The leading and most profitable of software companies are based in the US. As of 2008, the client software industry is primarily controlled by Microsoft. Software Magazine’s 500 list in 2005 shows the overall amount of earnings brought in by software companies per area, with the highest being California due to Silicon Valley and the amount of Fortune 500 software companies operating in that location.

A Little History About the Software Industry

The software industry began in the early 1960s when universities and businesses initially started to utilize computers and to seek out programs to do specific computing tasks. Many of these applications were created in-house by full-time employees. Some were circulated freely among users of a particular machine for no charge. But others were made on a commercial basis, and the very first standalone software firms started in the United States in 1959-1960.

The industry grew greatly with the progress of the personal computer in the mid-1970s, which produced a growing marketplace for games, applications, and utilities. And little by little the perception that software should be bought and paid for took hold. One of the original proponents of this idea was Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft.

In the early years of the 21st century, a new lucrative business type has arisen for hosted software, called software as a service, this was at least the third time this type had been attempted. SaaS reduces the concerns about software piracy, since it can only be accessed through the Internet, and by definition no client software is installed onto the end user’s computer.

Current Commercial Loan Software Providers:

The Trakker An affordable and comprehensive loan servicing software offering a wide range of features and able to handle numerous types of loans. Trakker is a user friendly Windows based program easily networked on such servers as: NT 4, 2000, and 2003, Novell, Unix, Terminal Server, peer to peer, and even Linux.

Nortridge System includes Loan Servicing, Customer Relationship Management, Origination, Configurable Automated Decisioning, Complete Document Control, Encompassing Collections, Funds Disbursement, Security, Reporting and much more.

LenderSuite LenderSuite targets the needs of enterprises that have any mortgage loans, lines of credit, commercial, auto and construction loans; land sales and developers, governmental agencies and virtually all others.

Margill Loan Manager Manage, globally anywhere from ten to thousands of regular, irregular, fixed rate or variable rate loans (auto loans, personal loans, corporate loans and notes), leases, mortgages, lines of credit and receivables.

MORSERV A PC/LAN/WAN based non-GUI application for the Mortgage loan Servicer. The system features Amortization Schedule preparation, Investor reporting, Tax and Insurance Due management reports and many other features that are required by interim or long-term mortgage loan servicing organizations.

Megasys Finance 3 Megasys Finance 3 System is an exceptionally easy to use total software solution for front-end credit evaluation, loan origination, payment processing, collections and more.

BrokerPro Software BrokerPro Software is the top selling commercial mortgage loan origination software in the U.S. Since 2001, BrokerPro has helped loan officers place commercial loans with some of the 100 wholesale commercial lenders who are on the Lender Pipeline.

The Mortgage Office A complete suite of mortgage software products designed from the ground up to specifically address the needs of those who originate and service loans and mortgage pools. Its modular design includes a complete loan servicing and loan origination system, mortgage pool software, trust accounting, default services tracking, escrow administration and more.

REAL Synergy A highly automated full-service platform specifically created for servicing commercial and multifamily loans. Users can work with virtually any loan structure including complex remittance requirements, monitor multiple properties for each loan, track building-site reports and view detailed appraisal summaries.

Commercial Servicer Software provides the most comprehensive and cost effective system for commercial loan servicing.

OnBase OnBase is a powerful document management and business process automation solution. Don’t fall behind on your work with slower, paper-intensive processes.

RealBenefits RealBenefits real estate software is for real estate investment analysis and valuation of income property and commercial real estate, plus loan software.

If you are a licensed real estate agent or broker, we encourage you to view our real estate software section for more great solutions to suit your personal and professional needs.

One such approach was the type19 mock radar trainer, built in 1943. From these first attempts in the WWII era through the mid 1970s, educational programs were directly tied to the hardware, ordinarily mainframe computers, on which they ran. Pioneering educational computer systems in this period included the PLATO system (1960), created at the University of Illinois, and TICCIT (1969).

In 1963, IBM had established a joint venture with Stanford University’s Institute for Mathematical Studies in the Social Sciences, directed by Patrick Suppes, to develop the earliest complete CAI elementary school curriculum which was implemented on a large scale in schools in both California and Mississippi.

