were referred to as second generation programming languages. They eliminated much of the error-prone and time-consuming first-generation programming needed with the earliest computers, freeing the programmer from tedium such as remembering numeric codes and calculating addresses. They were once widely used for all sorts of programming. However, by the 1980s (1990s on small computers), their use had largely been supplanted by high-level languages, in the search for improved programming productivity. Today, assembly language is used primarily for direct hardware manipulation, access to specialized processor instructions, or to address critical performance issues. Typical uses are device drivers, low-level embedded systems, and real-time systems.
Typically a modern assembler creates object code by translating assembly instruction mnemonics into opcodes, and by resolving symbolic names for memory locations and other entities. The use of symbolic references is a key feature of assemblers, saving tedious calculations and manual address updates after program modifications. Most assemblers also include macro facilities for performing textual substitution — e.g., to generate common short sequences of instructions to run inline, instead of in a subroutine.
Assembly languages were first developed in the 1950s, when they were referred to as second generation programming languages. They eliminated much of the error-prone and time-consuming first-generation programming needed with the earliest computers, freeing the programmer from tedium such as remembering numeric codes and calculating addresses. They were once widely used for all sorts of programming. However, by the 1980s (1990s on small computers), their use had largely been supplanted by high-level languages, in the search for improved programming productivity. Today, assembly language is used primarily for direct hardware manipulation, access to specialized processor instructions, or to address critical performance issues. Typical uses are device drivers, low-level embedded systems, and real-time systems.
Typically a modern assembler creates object code by translating assembly instruction mnemonics into opcodes, and by resolving symbolic names for memory locations and other entities. The use of symbolic references is a key feature of assemblers, saving tedious calculations and manual address updates after program modifications. Most assemblers also include macro facilities for performing textual substitution — e.g., to generate common short sequences of instructions to run inline, instead of in a subroutine.
Adobe InDesign
Adobe InDesign is a desktop publishing (DTP) software application produced by Adobe Systems.
InDesign was positioned as a high-end alternative and successor to Adobe's own PageMaker. InDesign's primary adopters are designers of periodical publications, posters, and other print media; longer documents still are designed with FrameMaker (manuals and technical documents) or with QuarkXPress (books, catalogs). The combination of a relational database, InDesign and Adobe InCopy word processor, which uses the same formatting engine as InDesign, is the heart of dozens of publishing systems for newspapers, magazines, and other publishing environments.
New versions of the software introduced new file formats. To support the vast array of new features (particularly typographic features) introduced with InDesign CS, both the program and its document format were not retro-compatible. Fortunately, InDesign CS2 introduced the retro-compatible InDesign Interchange (.inx) format, an XML-based representation of the document. Versions of InDesign CS updated with the 3.01 April 2005 update (available free on Adobe's Web site) can read files saved from InDesign CS2 exported to this format. The InDesign Interchange format does not support versions earlier than InDesign CS.
Currently InDesign does not seem to work correctly on Leopard (Mac OS X 10.5), as Adobe states: "InDesign CS3 may unexpectedly quit when using the Place, Save, Save As or Export commands using either the OS or Adobe dialog boxes. Unfortunately, there are no workarounds for these known issues."
InDesign was positioned as a high-end alternative and successor to Adobe's own PageMaker. InDesign's primary adopters are designers of periodical publications, posters, and other print media; longer documents still are designed with FrameMaker (manuals and technical documents) or with QuarkXPress (books, catalogs). The combination of a relational database, InDesign and Adobe InCopy word processor, which uses the same formatting engine as InDesign, is the heart of dozens of publishing systems for newspapers, magazines, and other publishing environments.
New versions of the software introduced new file formats. To support the vast array of new features (particularly typographic features) introduced with InDesign CS, both the program and its document format were not retro-compatible. Fortunately, InDesign CS2 introduced the retro-compatible InDesign Interchange (.inx) format, an XML-based representation of the document. Versions of InDesign CS updated with the 3.01 April 2005 update (available free on Adobe's Web site) can read files saved from InDesign CS2 exported to this format. The InDesign Interchange format does not support versions earlier than InDesign CS.
Currently InDesign does not seem to work correctly on Leopard (Mac OS X 10.5), as Adobe states: "InDesign CS3 may unexpectedly quit when using the Place, Save, Save As or Export commands using either the OS or Adobe dialog boxes. Unfortunately, there are no workarounds for these known issues."
