Applications software

Applications software
General purpose
This is sometimes called generic software. This means, for example, that any one of the many different word processing packages that you can buy will all do the same general sorts of tasks.
Most of this software is bought 'off-the shelf'. Advantages include:
 Relatively cheap
 Readily available
 Quick and easy to install
 Well-supported
 Tried and tested
 Familiar to many users
The most common general purpose software includes:
Word processing
Spreadsheets
Databases
Graphics
Presentation
Internet browser/e-mail

Bespoke
Sometimes an organisation finds that general purpose software will not do exactly what they want. In this case they might decide to have special bespoke software designed and 'tailor-made' just for them.
This has the advantage that it should do exactly what the user requires.
The disadvantages are that it is expensive and can take a long time to develop.