Software for software
Let's start with the standard textbook definition first.
System programming (or systems programming) is the activity of programming computer system software. The primary distinguishing characteristic of system programming when compared to application programming is that application programming aims to produce software that provides services directly to the user (for example, a word processor), whereas system programming aims to produce software and software platforms that provide services to other software, and are designed to work in performance-constrained environments, for example, operating systems, computational science applications, game engines and AAA video games, industrial automation, and software as a service ...
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