Microsoft Excel
Microsoft Excel (full name Microsoft Office Excel) is a spreadsheet application written and distributed by Microsoft for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X. It features calculation, graphing tools, pivot tables and a macro programming language called VBA (Visual Basic for Applications). It is overwhelmingly the dominant spreadsheet application available for these platforms and has been so since version 5 in 1993, and is bundled as part of Microsoft Office. Excel is one of the most popular microcomputer applications to date.
Microsoft Excel up until 2007 version used a proprietary binary file format called Binary Interchange File Format (BIFF) as its primary format. Excel 2007 uses Office Open XML as its primary file format, an XML-based container similar in design to XML-based format called "XML Spreadsheet" ("XMLSS"), first introduced in Excel 2002. The latter format is not able to encode VBA macros.
Although supporting and encouraging the use of new XML-based formats as replacements, Excel 2007 is still backwards compatible with the traditional, binary, formats. In addition, most versions of Microsoft Excel are able to read CSV, DBF, SYLK, DIF, and other legacy formats.
Microsoft Excel up until 2007 version used a proprietary binary file format called Binary Interchange File Format (BIFF) as its primary format. Excel 2007 uses Office Open XML as its primary file format, an XML-based container similar in design to XML-based format called "XML Spreadsheet" ("XMLSS"), first introduced in Excel 2002. The latter format is not able to encode VBA macros.
Although supporting and encouraging the use of new XML-based formats as replacements, Excel 2007 is still backwards compatible with the traditional, binary, formats. In addition, most versions of Microsoft Excel are able to read CSV, DBF, SYLK, DIF, and other legacy formats.
Microsoft Visual Studio
Microsoft Visual Studio is the main Integrated Development Environment (IDE) from Microsoft. It can be used to develop console and GUI applications along with Windows Forms applications, web sites, web applications, and web services in both native code as well as managed code for all platforms supported by Microsoft Windows, Windows Mobile, .NET Framework, .NET Compact Framework and Microsoft Silverlight.
Visual Studio includes a code editor supporting IntelliSense as well as code refactoring. The integrated debugger works both as a source-level debugger as well as a machine-level debugger. Other built-in tools include a forms designer for building GUI applications, web designer, class designer, and database schema designer. It allows plug-ins to be added that enhance the functionality at almost every level - including adding support for source control systems (like Subversion and Visual SourceSafe) to adding new toolsets like editors and visual designers for domain-specific languages or toolsets for other aspects of the software development lifecycle (like the Team Foundation Server client: Team Explorer).
Visual Studio supports languages by means of language services, which allow any programming language to be supported (to varying degrees) by the code editor and debugger, provided a language-specific service has been authored. In-built languages include C/C++ (via Visual C++), VB.NET (via Visual Basic .NET), and C# (via Visual C#). Support for other languages such as F#, Python, and Ruby among others has been made available via language services which are to be installed separately. It also supports XML/XSLT, HTML/XHTML, JavaScript and CSS.
Visual Studio includes a code editor supporting IntelliSense as well as code refactoring. The integrated debugger works both as a source-level debugger as well as a machine-level debugger. Other built-in tools include a forms designer for building GUI applications, web designer, class designer, and database schema designer. It allows plug-ins to be added that enhance the functionality at almost every level - including adding support for source control systems (like Subversion and Visual SourceSafe) to adding new toolsets like editors and visual designers for domain-specific languages or toolsets for other aspects of the software development lifecycle (like the Team Foundation Server client: Team Explorer).
Visual Studio supports languages by means of language services, which allow any programming language to be supported (to varying degrees) by the code editor and debugger, provided a language-specific service has been authored. In-built languages include C/C++ (via Visual C++), VB.NET (via Visual Basic .NET), and C# (via Visual C#). Support for other languages such as F#, Python, and Ruby among others has been made available via language services which are to be installed separately. It also supports XML/XSLT, HTML/XHTML, JavaScript and CSS.
NetBeans
NetBeans refers to both a platform for the development of Java desktop applications, and an integrated development environment (IDE) developed using the NetBeans Platform.
The NetBeans Platform allows applications to be developed from a set of modular software components called modules. A module is a Java archive file that contains Java classes written to interact with the NetBeans Open APIs and a manifest file that identifies it as a module. Applications built on modules can be extended by adding new modules. Since modules can be developed independently, applications based on the NetBeans platform can be easily and powerfully extended by third party developers.
