The Magazine Show on Talk Radio Europe,
Mijas TV340 & Mijas Radio 107.7
The following is the content of T.R.E. on the 2nd May,
Mijas TV340 on the 26th April & Mijas Radio 107.7 on the 28th April.
"Apps, Plugins & Portable Apps "
Application software, also known as an application or an "app", is computer software designed to help the user to perform singular or multiple related specific tasks. Examples include Microsoft software , (word, excel) photo editing programs, browsers, etc. etc.
We have been calling them programs on our computer but now that smaller programs have become so popular for the smart phone the name has been shortened to apps.
The term app has become a popular buzzword; in January 2011, app was awarded the honour of being 2010's "Word of the Year" by the American Dialect Society.
In computing, a plug-in (or plugin) is a set of software components that adds specific abilities to a larger software application.
If supported, plug-ins enables customizing the functionality of an application. For example, plug-ins are commonly used in web browsers to play video, scan for viruses, and display new file types.
Well-known plug-ins examples include Adobe Flash Player and QuickTime.
Add-on is often considered the general term comprising snap-ins, plug-ins, extensions, and themes.[
Applications support plug-ins for many reasons. Some of the main reasons include:
Web browsers use plug-ins (often implementing the NPAPI specification) to play video and presentation formats (Flash, QuickTime, Microsoft Silverlight, 3DMLW)
Plug-ins and extensions both increase the utility of the original application,
A portable application is a computer software program designed to run independently from any operating system.
This type of application is stored on a removable storage device such as cd or USB flash drive – storing program files, configuration information and data on the storage medium alone.
These are the normal standalone programs that you have always been able to buy for your computer.
Some of these programs can come with their own build-in Plugins, like:
These are designed to run under smartphone operating systems like Apple, Android or Windows Mobile etc., they are specially designed to take the minimum of memory space and to work with the reduced size screen.
These Apps are normally available free or purchased from an App Store. Apple has made an application for the trade mark “App Store” so, if approved; it cannot be used by anyone else. Apple are noted for having more apps for their i phone. 350,000
The Apple App Store is preinstalled on Apple's iOS (carried on the iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad and Mac), which allows users to browse and download applications from the iTunes Store that were developed with the iOS SDK or Mac SDK and published through Apple. Depending on the application, they are available either for free or at a cost. The applications can be downloaded directly to a target device, or downloaded onto a PC or Mac via iTunes. 30% of revenue from the store goes to Apple, and 70% go to the producer of the app.
Android calls their store “Marketplace”, applications are either free or carry a small cost. Amazon are trying toi become a major sourse of Android applications but the Android operating system is owned by Google.
Amazon still use the term “App Store” until the Apply trade mark application is accepted.
Google also have “Google Apps”
A Small Sample of the Basic smartphone/tablet apps:
These have to reside within a “Host” program; the most common is your web browser or email client. You can select “Plugins” from your browser tool bar, here you can search and install plugins. Others are downloaded like programs but instead of being stored in your “Downloads” folder they are installed directly into the host program.
Typical Plugins are:
These are complete programs that you would normally install on your computer but instead can be run from a USB drive.
They are smaller than their original version and require no installation. It means that you can take both your programs and data and run them on any computer, Office, internet café etc., without needing the program on the main computer.
To run these programs from a USB drive you first need a Portable Application Shell program to provide the menu when you plug in the drive. This shell can be obtained from www.portableapps.com .
The website www.portableapps.com/apps lists over 180 different portable applications (Normally versions of programs you are already familiar with). These are Open Source and are free.
From this web site you can download straight into you Portable Application Shell on your USB drive.
Portable Applications are available for the following categories: