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Freely Redistributable Software
Freely redistributable software (FRS) is software that anyone is free to redistribute. The term has been used to mean two types of free-to-redistribute software, distinguished by the legal modifiability and limitations on the purpose of use of the software. FRS which can be legally modified and used for any purpose is the same as free software. Non-legally modifiable FRS is freeware, shareware, or similar. The non-modifiable FRS generally comes in the form of executable binaries. Proprietary software companies and authors often use it to showcase their work or encourage users to buy full products from them (in the case of shareware, demo, or trial versions). Freeware that is not restricted to be obtained from a specific distributor is also FRS. Firmware and microcode In cases of firmware or microcode, it is acceptable for major open-source projects like OpenBSD to include a binary firmware of a device within the distribution, as long as said firmware runs only on the external de ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Software
Software consists of computer programs that instruct the Execution (computing), execution of a computer. Software also includes design documents and specifications. The history of software is closely tied to the development of digital computers in the mid-20th century. Early programs were written in the machine language specific to the hardware. The introduction of high-level programming languages in 1958 allowed for more human-readable instructions, making software development easier and more portable across different computer architectures. Software in a programming language is run through a compiler or Interpreter (computing), interpreter to execution (computing), execute on the architecture's hardware. Over time, software has become complex, owing to developments in Computer network, networking, operating systems, and databases. Software can generally be categorized into two main types: # operating systems, which manage hardware resources and provide services for applicat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Free Software
Free software, libre software, libreware sometimes known as freedom-respecting software is computer software distributed open-source license, under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, distribute it and any adapted versions. Free software is a matter of liberty, not price; all users are legally free to do what they want with their copies of a free software (including profiting from them) regardless of how much is paid to obtain the program.Selling Free Software (GNU) Computer programs are deemed "free" if they give end-users (not just the developer) ultimate control over the software and, subsequently, over their devices. The right to study and modify a computer program entails that the source code—the preferred ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Freeware
Freeware is software, often proprietary, that is distributed at no monetary cost to the end user. There is no agreed-upon set of rights, license, or EULA that defines ''freeware'' unambiguously; every publisher defines its own rules for the freeware it offers. For instance, modification, redistribution by third parties, and reverse engineering are permitted by some publishers but prohibited by others. Unlike with free and open-source software, which are also often distributed free of charge, the source code for freeware is typically not made available. Freeware may be intended to benefit its producer by, for example, encouraging sales of a more capable version, as in the freemium and shareware business models. History The term ''freeware'' was coined in 1982 by Andrew Fluegelman, who wanted to sell PC-Talk, the communications application he had created, outside of commercial distribution channels. Fluegelman distributed the program via the same process as ''shareware''. As s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shareware
Shareware is a type of proprietary software that is initially shared by the owner for trial use at little or no cost. Often the software has limited functionality or incomplete documentation until the user sends payment to the software developer. Shareware is often offered as a download from a website. Shareware differs from freeware, which is fully-featured software distributed at no cost to the user but without source code being made available; and free and open-source software, in which the source code is freely available for anyone to inspect and alter. There are many types of shareware and, while they may not require an initial up-front payment, many are intended to generate revenue in one way or another. Some limit use to personal non- commercial purposes only, with purchase of a license required for use in a business enterprise. The software itself may be time-limited, or it may remind the user that payment would be appreciated. Types of shareware Trialware Trialware ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Executable
In computer science, executable code, an executable file, or an executable program, sometimes simply referred to as an executable or binary, causes a computer "to perform indicated tasks according to encoded instruction (computer science), instructions", as opposed to a data (computing), data file that must be interpreted (parser, parsed) by an interpreter (computing), interpreter to be functional. The exact interpretation depends upon the use. "Instructions" is traditionally taken to mean machine code instructions for a physical central processing unit, CPU. In some contexts, a file containing scripting instructions (such as bytecode) may also be considered executable. Generation of executable files Executable files can be hand-coded in machine language, although it is far more convenient to develop software as source code in a high-level language that can be easily understood by humans. In some cases, source code might be specified in assembly language instead, which rema ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Binaries
A binary file is a computer file that is not a text file. The term "binary file" is often used as a term meaning "non-text file". Many binary file formats contain parts that can be interpreted as text; for example, some computer document files containing formatted text, such as older Microsoft Word document files, contain the text of the document but also contain formatting information in binary form. Background and terminology All modern computers store information in the form of bits (binary digits), using binary code. For this reason, all data stored on a computer is, in some sense, "binary". However, one particularly useful and ubiquitous type of data stored on a computer is one in which the bits represent text, by way of a character encoding. Those files are called " text files" and files which are not like that are referred to as "binary files", as a sort of retronym or hypernym. Some "text files" contain portions that are actually binary data, and many "binary file ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Proprietary Software
Proprietary software is computer software, software that grants its creator, publisher, or other rightsholder or rightsholder partner a legal monopoly by modern copyright and intellectual property law to exclude the recipient from freely sharing the software or modifying it, and—in some cases, as is the case with some patent-encumbered and EULA-bound software—from making use of the software on their own, thereby restricting their freedoms. Proprietary software is a subset of non-free software, a term defined in contrast to free and open-source software; non-commercial licenses such as CC BY-NC are not deemed proprietary, but are non-free. Proprietary software may either be closed-source software or source-available software. Types Origin Until the late 1960s, computers—especially large and expensive mainframe computers, machines in specially air-conditioned computer rooms—were usually leased to customers rather than Sales, sold. Service and all software available ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Demoware
Shareware is a type of proprietary software that is initially shared by the owner for trial use at little or no cost. Often the software has limited functionality or incomplete documentation until the user sends payment to the software developer. Shareware is often offered as a download from a website. Shareware differs from freeware, which is fully-featured software distributed at no cost to the user but without source code being made available; and free and open-source software, in which the source code is freely available for anyone to inspect and alter. There are many types of shareware and, while they may not require an initial up-front payment, many are intended to generate revenue in one way or another. Some limit use to personal non- commercial purposes only, with purchase of a license required for use in a business enterprise. The software itself may be time-limited, or it may remind the user that payment would be appreciated. Types of shareware Trialware Trialware ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Firmware
In computing Computing is any goal-oriented activity requiring, benefiting from, or creating computer, computing machinery. It includes the study and experimentation of algorithmic processes, and the development of both computer hardware, hardware and softw ..., firmware is software that provides low-level control of computing device Computer hardware, hardware. For a relatively simple device, firmware may perform all control, monitoring and data manipulation functionality. For a more complex device, firmware may provide relatively low-level control as well as hardware abstraction Service (systems architecture), services to higher-level software such as an operating system. Firmware is found in a wide range of computing devices including personal computers, smartphones, home appliances, vehicles, computer peripherals and in many of the integrated circuits inside each of these larger systems. Firmware is stored in non-volatile memory either read-only memory (ROM) or progra ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Microcode
In processor design, microcode serves as an intermediary layer situated between the central processing unit (CPU) hardware and the programmer-visible instruction set architecture of a computer. It consists of a set of hardware-level instructions that implement the higher-level machine code instructions or control internal finite-state machine sequencing in many digital processing components. While microcode is utilized in Intel and AMD general-purpose CPUs in contemporary desktops and laptops, it functions only as a fallback path for scenarios that the faster hardwired control unit is unable to manage. Housed in special high-speed memory, microcode translates machine instructions, state machine data, or other input into sequences of detailed circuit-level operations. It separates the machine instructions from the underlying electronics, thereby enabling greater flexibility in designing and altering instructions. Moreover, it facilitates the construction of complex multi-step inst ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
OpenBSD
OpenBSD is a security-focused operating system, security-focused, free software, Unix-like operating system based on the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD). Theo de Raadt created OpenBSD in 1995 by fork (software development), forking NetBSD 1.0. The OpenBSD project emphasizes software portability, portability, software standard, standardization, software bug, correctness, proactive computer security, security, and integrated cryptography. The OpenBSD project maintains portable versions of many subsystems as package manager, packages for other operating systems. Because of the project's preferred BSD license, which allows binary redistributions without the source code, many components are reused in proprietary and corporate-sponsored software projects. The firewall (computing), firewall code in Apple Inc., Apple's macOS is based on OpenBSD's PF (firewall), PF firewall code, Android (operating system), Android's Bionic (software), Bionic C standard library is based on OpenBSD c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