NetBeans began in 1997 as Xelfi, a student project under the guidance of the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics at Charles University in Prague. A company was later formed around the project and produced commercial versions of the NetBeans IDE until it was bought by Sun Microsystems in 1999. Sun open-sourced the NetBeans IDE in June of the following year. The NetBeans community has since continued to grow, thanks to individuals and companies using and contributing to the project.
The NetBeans IDE is an open-source integrated development environment written entirely in Java using the NetBeans Platform. NetBeans IDE supports development of all Java application types (J2SE, web, EJB and mobile applications) out of the box. Among other features are an Ant-based project system, version control and refactoring.
The current version is NetBeans IDE 6.0, which was released in December 2007. NetBeans IDE 6.0 extends the existing Java EE features (including Java Persistence support, EJB 3 and JAX-WS). Additionally, the NetBeans Enterprise Pack supports development of Java EE 5 enterprise applications, including SOA visual design tools, XML schema tools, web services orchestration (for BPEL), and UML modeling. The NetBeans C/C++ Pack supports C/C++ projects. NetBeans 5.5.1 builds on the functionality of NetBeans 5.5 and also provides several bug fixes.
The NetBeans Platform allows applications to be developed from a set of modular software components called modules. A module is a Java archive file that contains Java classes written to interact with the NetBeans Open APIs and a manifest file that identifies it as a module. Applications built on modules can be extended by adding new modules. Since modules can be developed independently, applications based on the NetBeans platform can be easily and powerfully extended by third party developers.
NetBeans began in 1997 as Xelfi, a student project under the guidance of the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics at Charles University in Prague. A company was later formed around the project and produced commercial versions of the NetBeans IDE until it was bought by Sun Microsystems in 1999. Sun open-sourced the NetBeans IDE in June of the following year. The NetBeans community has since continued to grow, thanks to individuals and companies using and contributing to the project.
The NetBeans IDE is an open-source integrated development environment written entirely in Java using the NetBeans Platform. NetBeans IDE supports development of all Java application types (J2SE, web, EJB and mobile applications) out of the box. Among other features are an Ant-based project system, version control and refactoring.
The current version is NetBeans IDE 6.0, which was released in December 2007. NetBeans IDE 6.0 extends the existing Java EE features (including Java Persistence support, EJB 3 and JAX-WS). Additionally, the NetBeans Enterprise Pack supports development of Java EE 5 enterprise applications, including SOA visual design tools, XML schema tools, web services orchestration (for BPEL), and UML modeling. The NetBeans C/C++ Pack supports C/C++ projects. NetBeans 5.5.1 builds on the functionality of NetBeans 5.5 and also provides several bug fixes.
Oracle Database
The Oracle Database (commonly referred to as Oracle RDBMS or simply as Oracle), a relational database management system (RDBMS) software product released by Oracle Corporation, has become a major factor in database computing.
Larry Ellison and his friends and former co-workers Bob Miner and Ed Oates started the consultancy Software Development Laboratories (SDL) in 1977. SDL developed the original version of the Oracle software. The name Oracle comes from the code-name of a CIA-funded project Ellison had worked on while previously employed by Ampex.
Many widespread computing platforms have come to use the Oracle database software extensively.
An Oracle database system comprises at least one instance of the application, along with data storage. An instance comprises a set of operating-system processes and memory-structures that interact with the storage. Typical processes include PMON (the process monitor) and SMON (the system monitor).
Users of Oracle databases refer to the server-side memory-structure as the SGA (System Global Area). The SGA typically holds cache information such as data-buffers, SQL commands and user information. In addition to storage, the database consists of online redo logs (which hold transactional history). Processes can in turn archive the online redo logs into archive logs (offline redo logs), which provide the basis (if necessary) for data recovery and for some forms of data replication.
The Oracle RDBMS stores data logically in the form of tablespaces and physically in the form of data files. Tablespaces can contain various types of memory segments; for example, Data Segments, Index Segments etc. Segments in turn comprise one or more extents. Extents comprise groups of contiguous data blocks. Data blocks form the basic units of data storage. At the physical level, data-files comprise one or more data blocks, where the block size can vary between data-files.
Larry Ellison and his friends and former co-workers Bob Miner and Ed Oates started the consultancy Software Development Laboratories (SDL) in 1977. SDL developed the original version of the Oracle software. The name Oracle comes from the code-name of a CIA-funded project Ellison had worked on while previously employed by Ampex.
Many widespread computing platforms have come to use the Oracle database software extensively.
An Oracle database system comprises at least one instance of the application, along with data storage. An instance comprises a set of operating-system processes and memory-structures that interact with the storage. Typical processes include PMON (the process monitor) and SMON (the system monitor).
