Applications
- Task-oriented software, aka productivity software, can help to work faster and make life more convenient.
- The collective set of business tasks is limited to major categories such as word processing (including desktop publishing), spreadsheets, database management, graphics, and communications.
Word Processing/Desktop Publishing is the most widely used personal computer software.
- This software lets you create, edit, format, store, and print text and graphics in one document. In this context the three terms -- edit, format, and store -- that reveal the difference between word processing and plain typing.
- As the number of features in word processing packages evolve, word processing has entered the realm of desktop publishing.
- Desktop publishing packages are usually more sophisticated and powerful than word processing packages to meet the demands of high-level publishing such as typesetting and color reproduction.
- Many magazines and newspapers today rely on desktop publishing software.
- Businesses use it to produce professional-looking newsletters, reports, and brochures-both to improve internal communication and to make a better impression on the outside world.
Electronic Spreadsheets
- Spreadsheets consist of columns and rows, used as business tools for centuries.
- A manual spreadsheet can be tedious to prepare, change and recalculate.
- An electronic spreadsheet is a spreadsheet, but the tedious work is done by the computer.
- Spreadsheet application automatically recalculates the results when a number is changed.
- This capability allows users to perform "what-if" analyses to try different combinations of numbers and parameters and see the results quickly.
Database Management
- Database management is the management of a collection of interrelated facts.
- Database Management System (DBMS) can handles data in a variety of ways.
- The DBMS can store data, update it, manipulate it, report it in a variety of views, and print it in as many forms, i.e., repots that provide users information.
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- An event promoter, for example, can store and change data about upcoming event dates, seating, ticket prices, and sales.
- The promoter can also use the software to retrieve information, such as the number of tickets sold in each price range or the percentage of tickets sold the day before the concert.
Graphics
- As the old adage goes, a picture is worth a thousand words; graphics, maps, and charts can make the comparison of data and gleaning of trends more easily than words and numbers, and help decision makers tremendously.
Communications
- As noted previously, a worker having a readily available personal computer connected to a network such as the Internet whether at work, home or on the road, communication with colleagues and customers can be conducted easily and conveniently.