The Information And Communication Technology Computer Science Essay

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

Student’s Name

College

Project Management Software

The world has seen tremendous growth in the Information and Communication Technology sector. From the invention of the first computer, different changes have been made to the size, portability and the availability of these machines. The computer has been a great field of study and more people are taking Information Technology as a field of expertise. The population that uses the computer has been growing and in a few years’ time almost everybody will be using the computer. In order to make work easier for these people especially those who are not involved in the Information Technology sector, IT professionals have come up with specific programs that can help the computers be more user friendly to these people. These programs make it easier for people to perform simple jobs such as typing without going to college to study. The user just needs to know very little about the computer or the electronic device while using it.

Application software in ICT is defined as computer software that is designed to help the computer user to perform or do specific tasks. Application software deal with documents and are designed to help all walks of life. Application software is also created for the smart phones. Most of this application software is available free in the internet and people are encouraged to download them and use them. Application software can be categorised as either vertical application or horizontal applications. Vertical applications are those that are designed for particular companies while Horizontal applications are more widespread and are designed for use by many people. They are found easily. Examples of such software are accounting software, office suites, graphics software, media players, enterprises software and project management software among others. The major project management articles that are currently being used include Microsoft Software, CorelDraw software and Smart Draw Softwares.

Corel Draw is an application software that is suited for creating artworks as it combines both text and graphics. Graphics that are created by it can be logos, photos and many more. Corel Draw has many versions but the latest version that is available in the market is Corel Draw version 12. For people not conversant with the software, Corel Draw comes with the Corel Tutor. Corel Tutor enables the new user to get online and offline help when he or she is stuck while working. It also shows instructions and guides the user through various tours to explain the working of the software. It also comes with the ability to import files from other applications within the device being used and comes with a variety of saving options command. One can save the documents with embedded Visual basic project, embedded fonts using TrueDoc and web safe filenames.

Other features of Corel Draw are as follows; Corel Draw application is used for graphic design, photo painting which is an image editing application. The photo painting application can be used to colour and tone of a photo or retouching images or masking images. Corel Draw has independent layers for each page being used which help the user to organize and arrange objects in a layout where too many objects are used. The layers can either be local layers or master layers, creating and Editing tables for easier typing and information is easy to understand, live text preview which lets the user instantly preview the changes in the text that is selected, applying any formatting to the text, monitoring paragraph text and also supports other applications such as Adobe illustrator, Photoshop, AutoCAD, Microsoft word, Microsoft Publisher and any document that has Adobe document format (pdf). Lastly the user can also open previous versions of Corel Draw depending on the version used.

Microsoft software is the most commonly known software and is mostly referred to as Microsoft Office. This software has a variety of applications within it and these applications are: Microsoft Office Word, Microsoft Office Publisher, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft power point, Microsoft Access which are the commonly used ones. Other applications include Microsoft Outlook, Microsoft Groove, Microsoft InfoPath and Microsoft One Note.

Microsoft office Word mostly deals with the text part of documents. It has features such as inserting pictures, tables. It also offers formatting features such as changing the font, different types of font, changing the colour, character spacing. It also allows one to check for spelling, thesaurus and also has the mail merge feature that enables one to send one letter to different people without having to re write the letter. Microsoft excel deals with tables and is mostly used by people in the accountancy and statistics field. It has in built formulas and functions that are in built in the program that help perform calculations and other mathematical functions. Microsoft Access is used to deal with tables that have multiple information which cannot be easily typed in Excel. It also has the query feature that allows multiple tables to be linked together and form one table. Microsoft Publisher deals with graphic Design and is used for creating posters, invitations, Business cards among others. All this application allows pictures to be imported from other files and be inserted within texts. In overall Microsoft Office offers a variety of features for the computer. They also have security features where one can back up and retrieve information in case of data loss and other damage that can be done to property. Lastly Microsoft Office is readily available to users at an affordable price.

Smart Draw software is an application that makes it easier to create charts, diagrams and other visuals. Smart Draw is normally used with Windows 7, Vista, XP and windows 2000. It is an integration of Microsoft Excel, Power Point and Microsoft Project that is it combines the functions of these other applications to form one single presentation. This is an advantage as it saves time one would have used to create the document in different applications then combine them. This application also creates very good visual flowcharts, organizational charts mind maps and project charts among others.

Some of the features of the Smart Draw application are as follows; automatic formatting where one can make or change the shape in various shapes. This feature allows the user to start with a basic template. Another feature of the Smart Draw is the presence of the 70 visuals that can be used. From this variety one can edit their document to what suites them best. Some of the visual templates that can be used are Sales proposition, Activity Network Affinity program, BCG Matrix, Vehicle Diagram, Wheel Calendar, Authority Matrix Balanced Scorecard, Workflow Diagram, Certificate Charts &Graphs, and Pedigree Chart, Puzzle piece Diagram and Rack Diagram among others. Another feature is that the Smart Draw also allows sharing documents where one can export files from other sources such as pdf files, pictures and documents from Microsoft Excel among other applications. Another feature is one can add images and videos to the project with the insert Image command that is present in the application. The Smart Draw application also allows flexibility for one to print the document. The surface one can draw on is large and one can use to create large sizes of documents and when it comes to printing one can choose the print single page option only.

Most of this software can be found in on the internet with various prices. Most of them have trial versions which are offered for free. One can log in and search for them using a search engine and download them to your computer. However these are trial versions and one needs to purchase the correct version in order to get all the features that come with these applications. One can also look for the original version and each application when purchased has a unique code that unlocks it. This code is unique and cannot be used on another computer. One can also purchase the applications and buy them from the internet using wireless transfer and accounts such as pay pal. The application is downloaded and the unique code is sent to the user. The user then inputs it when installing it in order to make installation complete.

One can also purchase these applications from vendors. These are the people who sell computer software and other computer hardware and sometimes new computers. They are found everywhere in every city and their prices are standardized. In South Africa for example, the standard price for getting Corel Draw software would be as low as two hundred rand depending on where it is bought. These rates are dated far from eighth January 2012 and it can be found in any computer vendor. Smart Draw is also found in South Africa and the standardized price for the year 2013 is six hundred and sixty one rand. Lastly Microsoft office is also readily available with the latest pricing being as low as five hundred rand. These softwares are also installed when one buys a new device. It is part of the deal that comes with purchasing a new laptop or device.