Early terminals that ran learning systems cost more than $10,000, putting them out of reach of nearly all institutions. Some programming languages from this time, particularly BASIC (1963), and LOGO (1967) can additionally be considered educational, as they were specifically targeted to students and novice PC users.

Different Types of Educational Software

Children’s learning: A large number of titles, most likely running into the thousands, were created and released from the mid-1990’s onwards, aimed primarily at the home-based education of younger kids. Later iterations of these titles generally began to link educational material to school curricula.

The design of educational software applications for home use has been influenced strongly by computer gaming concepts. However, as far as feasible a distinction ought to be drawn between proper learning titles and software where the gaming outweighs the instructive value.

Reference software: Most publishers of print dictionaries and encyclopedias have been involved in the creation of instructive reference programs since the mid-1990s. They were united in the reference software marketplace by both start-up companies and established software publishers.

Educational computer games: These are games which were originally created for adults or older children and which have impending learning implications. For the most part, these games provide simulations of various types of human activities, allowing players to explore a variety of social, historical and economic processes.

The phrase open source software began as part of a marketing campaign for free applications. A report by the Standish Group states that use of open source software models has contributed in savings of roughly $60 billion per year to end users.

Some History Behind Open Source Software

The free software movement was started in 1983. In 1998, a collection of persons advocated that the label free software ought to be replaced by open source software as an example which is not as unclear and more comfortable for the corporate world. Software creators might wish to distribute their programs with an open source license, so that any person may also develop the same software or understand its inner functions.

Open source software normally permits a person to create modifications of the software, port it to additional operating systems and CPU architectures, share it with others or sell it.  All of which are not permitted in commercial software packages.

Open Source typically presents an open source viewpoint, and further defines the conditions of usage, modification and redistribution of open source software. Software licenses grant rights to any person which would otherwise be held in reserve by copyright law to the copyright holder. Several open source software licenses have qualified inside the boundaries of the Open Source Definition. The most prominent and prevalent instance is the GNU General Public License (GPL).

While open source distribution presents a way to appoint the source codes of a product publicly available, the open source licenses permit the authors to fine tune such access.

Open Source Licensing

A license defines the privileges and obligations that a licensor grants to a user. Open Source licenses permit licensees the right to emulate, adapt and redistribute source code. These licenses may possibly also impose obligations, or modifications to the code that are circulated have got to be made obtainable in source code form, an author attribution has to be placed in a software documentation using that Open Source, etc.

Authors originally derive a right to grant a license to their effort based on the legal theory that upon conception of a product the author owns the copyright in that product. The author still retains ownership of those copyrights, the licensee simply is permitted to utilize those rights, as granted in the license, so long as they uphold the obligations of the license. The author does have the option to sell/assign, versus license, their exclusive entitlement to the copyrights to their labor; where upon the new owner/assignee controls the copyrights.

Additional Information

Open Source development is commonly performed within the public eye, using services provided for free on the Internet, such as the Launchpad and SourceForge web sites, and utilizing tools that are themselves Open Source, mashing together the CVS and Subversion source control systems, and the GNU Compiler Collection.

Computer programs are commonly regarded in the role of anything but hardware, which means that the “hard” are the parts that are physical while the “soft” part is the intangible objects found inside of the computer itself. Software encompasses an exceptionally broad array of products and technologies created using various techniques like programming languages, scripting languages, microcode, or an FPGA configuration.

The types of applications include web pages created by technologies such as HTML, PHP, Perl, JSP, ASP.NET, XML, and desktop programs like OpenOffice, Microsoft Word created by technologies like C, C++, Java,or C#.  Software generally runs on an underlying software operating systems such as the Linux or Microsoft Windows.  Software also includes video games and the logic systems of forward-looking consumer products such as automobiles, televisions, even toasters.

Software can include such items as web pages, programs or video games, that are coded by a variety of different programming languages like C or C++.  The term “Software” is from time to time used in a much broader context to mean something which is not hardware but which is used with computer hardware, this may include film, tapes and in some cases even records.

