There are many versions of operating systems, but the choice will depend on the intended purpose. The leading vendors, well-known worldwide in the production of operating systems, are - Microsoft Company, which produces Windows operating system, Mac OS X with its Apple operating system and the Unisys Corporation, which produces the Linux operating system.
The Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, that is responsible for developing, manufacturing, licensing and supporting a wide range of products and services that are related to computing. It is prominent for its Windows operating system which is used both at homes and in offices. Microsoft released its Windows operating system in 1984, which was home computing software at that time. The office suit soon followed with the introduction of Microsoft Office in 1990. When command driven operating systems, such as Microsoft Disk Operating System (MS-DOS), were paramount, the users needed to memorize all command jargons associated with each operating system. This was both tedium and stressful, causing many people to develop cold feet at the sight of a computer. The introduction of the Windows OS by Microsoft corporation in the mid 90’s has paved the way for wide use of computer equipment in business, management, communication and other aspects of human endeavors (Silberschatz et al., 2008).
Windows operating system introduced flexibility and user-friendliness into this field of technology. This makes computers easier to use when compared to the old non-windows based operating system. The well known Microsoft operating systems are Windows XP and Vista. Windows Vista is relatively more demanding in terms of system requirements compared to Windows XP and other operating systems.
This is the current version of the operating system used on Apple Macintosh computers. It is a highly developed, user-friendly operating system. Earlier versions of these operating systems were largely based on the original release of 1984. In the late 1990’s majority of computer users were much accustomed to Windows. Desktops are intended for single user operating systems that entirely hide the full directories paths. The Mac has moderately comprehensible interface with a vast variety of features. It is well guarded from viruses and other forms of virtual attacks. However, Mac OS is limited to Apple manufactured hardware and, thus, it has a smaller library of applications compared to Windows. Consequently, this operating system has a limited market niche ranging from the middle to high class markets. Though this operating system does not suffer much of the computer viruses’ attacks, the security threat remains similar to that of the other operating systems. But such issues are commonly fixed with software updates upon discovery. Despite the dominance of the windows operating system, Mac OS has seen a significant increase in the market share over the years and even months (Schoun, 2000).
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