Users of Oracle databases refer to the server-side memory-structure as the SGA (System Global Area). The SGA typically holds cache information such as data-buffers, SQL commands and user information. In addition to storage, the database consists of online redo logs (which hold transactional history). Processes can in turn archive the online redo logs into archive logs (offline redo logs), which provide the basis (if necessary) for data recovery and for some forms of data replication.
The Oracle RDBMS stores data logically in the form of tablespaces and physically in the form of data files. Tablespaces can contain various types of memory segments; for example, Data Segments, Index Segments etc. Segments in turn comprise one or more extents. Extents comprise groups of contiguous data blocks. Data blocks form the basic units of data storage. At the physical level, data-files comprise one or more data blocks, where the block size can vary between data-files.
Google Docs
Google Docs is a free, Web-based word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation application offered by Google. It allows users to create and edit documents online while collaborating in real-time with other users. Google Docs combines the features of two services, Writely and Spreadsheets, which were merged into a single product on October 10, 2006. A third product for presentations, including technology designed by Tonic Systems, was released on September 17, 2007.
Documents, spreadsheets, and presentations can be created within the application itself, imported through the web interface, or sent via email. They can also be saved to the user's computer in a variety of formats. By default, they are saved to Google's servers. Open documents are automatically saved to prevent data loss. Documents can be tagged and archived for organizational purposes.
Collaboration between users is also a feature of Google Docs. Documents can be shared, opened, and edited by multiple users at the same time.
The application supports popular Office file types such as .doc or .xls. It also includes support for the OpenDocument format
There is a limit on how much a user can store on his/her account. Each document must be under 500k plus 2MB for each embedded image. Each spreadsheet must be under 10,000 rows, 256 columns, 100,000 cells and under 40 sheets. A user can have a total of 5,000 documents and presentations, 5,000 images and 1,000 spreadsheets. The maximum number of spreadsheets that one can open at one time is 11[2]. Only presentations under 10mb can be imported. Users cannot easily hyperlink one Google Document to another. Users cannot easily share multiple documents. There is no notification system that alerts users when a document they are interested in has been modified. Docs are only accessible through Mozilla Firefox, Microsoft Internet Explorer and Safari (web browser).
Documents, spreadsheets, and presentations can be created within the application itself, imported through the web interface, or sent via email. They can also be saved to the user's computer in a variety of formats. By default, they are saved to Google's servers. Open documents are automatically saved to prevent data loss. Documents can be tagged and archived for organizational purposes.
Collaboration between users is also a feature of Google Docs. Documents can be shared, opened, and edited by multiple users at the same time.
The application supports popular Office file types such as .doc or .xls. It also includes support for the OpenDocument format
There is a limit on how much a user can store on his/her account. Each document must be under 500k plus 2MB for each embedded image. Each spreadsheet must be under 10,000 rows, 256 columns, 100,000 cells and under 40 sheets. A user can have a total of 5,000 documents and presentations, 5,000 images and 1,000 spreadsheets. The maximum number of spreadsheets that one can open at one time is 11[2]. Only presentations under 10mb can be imported. Users cannot easily hyperlink one Google Document to another. Users cannot easily share multiple documents. There is no notification system that alerts users when a document they are interested in has been modified. Docs are only accessible through Mozilla Firefox, Microsoft Internet Explorer and Safari (web browser).
OpenOffice.org
OpenOffice.org (OO.o or OOo) is an office suite application available for a number of different computer operating systems. It supports the OpenDocument standard for data interchange as its default file formats, as well as Microsoft Office '97-2003 formats, among many others.
OpenOffice.org is based on StarOffice, an office suite developed by StarDivision and acquired by Sun Microsystems in August 1999. The source code of the suite was released in July 2000 with the aim of reducing the dominant market share of Microsoft Office by providing a free, open and high-quality alternative. OpenOffice.org is free software, available under the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL).
The project and software are informally referred to as OpenOffice, but this term is a trademark held by another party, requiring the project to adopt OpenOffice.org as its formal name.
According to its mission statement, the OpenOffice.org project aims "To create, as a community, the leading international office suite that will run on all major platforms and provide access to all functionality and data through open-component based APIs and an XML-based file format."
OpenOffice.org aims to compete with Microsoft Office and emulate its look and feel where suitable. It can read and write most of the file formats found in Microsoft Office, and many other applications; an essential feature of the suite for many users. OpenOffice.org has been found to be able to open files of older versions of Microsoft Office and damaged files that newer versions of Microsoft Office itself cannot open. However, it cannot open older Word for Macintosh (MCW) files.