Software’s Unique Relationship to Computer Hardware

Computer software is so called to distinguish it from PC hardware, which is a broad term designed to encompass the physical interconnections and devices necessary to warehouse and carry out the software. At the lowest level, software consists of a machine language restricted to an individual processor. A machine language consists of groups of binary values signifying CPU instructions that alter the state of the PC from its preceding state. Software is an ordered sequence of directives for changing the state of the computer hardware in a specific sequence. It is generally written in high-level programming languages that are easier and more efficient for people to use than machine language.

The phrase “software” was originally used in this sense by John W. Tukey in 1958. In computer science and software engineering, computer software is all computer programs. The theory that is the foundation for most current applications was initially planned by Alan Turing in his 1935 essay Computable figures with an application to the Entscheidungs problem.

Different kinds of Software

Applied computer systems divide software programs into 3 main classes: System software, programming software and application software, even though the distinction is arbitrary, and commonly blurred.

System software

System software helps run the PC hardware and computer system. It often includes a combination of the following:

• device drivers
• operating systems
• servers
• utilities
• windowing systems

The intention of systems software is to relieve the applications programmer from the details of the individual computer complex being used, together with such accessory products as communications, printers, readers, displays and keyboards, and additionally to partition the computer’s assets such as memory and processor time in a safe and balanced approach.

Programming software

Programming applications typically provides tools to help a programmer in creating computer programs, and applications using assorted programming languages in a more suitable way. The tools include:

• compilers
• debuggers
• interpreters
• linkers
• text editors

An Integrated development environment or (IDE) is a individual application that tries to handle all these functions.

Application software

Application software permits end users to complete 1 or more specialized tasks. Characteristic applications include:

• manufacturing automation
• small business software
• computer games
• quantum chemistry and solid state physics software
• telecommunications
• databases
• learning programs
• medical software
• military software
• commercial software
• molecular modeling software
• image editing
• spreadsheet
• word processing
• decision making software

The Quality and Reliability of Software

Software quality is extremely crucial, especially for commercial and system software like Microsoft Office, Microsoft Windows and Linux.  If software is faulty, it can delete a person’s work, crash the PC and do other unexpected items.

Faults and errors are often called “bugs.”  Many bugs are revealed and eliminated through software testing.  Although, software testing seldomly – if ever – gets rid of every bug.  In fact, a number of programmers say that “every program has at least one more bug”.

All key software companies, such as Microsoft, Novell and Sun Microsystems, control their own software testing departments with the particular goal of just testing.  Programs can be tested through unit testing, regression testing and other methods, which are completed manually, or most commonly, without human intervention, since the amount of code to be tested can be pretty substantial. For example, NASA has exceptionally rigorous software testing procedures for its Space Shuttle and other programs because faulty programs can crash the entire program and make the vehicle not functional, at significant expense.

Software Licenses

The software’s license gives the user the permission to use the program in the approved environment.  Some software comes with the license when purchased off the shelf, or an OEM license when bundled with hardware. Other software comes with a free software license, granting the user the rights to change and redistribute the software.  Software can also be in the form of freeware or shareware.

Software Design and Implementation

Design and implementation of software varies depending on the complexity of the software.  For example, design and construction of Microsoft Word software may take much longer time than designing and developing Microsoft Notepad because of the difference in functionalities in each one.

Software is usually designed and created in integrated development environments (IDE) like emacs, xemacs, Microsoft Visual Studio and Eclipse that can simplify the process and compile the software.  As noted in another section, software is ordinarily produced on top of existing software and the application programming interface (API) that the underlying software provides like GTK+, JavaBeans or Swing. Libraries (APIs) are categorized for various purposes.

For example, JavaBeans library is used for designing enterprise applications, Windows Forms library is used for designing graphical user interface (GUI) applications like Microsoft Word, and Windows Communication Foundation is used for designing web services.  Underlying PC programming concepts like quicksort, hashtable, array, and binary tree can be beneficial to creating software. When a program is designed, it relies on the API. For example, if a user is designing a Microsoft Windows desktop application, he/she might use the .NET Windows Forms library to design the desktop application and call its APIs like Form1.Close() and Form1.Show() to close or open the application and write the additional operations him/herself that it need to have.  Devoid of these APIs, the programmer would need to write these APIs him/herself.

Companies like Sun Microsystems, Novell, and Microsoft provide their own APIs so that many programs are written utilizing their application libraries that generally have numerous APIs in them.

