3. Operating Systems

The operating system is part of the system software.  All computers have an operating system, they cannot function without one. 

The operating system is a program that allows applications software to communicate with the hardware.

Examples of operating systems are Windows Vista, Windows XP, Unix, Linux and MacOS.

An operating system has many tasks. Here are just a few of them:

  • Sorting out where to store data on disk drives
  • Dealing with security - user names and passwords
  • Organising files and folders
  • Managing data transfer from the CPU to the peripherals e.g. printer, monitor
  • Deals with saving, deleting, opening, closing files

 

 

challenge see if you can find out one extra fact on this topic that we haven't already told you

Click on this link: Operating System