OpenOffice.org is based on StarOffice, an office suite developed by StarDivision and acquired by Sun Microsystems in August 1999. The source code of the suite was released in July 2000 with the aim of reducing the dominant market share of Microsoft Office by providing a free, open and high-quality alternative. OpenOffice.org is free software, available under the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL).
The project and software are informally referred to as OpenOffice, but this term is a trademark held by another party, requiring the project to adopt OpenOffice.org as its formal name.
According to its mission statement, the OpenOffice.org project aims "To create, as a community, the leading international office suite that will run on all major platforms and provide access to all functionality and data through open-component based APIs and an XML-based file format."
OpenOffice.org aims to compete with Microsoft Office and emulate its look and feel where suitable. It can read and write most of the file formats found in Microsoft Office, and many other applications; an essential feature of the suite for many users. OpenOffice.org has been found to be able to open files of older versions of Microsoft Office and damaged files that newer versions of Microsoft Office itself cannot open. However, it cannot open older Word for Macintosh (MCW) files.
Adobe Dreamweaver
Adobe Dreamweaver is a web development application originally created by Macromedia and now owned by Adobe Systems, which acquired Macromedia in 2005.
Dreamweaver is available for both Mac and Windows operating systems. Recent versions have incorporated support for web technologies such as CSS, JavaScript, and various server-side scripting languages and frameworks including ASP.NET, ColdFusion, JavaServer Pages, and PHP.
As a WYSIWYG Presto-based editor, Dreamweaver can hide the details of pages' HTML code from the user, making it possible for non-coders to create web pages and sites. A professional criticism of this approach is that it produces HTML pages whose file size and amount of HTML code is much larger than they should be, which can cause web browsers to perform poorly. This can be particularly true because the application makes it very easy to create table-based layouts. In addition, some web site developers have criticized Dreamweaver in the past for producing code that often does not comply with W3C standards, though this has improved considerably in recent versions. Dreamweaver 8.0 (the version prior to the recently released 9.0 within CS3) performed poorly on the Acid2 Test, developed by the Web Standards Project. However, Macromedia has increased the support for CSS and other ways to lay out a page without tables in later versions of the application, with the ability to convert tables to layers and vice versa.
Dreamweaver is available for both Mac and Windows operating systems. Recent versions have incorporated support for web technologies such as CSS, JavaScript, and various server-side scripting languages and frameworks including ASP.NET, ColdFusion, JavaServer Pages, and PHP.
As a WYSIWYG Presto-based editor, Dreamweaver can hide the details of pages' HTML code from the user, making it possible for non-coders to create web pages and sites. A professional criticism of this approach is that it produces HTML pages whose file size and amount of HTML code is much larger than they should be, which can cause web browsers to perform poorly. This can be particularly true because the application makes it very easy to create table-based layouts. In addition, some web site developers have criticized Dreamweaver in the past for producing code that often does not comply with W3C standards, though this has improved considerably in recent versions. Dreamweaver 8.0 (the version prior to the recently released 9.0 within CS3) performed poorly on the Acid2 Test, developed by the Web Standards Project. However, Macromedia has increased the support for CSS and other ways to lay out a page without tables in later versions of the application, with the ability to convert tables to layers and vice versa.
Microsoft Word
Microsoft Word is Microsoft's flagship word processing software. It was first released in 1983 under the name Multi-Tool Word for Xenix systems. Versions were later written for several other platforms including IBM PCs running DOS (1983), the Apple Macintosh (1984), SCO UNIX, OS/2 and Microsoft Windows (1989). It is a component of the Microsoft Office system; however, it is also sold as a standalone product and included in Microsoft Works Suite. Beginning with the 2003 version, the branding was revised to emphasize Word's identity as a component within the Office suite; Microsoft began calling it Microsoft Office Word instead of merely Microsoft Word. The latest release is Word 2007.
Word 2007 is the most recent version of Word. This release includes numerous changes, including a new XML-based file format, a redesigned interface, an integrated equation editor, bibliographic management. Additionally, an XML data bag was introduced, accessible via the object model and file format, called Custom XML - this can be used in conjunction with a new feature called Content Controls implement structured documents. It also has contextual tabs, which are functionality specific only to the object with focus, and many other features like Live Preview (which enables you to view the document without making any permanent changes), Mini Toolbar, Super-tooltips, Quick Access toolbar, SmartArt, etc.