Computer Software: Industry and Organizations

Software has its own niche industry that is called the software industry made up of numerous entities and peoples that generate software, and as a end result there are numerous software companies and programmers in the world.  Because software is increasingly used in numerous unique areas like in finance, searching, mathematics, space exploration, gaming and mining and such, software companies and people usually concentrate in certain areas.  For example, Electronic Arts primarily creates video games.

Several of the well recognized software companies include Microsoft, Oracle, Novell, Adobe and Corel.

Product manufacturers worldwide face a common problem, regardless of the types of products that they are manufacturing. That problem is that the customers want, or in some cases need, products to be available in a shorter time than it typically takes the manufacturer to make them. Of course, this requires an enormous amount of planning and problem solving for the manufacturers.

Should a company not purchase enough of any particular item used in their manufacturing process, or if they were to purchase the wrong item, that company may end up suffering from the inability to meet contracts to supply products by an agreed date or price. While some of you may be thinking this is a bit far fetched, the reality of the situation is that this is actually quite common in this industry. Every company has a duty to protect their assets if they intend to remain in business.

The Role of MRP Software in the Manufacturing Industry

MRP software plays several important roles in strategically ridding a company of the problem outlined above.  Though no system can ever be perfect as there will always be unexpected problems within such a detailed process. In any event, an MRP system, or software, is designed to meet three simultaneous objectives.  Those objectives are:

• To ensure there is always an adequate amount of materials and/or products available to complete the production process and allow for delivery to the client.
• The software aims to maintain the lowest possible level of inventory, minimizing waste and controlling the manufacturing budget.
• It also plans a number of key manufacturing activities along with keeping deliveries on schedule.

By consistently meeting the above objectives, a manufacturing company is able to keep production costs to a minimum, while maintaining enough inventory to supply their customers quickly and efficiently. Were a company to overlook these areas, they would likely suffer a dramatic loss in money and business. After all, supply and demand is the name of the game in the manufacturing world.

Common Problems with MRP Software

Not every software, or for that matter every implementation, can be perfect. In a number of cases it is quite the contrary. One major concern with any MRP solution is simply the integrity of the data used. Should there be any errors within the inventory data, bill of materials, or the master production schedule, all of your outputted data will most likely be incorrect as well. It is typically recommended that if you choose to use this type of system, you have a minimum ninety-nine percent data integrity which would allow the system to provide accurate results.

One other common problem that we find with MRP implementations is the requirement that the user specify how long the manufacturing process will take from beginning to end for any given product. Usually, the system will make an error in assuming that this “lead time”  will remain the same each and every time that particular item is made, without considering the quantity being produced, among other items being made simultaneously in the factory.

Items to Consider While Planning a New System

It is very common for a manufacturer to have more than one, or even a number of factories. Additionally, those factories may be in different cities or countries. Ideally, you would need to choose an MRP software that is designed to manage each factory independently of one another.

We have seen quite a few instances where the software calculated inventory levels across all factories to be sufficient based on an overstock in one factory. This would in turn allow one or more factories to run out of their inventory without notifying the ordering department.

Popular MRP Software Providers

While there are a number of excellent MRP solutions available today, the market is in no means saturated. There still remains a lot of room for improvement, though a number of companies have made great advancements in the technology of these products.  Below are some popular solutions currently being implemented in manufacturing companies throughout the world:

• MRP Plus by Horizon Software has been serving the manufacturing industry for over twenty years and has been said to be one of the best solutions on the market today. You can view their software online at www.MRPPlus.com
• DBA Manufacturing also offers an strong solution in the MRP market. One of the nice features in their solution is the strong integrated accounting functions. In addition, you can download a free version of their software to get a feel for the way it works. Their website is www.dbamanufacturing.com
• Epicor Manufacturing Solutions are also highly reputable within the industry. They offer a comprehensive software portfolio that allows you to monitor every aspect of your manufacturing business.  Visit them online at www.epicor.com

According to the ITIL(IT Infrastructure Library), “The goal of the Change Management process is to ensure that standardized methods and procedures are used for efficient and prompt handling of all changes, in order to minimize the impact of change-related incidents upon service quality, and consequently improve the day-to-day operations of the organization.”

