Utility Software
Utility Software is a group of system software that perform specialist jobs. Operating Systems have some Utilities built in but others are third party software (made by someone else). Common Utilities include:
- Protection - Anti-virus, Anti-malware, (AVG, AVAST, Norton ) Firewalls (Windows Defender, Zone Alarm)
- Encryption (and decryption) - scrambling data into a form that can not be read with out the key. Bit Locker is an example of this
- Compression - reduces the file size of documents so they take up less space (Win Zip, 7 Zip, Win RaR)
- Defragmentation - analyses how and where data is stored on a disk and rearranges it to make it more logical and efficient (watch the video - you need to know this for GCSE)
- Disk Checker - pretty much does what it says - checks the disk for errors
- Back Up software - again, does what it says - backs up data , can be all the data or just what has changed since the last back up (an incremental back up)