Word 2007 formatting breaks the ability for users to send files to earlier versioned Word users on the Macintosh or Windows (version 2004 on the Mac, 2003 on Windows). Some third-party converters have become available to assist with this, but for most, simply saving Word 2007 files with the 'Save As' command and selecting Word 2003 format creates a compatible file. Office 2008 for the Mac will acquire (restore) the cross-platform capability with the .docx format, but older version users on either platform will remain at a disadvantage.
Word 2007 is the most recent version of Word. This release includes numerous changes, including a new XML-based file format, a redesigned interface, an integrated equation editor, bibliographic management. Additionally, an XML data bag was introduced, accessible via the object model and file format, called Custom XML - this can be used in conjunction with a new feature called Content Controls implement structured documents. It also has contextual tabs, which are functionality specific only to the object with focus, and many other features like Live Preview (which enables you to view the document without making any permanent changes), Mini Toolbar, Super-tooltips, Quick Access toolbar, SmartArt, etc.
Word 2007 formatting breaks the ability for users to send files to earlier versioned Word users on the Macintosh or Windows (version 2004 on the Mac, 2003 on Windows). Some third-party converters have become available to assist with this, but for most, simply saving Word 2007 files with the 'Save As' command and selecting Word 2003 format creates a compatible file. Office 2008 for the Mac will acquire (restore) the cross-platform capability with the .docx format, but older version users on either platform will remain at a disadvantage.
FreeBSD
FreeBSD is a Unix-like free operating system descended from AT&T UNIX via the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD) branch through the 386BSD and 4.4BSD operating systems. It runs on Intel x86 family (IA-32) PC compatible systems including DEC Alpha, Sun UltraSPARC, IA-64, AMD64, PowerPC and NEC PC-98 architectures along with the Microsoft Xbox. Support for the ARM and MIPS architectures is under development.
FreeBSD has been characterized as "the unknown giant among free operating systems." It is not a clone of UNIX, but works like UNIX, with UNIX-compliant internals and system APIs. FreeBSD is generally regarded as reliable and robust. Among all operating systems which can accurately report uptime remotely, FreeBSD is the free operating system listed most often in Netcraft's list of the 50 web servers with the longest uptime. A long uptime also indicates no crashes have occurred and no kernel updates have been deemed needed, since installing a new kernel requires a reboot and resets the uptime counter of the system.
FreeBSD is developed as a complete operating system. The kernel, device drivers and all of the userland utilities, such as the shell, are held in the same source code revision tracking tree (CVS). Whereas with Linux the kernel, userland utilities and applications are developed separately, then packaged together in sundry ways by other groups as Linux distributions.
FreeBSD has been characterized as "the unknown giant among free operating systems." It is not a clone of UNIX, but works like UNIX, with UNIX-compliant internals and system APIs. FreeBSD is generally regarded as reliable and robust. Among all operating systems which can accurately report uptime remotely, FreeBSD is the free operating system listed most often in Netcraft's list of the 50 web servers with the longest uptime. A long uptime also indicates no crashes have occurred and no kernel updates have been deemed needed, since installing a new kernel requires a reboot and resets the uptime counter of the system.
FreeBSD is developed as a complete operating system. The kernel, device drivers and all of the userland utilities, such as the shell, are held in the same source code revision tracking tree (CVS). Whereas with Linux the kernel, userland utilities and applications are developed separately, then packaged together in sundry ways by other groups as Linux distributions.
Unix
Unix (officially trademarked as UNIX®, sometimes also written as Unix or Unix® with small caps) is a computer operating system originally developed in 1969 by a group of AT&T employees at Bell Labs including Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie and Douglas McIlroy. Today's Unix systems are split into various branches, developed over time by AT&T as well as various commercial vendors and non-profit organizations.
As of 2007, the owner of the trademark UNIX® is The Open Group, an industry standards consortium. Only systems fully compliant with and certified to the Single UNIX Specification qualify as "UNIX®" (others are called "Unix system-like" or "Unix-like").
During the late 1970s and early 1980s, Unix's influence in academic circles led to large-scale adoption of Unix (particularly of the BSD variant, originating from the University of California, Berkeley) by commercial startups, the most notable of which is Sun Microsystems. Today, in addition to certified Unix systems, Unix-like operating systems such as Linux and BSD are commonly encountered. Sometimes, "traditional Unix" may be used to describe a Unix or an operating system that has the characteristics of either Version 7 Unix or UNIX System V.