The software itself was designed to manage the change process for various hardware, systems software and communications systems.  Most applications have the ability to manage these processes by managing and filtering changes, reviewing and closing requests for change and then when the process is complete, most software will handle the reporting of the process changes.

The leading providers of change management software:

• Change Management System by Elite Information Services – Elite really dedicated themselves to automation and smooth processing when they created their change management system with large organizations in mind.  We were given the opportunity to test drive their program with a free demo(see their site) and it was by far our favorite cms to date.  Elite has designed a truly unique, feature rich platform that we encourage you to check out on their website at www.elite-is.com

• IntaSoft’s Change and Configuration Management Software – IntaSoft currently offers three levels of change mgmt. software which includes a simple web based change management, a more powerful we based version geared for Enterprises and a full scale change and release management solution which is fully customizable, offers ITIL templates and much more.  Their software starts at $500 which does include full support from their team, you can visit them online at www.intasoft.net

• Change Management Control Software by SLAM Solutions Inc. – SLAM Solutions offers a wonderful, feature rich, cross-browser, web based change management control software that comes highly recommended by several of our colleagues in the software industry.  Their software is designed in XML, it allows for multiple workflows with the aid of their Workflow wizard, newly added fields are completely customizable and there are many more features.  Check out their website at www.slamsolutions.com

Other change management software that you may be interested in:

• http://www.landesk.com/change-management-software.aspx
• http://www.axiossystems.com/six/en/products/change_management/
• http://www.softlanding.com/turnover/index.htm
• http://www.frontrange.com/ProductsSolutions/Detail.aspx?id=45
• http://www.borland.com/us/solutions/change-management/index.html

A medical billing software is designed to manage the patient billing process in every aspect. These software implementations typically file and manage insurance claims, eliminate human error from claims and organize medical billing for your practice.

Some companies have developed their traditional medical billing software into a full scale office management suite allowing for appointment scheduling, patient data storage, storing medical records and even word processing, but not every health care practice is large enough to warrant the use of such an extensive, and often expensive, software.

One factor does remain the same, every medical professional has the undesirable task of processing patient claims through insurance companies on a regular basis. Medical billing software will allow you, the health care provider, to not only speed up but also semi-automate this task and cut down on the hours needed to manage patient billing.

Who Needs Medical Billing Software

Medical practices of every size use medical billing software on a daily basis to cut down time and costs associated with processing insurance claims and managing patient billing. Every health care practice should have some sort of billing management implementation in place. If your office is very small, you may consider foregoing the software and instead use a medical billing service that can handle these claims for you on a case by case basis.

Over time, medical billing services will cost your practice more money than buying a billing software from the beginning and managing these tasks yourself, however, if you are short staffed and have time constraints that prevent you from being able to manage your billing in a timely manner, medical billing software may not be for you. Try analyzing the costs associated with purchasing and running a software or going with a billing service to find the best fit for your office.

The Features of Medical Billing Software

Medical billing software is often all over the board in terms of usability and functionality. You will find that some programs have every feature imaginable while others do little more than process and submit claims to insurance companies. While the full featured software implementations are invaluable to hospitals and large medical centers, the majority of smaller medical practices just won’t find a need for so many bells and whistles.

When choosing a medical billing software for your practice, you should determine which aspects you need help with and then go from there. Try to find a program that not only meets every need that your medical practice has, but also exceeds the expectations ever so slightly. Some of the features that can typically be found in the best medical billing software include:

• Patient Information Management
• Electronic Claim Filing
• Paper Claim Filing
• Financial Ledger/Records
• Word Processing
• System Reports
• Claim Status
• Appointment Scheduling

This is by no means an exhaustive list of features but should some up the primary focuses of many individual software. You should notice by the list that some of the features may just not be beneficial to your business, for instance, small medical practices often use a program such as QuickBooks to organize and manage business finances, rendering an additional financial program useless. Choose your software wisely.

Free Medical Billing Software

It may seem almost to good to be true but there are some free options in medical billing software field. Below are the top choices that will get your medical practice on track without costing you a cent.

Office Manager – Encompassing office management health care software for medical practices, doctors groups, DMEs, retailers, etc. It does User/patient management, point of sale, scheduling, sign-in, inventory, insurance claims, accounting, etc. Works with any operating system!

