- "Username" redirects here. For the same term in Wikipedia, see Wikipedia:Username
Users in a computing context refers to one who uses a computer system. Computing is usually defined like the activity of using and developing Computer technology Computer hardware and software. Users may need to identify themselves for the purposes of accounting, security, logging and resource management. In order to identify oneself, a user has an account (a user account) and a username, and in most cases also a password (see below). In computing a password is a Word or string of characters that is entered often along with a user name, in modern times usually into a computer system Users employ the user interface to access systems. The user interface (or Human Computer Interface) is the aggregate of means by which people&mdash the users '&mdash interact with the System
Users are also widely characterized as the class of people that uses a system without complete technical expertise required to fully understand the system. In most hacker-related contexts, they are also divided into lusers and power users. A power user is a User of a Personal computer who can use advanced features of programs which are outside the expertise of "normal" users yet is not capable See also End-user (computer science). The end-user is a p concept in Software engineering, referring to an Abstraction of the group of persons who will ultimately operate a piece of software
Screen names (also called a handle, nickname, or nick on some systems) refer to a public name that can be used to 'screen' ones true user name from the public eye. Services such as AOL allowed customers to have multiple screen names per user name, and IRC nicks are independent of one's system account username.
For instance, one can be a user of (and have an account on) a computer system, a computer network and have an e-mail account, an IM account and use one or more nicks on IRC. A computer is a Machine that manipulates data according to a list of instructions. A computer network is a group of interconnected Computers. Networks may be classified according to a wide variety of characteristics Electronic mail, often abbreviated to e-mail, email, or originally eMail, is a Store-and-forward method of writing sending receiving
Semantics
A user account allows one to authenticate to system services. Authentication (from Greek αυθεντικός real or genuine from authentes author is the act of establishing or confirming something (or someone as It also generally provides one with the opportunity to be authorized to access them. However, authentication does not automatically imply authorization. Once the user has logged on, the operating system will often use an identifier such as an integer to refer to them, rather than their username. On Unix systems this is called the user identifier or user id. Unix (officially trademarked as UNIX, sometimes also written as Unix with Small caps) is a computer On Unix-like systems users are represented by a user identifier, often abbreviated UID or User ID.
Computer systems are divided into two groups based on what kind of users they have:
- single-user systems do not have a concept of several user accounts
- multi-user systems have such a concept, and require users to identify themselves before using the system. Multi-user is a term that defines an Operating system or Application software that allows concurrent access by multiple users of a Computer.
See also
References
This article was originally based on material from the Free On-line Dictionary of Computing, which is licensed under the GFDL. A nickname is a Name of an entity or thing that is not its Proper name. In computing a password is a Word or string of characters that is entered often along with a user name, in modern times usually into a computer system The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing ( FOLDOC) is an online searchable encyclopedic Dictionary of Computing subjects The GNU Free Documentation License ( GNU FDL or simply GFDL) is a Copyleft License for free documentation designed by the Free Software