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Subject:Re: The word system From:"Michael West" <mbwest -at- bigpond -dot- net -dot- au> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Tue, 21 Aug 2001 21:39:34 +1000
Annika wrote
> I have never heard that it is
> somehow defined somewhere how big a system should be
> so that you could call it a system...
>
> I'd really like to hear your opinions about this.
It's relative.
Don't you hate that?
I'm trying to imagine how this issue might have arisen
between you and your colleague. Perhaps you are working
on documentation for a 'system' of some sort. I often find
that I have to think carefully about how I use the term
'the system' or 'the <productname> system' in the user
documentation. We might think we're writing about our
product as a 'system' when in fact our user thinks of it
as one of many applications that runs on a 'system.' That
user might be confused by our use of the term 'system.'
According to the dictionary definition, Microsoft Word could
be described as a word-processing system, but most users
would say "no, it's just an application."
It's usually better to refer to a software product as an
application -- even though it might meet the technical
requirements for being a 'system' -- just to avoid confusion.
Most tekkies think of 'system' as the larger entity that
contains all the smaller entities -- subsystems, components,
applications, modules, etc.
The word 'system' tends to refer to the container rather
than the component -- even if the component is also
a 'system.'
I no longer know whether I'm making sense, so I'll leave it
there. Perhaps you could tell us how the question arose,
and then all the fine technical writers and editors who read this
list could offer some practical advice. It's hard to do that
in a vacuum.
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