User:Dan.houghton123

What is an Operating System?

The operating system in my opinion is by far one of the most important if not the most important part a computer has to offer. Without the operating system the computer would simply not work, if you take a moment to just think of a purpose or action the computer may be able to do the operating system is in charge of that. As you can already probably see the Operating System has a big deal to do with how the computer is run.

The operating system can perform basic and easy tasks, for example they can be used for recognizing the input from the keyboard which inevitably will send to the output which will display on the screen. So already I hope you are starting to get a feel for how important the operating system is when using a computer. Another example of the important’s an operating system brings is security.

Many people when using a computer like to know that their work is secure and most importantly that no one is going to be going through the work that they have produced. You can set certain user accounts on your computer and for each user you can give it a password.

The operating system will take note of that password you have given to this particular user and this means you can only access the account if you put in that exact password. Obviously it doesn’t stop people from hacking into your account but it prevents it a lot more if you didn’t get this set up.

Each year companies that make computers are trying to find that bit of brilliants that other companies haven't figured out yet. What I mean by brilliants is they are trying to make there operating systems so complex but to us as the users so easy.

In this article I'm going to talk to you about how Windows have really exceeded in changing what they have to better their services to us as customers. I'm going to be talking about two of the products that they have on offer for us to purchase and explain to you the difference of both and how time really has taken its toll on technology.

How has technology changed over time? In time technology has changed because of the economical climate that we live in today. We can afford to do a lot more now than we ever could in the past which is why technology has grown so much in the last 10 years. I would like to talk about Windows 7 and what its functions and features are. This way we have an idea of where we currently are in technology terms.

What are functions and features that Windows 7 offers us?

•	Home Group – Home group allows you to quickly and easily make home networks between computers using Windows 7.

•	Jump list- This feature is probably the easiest one to implement but what it offers you is very clever. All you have to do is right click on any program of your choice and this will show you a list of recently used files that use that specific program.

•	Libraries- This function was made to simplify your life. By making this feature it allows you to find your saved items. This could be your work, music, pictures or videos that you may have saved onto your computer.

•	Location-Aware Printing – This feature is often for people that travel around a lot. What I mean by that is people that need to travel between offices or from work and home. This feature is handy because it remembers exactly what network and printer that you last used and this means it automatically switches the default printer to the one that you last used. As you can probably tell this will save you a lot of time and hassle because you don’t have to keep connecting up to the same network each time you want to print something out.

•	Aero Shake- This function is called a Aero Shake for the simple reason being all you do is click and shake one open window and all of the others on the desktop you are using will minimize. A simple tool that saves you a lot of time!

•	Aero Snap – All you have to do with this function is drag a window to any edge of your display screen, it doesn’t matter which one it is and it will automatically re-size itself without you having to do anything.

I have only listed a few of the features that Windows 7 has to offer and already the complexity that the people who are making these products are having to go to through is colossal. As you can tell windows 7 really did produced the goods that many people expected and maybe a little bit extra. They really thought about some of the feedback that they had got, mainly to do with the time consuming aspects that some of the operating systems windows produced in the past maybe took a bit too long but now the time taken to do anything is insanely quick. I think evaluating your feedback is probably one of the most important aspects before making a product. It's what's going to sell the product and like I said Windows obviously listen to what their loyal customers had to say and they are reaching the benefits of that so all in all it was worth it.

How does this compare to other Operating Systems? In my comparison to Windows 7 I'd like to compare to Windows Vista because they are both made by the same company but both made at different times. We can see in detail the change Windows have made from their older products and see what they have focused on to get where they have got to.

What functions and features does Windows Vista have?

•	Family Safety Settings- This feature was put in place mainly so that parents could manage and control what their child does on the computer without even being there. Windows Vista introduces a colossal amount of parental control features to keep their children safe.

•	Windows Mail- For the majority of people, sending emails is one of the most important aspects they do on the computer. Emails have grown in popularity as well as importantance and in that time a lot of annoyances and risks have been identified. They have worked on many aspects of Windows Mail to make sure your experience of using e-mail as enjoyable and stress free as it can be so they have tried to reduce as many of the risks as there used to be. •	Windows Photo Gallery- This is a tool that gives you the tools you need to organise, find and most importantly view your photos and videos. You can even edit, print and share your photo from your Windows Photo Gallery. This is a place where you can keep your photos secure and safe instead of keeping them on your camera.

•	Windows Security- Windows Security has implemented to make your time on the computer and a lot safer. The improvements Windows Vista has engineered are to help you have a computer that is protected from unwanted software’s such as viruses, worms, spyware and many others. It will also allow you and your family to have a safer online experience because it will prevent the chances of you getting any unwanted problems that your computer may have. Last of all which is probably the best part of this feature is even if your computer manages to get a problem and is unsafe, all you have to do is go onto the control and guidance software and this will help you to improve your security.

•	Windows Update- Windows Update was made so that your computer keeps up to date and is more secure by providing Windows Vista software updates regularly. You can actually make the Windows Update automatically download and install the updates for you so that you don’t have to think about it.

How technology gone forward?

I am now going to explain the importance and difference of both of these operating systems. Both of these operating systems have both been made by the same producers which are Windows but were made at different times. In this comparison hopefully you can see the good in both operating systems but most importantly see the difference as well. I believe every year companies like Windows are trying to make their products quicker and also try making their products do multiple things at the click of a button. I am going to show you why I believe this by comparing Windows 7 to Windows Vista. As we all know Windows Vista is the older model and I’m by no means saying this is a bad product because it definitely is not but compared to the Windows 7 it admittedly does look a lot less capable.

An example of this is Windows 7 have created a programme called ‘Libraries’, this is a place where you keep all your documents, music, pictures, videos etc in. I feel having everything jumbled around a computer is very much unorganised and could get rather frustrating after a while. What I mean by that is if you are trying to find something you want to be able to find it immediately or in a very quick space of time.

What you don’t want to be doing is stressing out where it is which is what a lot of people tend to do. The idea of having everything in one place to me sounds very appealing because you will defiantly know where things will have been saved in.

A lot of people now use computers for all sorts of reasons; this is ranging from different age groups from children to elderly people. So it doesn’t matter how old people are they are still in need of a computer. Each user has different capabilities on a computer and what might suit one person may not suit another which is why Windows 7 have really opted to give as many options to the public as they can.

If I wanted to go onto the internet and have more than one page up at a time I could do this on both operating systems and this would be visual for you to see at the top of the screen because there would be different tabs for the different pages you have added onto the screen. Over time people began to use a lot of tabs at once and they would forget which page was which and would have to go through each page just to find the right one. As you can probably tell the frustration this probably caused is unbelievable. Windows decided on their windows 7 model that they would use something called the ‘hover in’ tool. This is a tool that has been designed so you can see each individual page visually; this way you will never have the stress of not knowing which page is which.

My last comparison will be about the speed in how you can do things on Windows 7 compared to Windows Vista. On Windows 7 they have created a feature called AeroSnap and what you do is you drag a windows to the edge of any page of your choice and this will automatically minimize every page you have open without you doing anything. In comparison to that Windows Vista you would have to minimize each individual page which is a bad thing but obviously the AeroSnap is a lot quicker to use.

Thank you very much for reading my page I hope you enjoyed it!