10.1 Roles of an Operating System
In Chapter 1, we talked about the changing role of the programmer. As early as the end of the first generation of software development, there was a split between those programmers who wrote tools to help other programmers and those who used the tools to solve problems. Modern software can be divided into two categories, application software and system software, reflecting this separation of goals. Application software is written to address specific needs—to solve problems in the real world. Word processing programs, games, inventory control systems, automobile diagnostic programs, and missile guidance programs are all application software. Chapters 12 through 14 discuss areas of computer science that relate ...
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