As of 2007, the owner of the trademark UNIX® is The Open Group, an industry standards consortium. Only systems fully compliant with and certified to the Single UNIX Specification qualify as "UNIX®" (others are called "Unix system-like" or "Unix-like").
During the late 1970s and early 1980s, Unix's influence in academic circles led to large-scale adoption of Unix (particularly of the BSD variant, originating from the University of California, Berkeley) by commercial startups, the most notable of which is Sun Microsystems. Today, in addition to certified Unix systems, Unix-like operating systems such as Linux and BSD are commonly encountered. Sometimes, "traditional Unix" may be used to describe a Unix or an operating system that has the characteristics of either Version 7 Unix or UNIX System V.
Linux
Linux (pronounced IPA: /ˈlɪnəks/; variants exist) is a Unix-like computer operating system. Linux is one of the most prominent examples of free software and open source development; typically all underlying source code can be freely modified, used, and redistributed by anyone.
The name "Linux" comes from the Linux kernel, started in 1991 by Linus Torvalds. The system's utilities and libraries come from the GNU operating system, started in 1983 by Richard Stallman. The GNU contribution is the reason for the alternate name GNU/Linux.
Predominantly known for its use in servers, Linux is supported by corporations such as Dell, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Novell, Oracle Corporation, Red Hat, and Sun Microsystems. It is used as an operating system for a wide variety of computer hardware, including desktop computers, supercomputers, video game systems, such as the PlayStation 2 and PlayStation 3, several arcade games, and embedded devices such as mobile phones and routers.
The Unix operating system was conceived and implemented in the 1960s and first released in 1970. Its wide availability and portability meant that it was widely adopted, copied and modified by academic institutions and businesses, with its design being influential on authors of other systems.
The GNU Project, started in 1984, had the goal of creating a "complete Unix-compatible software system" made entirely of free software. In 1985, Richard Stallman created the Free Software Foundation and developed the GNU General Public License (GNU GPL). Many of the programs required in an OS (such as libraries, compilers, text editors, a Unix shell, and a windowing system) were completed by the early 1990s, although low level elements such as device drivers, daemons, and the kernel were stalled and incomplete. Linus Torvalds has said that if the GNU kernel had been available at the time (1991), he would not have decided to write his own.
The name "Linux" comes from the Linux kernel, started in 1991 by Linus Torvalds. The system's utilities and libraries come from the GNU operating system, started in 1983 by Richard Stallman. The GNU contribution is the reason for the alternate name GNU/Linux.
Predominantly known for its use in servers, Linux is supported by corporations such as Dell, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Novell, Oracle Corporation, Red Hat, and Sun Microsystems. It is used as an operating system for a wide variety of computer hardware, including desktop computers, supercomputers, video game systems, such as the PlayStation 2 and PlayStation 3, several arcade games, and embedded devices such as mobile phones and routers.
The Unix operating system was conceived and implemented in the 1960s and first released in 1970. Its wide availability and portability meant that it was widely adopted, copied and modified by academic institutions and businesses, with its design being influential on authors of other systems.
The GNU Project, started in 1984, had the goal of creating a "complete Unix-compatible software system" made entirely of free software. In 1985, Richard Stallman created the Free Software Foundation and developed the GNU General Public License (GNU GPL). Many of the programs required in an OS (such as libraries, compilers, text editors, a Unix shell, and a windowing system) were completed by the early 1990s, although low level elements such as device drivers, daemons, and the kernel were stalled and incomplete. Linus Torvalds has said that if the GNU kernel had been available at the time (1991), he would not have decided to write his own.
MAC OS
Mac OS is the trademarked name for a series of graphical user interface-based operating systems developed by Apple Inc. (formerly Apple Computer, Inc.) for their Macintosh line of computer systems. The Macintosh user experience is credited with popularizing the graphical user interface. The original form of what Apple would later name the "Mac OS" was the integral and unnamed system software first introduced in 1984 with the original Macintosh, usually referred to simply as the System software.
Apple deliberately downplayed the existence of the operating system in the early years of the Macintosh to help make the machine appear more user-friendly and to distance it from other operating systems such as MS-DOS, which were portrayed as arcane and technically challenging. Much of this early system software was held in ROM, with updates typically provided free of charge by Apple dealers on floppy disk. As increasing disk storage capacity and performance gradually eliminated the need for fixing much of an advanced GUI operating system in ROM, Apple explored cloning while positioning major operating system upgrades as separate revenue-generating products, first with System 7 and System 7.5, then with Mac OS 7.6 in 1997.