ClearHealth PM/EMR – ClearHealth is a next generation practice management and EMR. It takes DNA from the FreeMED, OpenEMR projects. The software supports Demographics, Scheduling, Full Medical Billing, Disease Management, Decision Support, ePrescribing, HL7, and Web Services.

MirrorMed – MirrorMed is a free and open source EHR and practice management system written in PHP, it is a web-based application that is capable of running a health care practice. MirrorMed shares code with FreeMED, and OpenEMR.

Paid Medical Billing Software

Open Dental – Open source dental software designed to manage most aspects of a dental practice. Some features include billing, appointment scheduling, imaging and 3D dental charting.

Medisoft – Medisoft Medical Billing Software, Medical Records Software, Medinotes EMR, Electronic Health Records Software, Medical Biller, Billing Medical Practices.

MedicsElite – Full featured medical billing and practice management software with additional scalability through additional modules and enhancements.

EZ claim – Medical billing software designed primarily for small physician practices that allows for both paper and electronic claim billing. Company offers a thirty day free trial of the software.

Medisoft Software – Medisoft Software Lytec EMR EHR Electronic Medical Records Medical Billing Upgrade Support.

Advanced MD – Advanced MD offers several types of software to aid medical practices of varying sizes and scales. On their website you can find medical billing software, medical claims software, practice management software, scheduling software and medical record software.

MPM Soft – Medical billing software for the Windows platform. This software will help you to manage claims, eliminate claim errors, organize medical billing and staff, correct non-compliant coding issues and more.

NueMD – A complete electronic medical billing software solution that is easy-to-use and will help you better serve your clients by shortening their reimbursement cycles, increasing efficiencies within their practices, and providing them with detailed reports on revenue trends, collection aging, and payment status.

More Information on Medical Billing Software

If you are in need of assistance or curious to learn more about what is medical billing software and how it can help your medical practice, please feel free to contact us. We are regularly adding medical and patient billing software to this page, so please check back often. Visitors often ask us which software we recommend the most, and our response is usually to look into Medisoft Medial Billing Software as it has helped many medical practices and remains the leader in the billing industry.

The use of voice recognition software didn’t stop at personal computers but rather, has been put into use by commercial industries and placed into items that some of us, use everyday. When you pickup your cellphone and tell it to call mom, speak commands into your Nintendo DS or speak through the hands free setup in your car you are able to do that because of the advancements made in the voice recognition software industry.

How Well Does Voice Recognition Software Work

Unfortunately, voice recognition software has received a bad reputation for being flawed with glitches and errors. Many users report the inability for these types of software to comprehend normal speaking voices, calculate the proper spelling and in some cases even keep pace with the operator, though tremendous advancements are being made to correct these issues.

Developers make claims that these types of software are around ninety-eight percent accurate when used under the proper conditions, those being:

• working in a quiet environment with low levels of background noise.
• operator speaks clearly and precisely.
• operator does not have a heavy accent or speech impediment.

The problem with these claims are that very few people are able to maintain this level of “perfection” while working with the programs. Uncommon words, such as names or slang are often misunderstood or misspelled by the software possibly leaving numerous errors in the finished document.

Don’t let this stop you from using this software though, there are some voice recognition programs that work quite well as you will see later in this article.

Finding a Voice Recognition Software That Works

As a writer or disabled person, your greatest asset could be a properly functioning voice recognition program, although finding one on your own may be difficult. There are very few noteworthy software of this type on the market today, however there is a light at the end of the tunnel.

One such light is Dragon Naturally Speaking by Nuance. Naturally Speaking has quickly become the worlds best selling voice recognition software and for good reason, the program works exceptionally well. With around a one hundred dollar price tag for the standard edition, this program allows your speech to appear in documents, emails, instant messages and you can even use it to surf the Internet, plus it is amazingly accurate.

Another surprisingly well working voice recognition software is built right into Windows Vista Operating System. That’s right, Vista comes with a built-in speech recognition program right out of the box and it works very good. You can use the program to help you use your computer by asking questions, it adapts to your speaking style and vocabulary, it is available in multiple languages and you can control applications and manage documents all by voice.

So which program do you choose? Well if you already have Vista you might give their voice recognition program a try since it is free, however Dragon Naturally Speaking is the best on the market and well worth the small investment.

