Cygwin is a POSIX-compatible environment that runs natively on Microsoft Windows. Its goal is to allow programs of Unix-like systems to be recompiled and run natively on Windows with minimal source code modifications by providing them with the same underlying POSIX API they would expect in those systems.
Microsoft DirectX is a collection of application programming interfaces (APIs) for handling tasks related to multimedia, especially game programming and video, on Microsoft platforms. Originally, the names of these APIs all began with Direct, such as Direct3D, DirectDraw, DirectMusic, DirectPlay, DirectSound, and so forth. The name DirectX was coined as a shorthand term for all of these APIs and soon became the name of the collection. When Microsoft later set out to develop a gaming console, the X was used as the basis of the name Xbox to indicate that the console was based on DirectX technology. The X initial has been carried forward in the naming of APIs designed for the Xbox such as XInput and the Cross-platform Audio Creation Tool (XACT), while the DirectX pattern has been continued for Windows APIs such as Direct2D and DirectWrite.
Microsoft Windows was announced by Bill Gates on November 10, 1983. Microsoft introduced Windows as a graphical user interface for MS-DOS, which had been introduced a couple of years earlier. In the 1990s, the product line evolved from an operating environment into a fully complete, modern operating system over two lines of development, each with their own separate codebase.
Microsoft Windows is a group of several graphical operating system families, all of which are developed, marketed, and sold by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. Active Windows families include Windows NT and Windows Embedded; these may encompass subfamilies, e.g. Windows Embedded Compact or Windows Server. Defunct Windows families include Windows 9x, Windows Mobile and Windows Phone.
An operating system (OS) is system software that manages computer hardware and software resources and provides common services for computer programs.
Windows XP is a personal computer operating system produced by Microsoft as part of the Windows NT family of operating systems. It was released to manufacturing on August 24, 2001, and broadly released for retail sale on October 25, 2001.
Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of operating systems. The first operating system in the 9x family, it is the successor to Windows 3.1x, and was released to manufacturing on August 15, 1995, and generally to retail on August 24, 1995. Windows 95 merged Microsoft's formerly separate MS-DOS and Windows products, and featured significant improvements over its predecessor, most notably in the graphical user interface (GUI) and in its simplified "plug-and-play" features. There were also major changes made to the core components of the operating system, such as moving from a mainly co-operatively multitasked 16-bit architecture to a 32-bit preemptive multitasking architecture.
In computing, cross-platform software is computer software that is implemented on multiple computing platforms. Cross-platform software may be divided into two types; one requires individual building or compilation for each platform that it supports, and the other one can be directly run on any platform without special preparation, e.g., software written in an interpreted language or pre-compiled portable bytecode for which the interpreters or run-time packages are common or standard components of all platforms.
A computing platform or digital platform is the environment in which a piece of software is executed. It may be the hardware or the operating system (OS), even a web browser and associated application programming interfaces, or other underlying software, as long as the program code is executed with it. Computing platforms have different abstraction levels, including a computer architecture, an OS, or runtime libraries. A computing platform is the stage on which computer programs can run.
x86-64 is the 64-bit version of the x86 instruction set. It introduces two new modes of operation, 64-bit mode and compatibility mode, along with a new 4-level paging mode. With 64-bit mode and the new paging mode, it supports vastly larger amounts of virtual memory and physical memory than is possible on its 32-bit predecessors, allowing programs to store larger amounts of data in memory. x86-64 also expands general-purpose registers to 64-bit, as well extends the number of them from 8 to 16, and provides numerous other enhancements. Floating point operations are supported via mandatory SSE2-like instructions, and x87/MMX style registers are generally not used ; instead, a set of 32 vector registers, 128 bits each, is used. In 64-bit mode, instructions are modified to support 64-bit operands and 64-bit addressing mode. The compatibility mode allows 16- and 32-bit user applications to run unmodified coexisting with 64-bit applications if the 64-bit operating system supports them. As the full x86 16-bit and 32-bit instruction sets remain implemented in hardware without any intervening emulation, these older executables can run with little or no performance penalty, while newer or modified applications can take advantage of new features of the processor design to achieve performance improvements. Also, a processor supporting x86-64 still powers on in real mode for full backward compatibility.
Windows 9x is a generic term referring to a series of Microsoft Windows computer operating systems produced from 1995 to 2000, which were based on the Windows 95 kernel and its underlying foundation of MS-DOS, both of which were updated in subsequent versions. This includes all versions of Windows 95 and Windows 98. Windows ME is sometimes included.
Task Scheduler is a component of Microsoft Windows that provides the ability to schedule the launch of programs or scripts at pre-defined times or after specified time intervals: job scheduling. It was first introduced in the Microsoft Plus! for Windows 95 as System Agent but was renamed to Task Scheduler in Internet Explorer 4.0 and Windows 98. The Windows Event Log service must be running before the Task Scheduler starts up.
A mobile operating system is an operating system for phones, tablets, smartwatches, or other mobile devices. While computers such as typical laptops are 'mobile', the operating systems usually used on them are not considered mobile ones, as they were originally designed for desktop computers that historically did not have or need specific mobile features. This distinction is becoming blurred in some newer operating systems that are hybrids made for both uses.
A stop error, better known as a Blue Screen of Death, is an error screen displayed on a Windows computer system after a fatal system error, also known as a system crash: when the operating system reaches a condition where it can no longer operate safely.
Windows NT is a family of operating systems produced by Microsoft, the first version of which was released on July 27, 1993. It is a processor-independent, multiprocessing and multi-user operating system.
MS-DOS is an operating system for x86-based personal computers mostly developed by Microsoft. Collectively, MS-DOS, its rebranding as IBM PC DOS, and some operating systems attempting to be compatible with MS-DOS, are sometimes referred to as "DOS". MS-DOS was the main operating system for IBM PC compatible personal computers during the 1980s and the early 1990s, when it was gradually superseded by operating systems offering a graphical user interface (GUI), in various generations of the graphical Microsoft Windows operating system.
DOS is a family of disk operating systems, hence the name. DOS primarily consists of MS-DOS and a rebranded version under the name IBM PC DOS, both of which were introduced in 1981. Other later compatible systems from other manufacturers include DR-DOS (1988), ROM-DOS (1989), PTS-DOS (1993), and FreeDOS (1998). MS-DOS dominated the x86-based IBM PC compatible market between 1981 and 1995.
A Unix-like operating system is one that behaves in a manner similar to a Unix system, while not necessarily conforming to or being certified to any version of the Single UNIX Specification. A Unix-like application is one that behaves like the corresponding Unix command or shell. There is no standard for defining the term, and some difference of opinion is possible as to the degree to which a given operating system or application is "Unix-like".
In computing on Microsoft platforms, SysWoW64 is a subsystem of the Windows operating system capable of running 32-bit applications that is included in all 64-bit versions of Windows—including Windows XP Professional x64 Edition, IA-64 and x64 versions of Windows Server 2003, as well as 64-bit versions of Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Server 2012, Windows 8.1 and Windows 10. In Windows Server 2008 R2 Server Core, it is an optional component, but not in Nano Server. SysWoW64 aims to take care of many of the differences between 32-bit Windows and 64-bit Windows, particularly involving structural changes to Windows itself.
