FREE online courses on Information Technology - Chapter 2 FRAMEWORKS FOR IT
- Personal Support System
Large mainframe computers rarely feature applications that
enhance the productivity of the typical manager. One of the great appeals of
personal computers is the software available for personal productivity.
Spreadsheet programs are widely used in business for making decisions and
producing report. The spreadsheet program is a major enhancement to personal
productivity compared with the old way of doing mathematical analyses with
pencil, paper, and calculator.
For individual writings documents such as reports or even
memos, word processing contributes greatly to productivity. The concept of word
processing has been extended to desktop publishing. A desktop system features a
powerful program capable to generating text in variety of fonts and sizes.
Hardware is available to scan input images and include them with the text for
example, to add a photograph to a news release. There are also output devices to
produce high-resolution film that can be used directly in printing.
Personal productivity is also enhanced with packages for
presentation graphics. If a manager has to make a presentation, programs exists
that enable him or her to generate transparencies or 35mm sides in a variety of
type styles, sizes and colors. Many of these programs have libraries of clipart
from which the user can add various illustrations.
Personal productivity has been enhanced by the development of
graphical user interfaces (GUIs), such as Microsoft Windows and the operating
environment for the Macintosh computer. These systems create a graphical desktop
on the computer's monitor and provide many more capabilities than older systems
which only allowed character input and output.
