The following are the various types of computing environments.
- Personal computing is a stand-alone machine. In a personal computing environment, the complete program resides on the stand-alone machine and executed from the same machine. Laptops, mobile devices, printers, scanners and the computer systems we use at home, office are the examples for the personal computing environment.
- Time-Sharing Computing Environment: The time-sharing computing environment is a stand-alone computer in which a single user can perform multiple operations at a time by using a multitasking operating system. Here the processor time is divided among different tasks and this is called “Time-sharing”. For example, a user can listen to music while writing something in a text editor. Windows 95 and later versions of Windows OS, iOS and Linux operating systems are the examples for this computing environment.
- Client-Server Computing Environment: The client-server environment contains two machines (Client machine and Server machine). These both machines will exchange the information through an application. Here Client is a normal computer like PC, Tablet, Mobile, etc., and Server is a powerful computer which stores huge data and manages the huge amount of file and emails, etc., In this environment, client requests for data and server provides data to the client. In the client-server environment, the communication between client and server is performed using HTTP (Hyper Text Transfer Protocol).
- Distributed Computing Environment: In the distributed computing environment, the complete functionality of the software is not on a single computer but is distributed among multiple computers. Here we use a method of computer processing in which different programs of an application run simultaneously on two or more computers. These computers communicate with each other over a network to perform the complete task. In a distributed computing environment, the data is distributed among different systems and that data is logically related to each other.
- Grid Computing Environment: Grid computing is a collection of computers from different locations. All these computers work for a common problem. A grid can be described as a distributed collection of a large number of computers working for a single application.
- Cluster Computing Environment: Cluster computing is a collection of interconnected computers. These computers work together to solve a single problem. In a cluster computing environment, a collection of systems work together as a single system.
