A computer is an electronic machine which can store process and retrieve information through software.
Software is a written set of instructions for procedures for rules these procedure or guidelines are used to control the operation of the computer system.
Normally software is divided into two types:
1: system software
2: application software
The system software is used to control and manage the operation of the computer.
The application software is used to solve the particular problem of the users the system software is further divided into different categories. The most fundamental of all the system software is operating system.
We can see that operating system act over hardware layer and application runs over the operating system layers.
OPERATING SYSTEM:
Operating system or OS is the most important system software it is collection of system software and it is stored on the storage device such as hard disk CD ROM , floppy disk when a computer is switched on the operating system is transferred from the storage device into main memory.
Some handheld devices have the entire operating system in the ROM chips this type of operating system is difficult to update an operating system or OS is the software that communicate with the hardware and allow other programs to run.
it is comprised of the fundamental programs that a computer need to boot up and function every every desktop computer, tablet and smartphone includes an operating system that provides basic functionally for the device.
Common desktop operating system includes Windows Mac OS and LINUX and operating system controls and coordinates the overall operations of a computer system it manage the computer hardware control the execution of application program and provides the set of service to the fuse operating system acts as an interface between user and the computer the user interact with the operating system indirectly through application program for a computer to operate an operating system must be loaded in the main memory operating system performs a lot of task which we shall discuss throughout this book however some of the basic task are as follow.
1: Accept input from input devices
2: Send output to output devices
3: Manage the application programs in memory
4: Manager the files on the storage devices
5: Manage and control the IO devices.