Using Voice Recognition Software

If you noticed above we covered some of the functions commonly found in voice recognition software, its also important to note that two programs recommended really do not require any special training to operate and they learn your speaking style so they become even better the more you use them. However, here is a list of functions you can expect to see in most voice recognition applications:

• Convert speech to text in most writing applications such as Word and Office.
• Format and save documents as well as manage and control other applications on your computer.
• Surf the web with voice commands.
• Dictate emails and instant messages.
• Clarification of words when the program misunderstands what is said.
• Adaption to your speaking style and vocabulary.
• Text editing and corrections.

All of these features can be used by simply speaking commands into the microphone or headset, freeing your hands and saving you time for other projects.

Although data encryption has been around for quite a long period of time, it is still developing by leaps and bounds, thanks, in part, to the rapidly increasing amounts of data being shared and transferred across the Internet. Developers of data encryption software are constantly working to set higher security standards while keeping programs easy enough for the average person to operate, which as you may have guessed, can be a difficult undertaking.

What Does Data Encryption Software Do

Data encryption software transforms plain text into secure unreadable text by using a mathematical algorithm called a cipher. Generally, the party receiving the now ciphered information would need a key or password of some sort in order to decipher the text and again have the ability to read it. The purpose of all this is to protect the confidentiality of information stored on, or being shared from, your computer.

Different software implement varying degrees of security, and choosing the right one depends on the level of security risk the information being read would pose on you. Large corporations often use strong ciphers to protect data being transmitted to and from the office, however, for personal use most people would not require this degree of security. For those types of people a very basic encryption software will usually work just fine.

Data Encryption Software

AutoKrypt – Data encryption software designed for automation. Automatically encrypt or decrypt, files and folders on a schedule. Encryption methods include password based, secret key, public key and private key, OpenPGP password, Open PGP public and private key.

Cypherix – Cypherix products allow you to secure single and multiple files, folders and emails, quickly and easily, requiring relatively few computing resources and little time.

Entrust – A PC-based file encryption and media protection application that provides strong user authentication and data encryption. It is used to automatically perform encryption on data saved to specified folder(s) or removable media.

AquaCrypt – This program allows you to encrypt any file on your computer, including graphics images, any type of document (.txt, .doc, .ppt, .html, to name a few), or even executable programs. Uses a built-in powerful Blowfish encryption, written by Bruce Schneier and considered to be one of the strongest encryption algorithms worldwide, used in over 130 commercial applications.

NetLib – Has a database encryption software called Encryptionizer that is installed in banks, credit card processors, online merchants, hospitals, and government agencies worldwide.

Cryptosystem ME6 – A program for the encryption and decryption of single or multiple files for secure storage or transmission. It uses a symmetric key encryption method with a 500-bit key for security, and has numerous safeguards against user error.

File Encryption XP – Encrypt files of any type, including Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents. It protects information against being viewed or modified without your authorization.

Protexx – Ensures your privacy when using Wi-Fi hotspots, Wireless, Cable, and Network connections by keeping your personal information safe and anonymous from hackers. Up to 2048bit encryption, also have enterprise and government level encryption software.

SafeGuard Easy – Renders data completely undecipherable to unauthorized users as it encrypts and decrypts your hard drive’s data seamlessly, providing data at rest security for your laptop or desktop.

Cryptic Disk – The program uses the AES 256-bit encryption algorithm, the same type of encryption that NASA, the FBI and the Department of Defense use to protect their data.

CE Secure – An easy to use data encryption program that offers the maximum protection provided by AES256 bit encryption algorithms.

Free Data Encryption Software

TrueCrypt – TrueCrypt is a free open-source disk encryption software for the Windows, Mac and Linux platforms. Some features include automatic encryption, encrypt an entire partition or drive, created a virtual encrypted disk and more.

Encrypter 1.0.0 – Encrypter is a small application that encrypts files using a strong RC4 algorithm, written by David Midkiff. Just enter the file, password, and select encrypt or decrypt.

Other Resources

Web Hosting – Lunarpages offers a wide-range of services from Linux Virtual Private Servers and managed solutions to shared and reseller hosting plans. Visit online for quality web hosting from our US-based hosting facility.