Earlier versions of the Mac OS were compatible only with Motorola 68000-based Macintoshes. As Apple introduced computers with PowerPC hardware, the OS was upgraded to support this architecture as well. Mac OS X, which has superseded the "Classic" Mac OS, is compatible with both PowerPC and Intel processors.
Several computer manufacturers over the years have made Macintosh clones capable of running Mac OS, notably Power Computing, UMAX and Motorola. These machines normally ran various versions of classic Mac OS. Steve Jobs ended the clone licensing program after returning to Apple in 1997.
Apple deliberately downplayed the existence of the operating system in the early years of the Macintosh to help make the machine appear more user-friendly and to distance it from other operating systems such as MS-DOS, which were portrayed as arcane and technically challenging. Much of this early system software was held in ROM, with updates typically provided free of charge by Apple dealers on floppy disk. As increasing disk storage capacity and performance gradually eliminated the need for fixing much of an advanced GUI operating system in ROM, Apple explored cloning while positioning major operating system upgrades as separate revenue-generating products, first with System 7 and System 7.5, then with Mac OS 7.6 in 1997.
Earlier versions of the Mac OS were compatible only with Motorola 68000-based Macintoshes. As Apple introduced computers with PowerPC hardware, the OS was upgraded to support this architecture as well. Mac OS X, which has superseded the "Classic" Mac OS, is compatible with both PowerPC and Intel processors.
Several computer manufacturers over the years have made Macintosh clones capable of running Mac OS, notably Power Computing, UMAX and Motorola. These machines normally ran various versions of classic Mac OS. Steve Jobs ended the clone licensing program after returning to Apple in 1997.
MS Windows
Microsoft Windows is the name of several families of software operating systems by Microsoft. Microsoft first introduced an operating environment named Windows in November 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces (GUIs). Microsoft Windows eventually came to dominate the world's personal computer market, overtaking Mac OS, which had been introduced previously. At the 2004 IDC Directions conference, IDC Vice President Avneesh Saxena stated that Windows had approximately 90% of the client operating system market. The current client version of Windows is Windows Vista. The current server version of Windows is Windows Server 2003. The successor to Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008, is currently being beta tested.
Windows/386 introduced a 32-bit protected mode kernel and virtual machine monitor. For the duration of a Windows session, it created one or more virtual 8086 environments and provided device virtualization for the video card, keyboard, mouse, timer and interrupt controller inside each of them. The user-visible consequence was that it became possible to preemptively multitask multiple MS-DOS environments in separate Windows (graphical applications required switching the window to full screen mode). Windows applications were still multi-tasked cooperatively inside one of such real-mode environments.
Windows 3.0 (1990) and Windows 3.1 (1992) improved the design, mostly because of virtual memory and loadable virtual device drivers (VxDs) which allowed them to share arbitrary devices between multitasked DOS windows. Because of this, Windows applications could now run in 16-bit protected mode (when Windows was running in Standard or 386 Enhanced Mode), which gave them access to several megabytes of memory and removed the obligation to participate in the software virtual memory scheme. They still ran inside the same address space, where the segmented memory provided a degree of protection, and multi-tasked cooperatively. For Windows 3.0, Microsoft also rewrote critical operations from C into assembly, making this release faster and less memory-hungry than its predecessors
Windows/386 introduced a 32-bit protected mode kernel and virtual machine monitor. For the duration of a Windows session, it created one or more virtual 8086 environments and provided device virtualization for the video card, keyboard, mouse, timer and interrupt controller inside each of them. The user-visible consequence was that it became possible to preemptively multitask multiple MS-DOS environments in separate Windows (graphical applications required switching the window to full screen mode). Windows applications were still multi-tasked cooperatively inside one of such real-mode environments.
Windows 3.0 (1990) and Windows 3.1 (1992) improved the design, mostly because of virtual memory and loadable virtual device drivers (VxDs) which allowed them to share arbitrary devices between multitasked DOS windows. Because of this, Windows applications could now run in 16-bit protected mode (when Windows was running in Standard or 386 Enhanced Mode), which gave them access to several megabytes of memory and removed the obligation to participate in the software virtual memory scheme. They still ran inside the same address space, where the segmented memory provided a degree of protection, and multi-tasked cooperatively. For Windows 3.0, Microsoft also rewrote critical operations from C into assembly, making this release faster and less memory-hungry than its predecessors
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