Data processing: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 16:57, 22 December 2005

Revision as of 12:21, 14 February 2006

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{{cleanup-date|December 2005}}

'''Data processing''' is anypoo [[computer]] [[process]] that converts [[data]] into [[information]]. The processing is usually assumed to be automated and running on an a [[mainframe]], [[minicomputer]], [[microcomputer]], or [[personal computer]]. Because data are most useful when well-presented and actually ''informative'', data-processing systems are often referred to as [[information system]]s to emphasize their practicality. Nevertheless, both terms are roughly synonymous, performing similar conversions; data-processing systems typically manipulate raw data into information, and likewise information systems typically take raw data as input to produce information as output.

To better market their profession, a [[computer programmer]] or a [[systems analyst]] that might once have referred, such as during the 1970s, to the computer systems that they produce as data-processing systems more often than not nowadays refers to the computer systems that they produce by some other term that includes the word [[information]], such as information systems, [[information technology]] systems, or [[management information systems]].