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A
computer software application that carries
out some task on behalf of users. This is
usually divided into file serving, allowing
users to store and access files on a common
computer; and application serving, where
the software runs a computer program to
carry out some task for the users. This
is the original meaning of the term. Web,
mail, and database servers are what most
people access when using the Internet.
The term
is now also used to mean the physical computer
on which the software runs. Originally server
software would be located on a mainframe
computer or minicomputer. These have largely
been replaced by computers built using a
more robust version of the microprocessor
technology than is used in personal computers,
and the term "server" was adopted
to describe microprocessor-based machines
designed for this purpose. In a general
sense, server machines have high-capacity
(and sometimes redundant) power supplies,
a motherboard built for durability in 24x7
operations, large quantities of ECC RAM,
and fast I/O subsystem employing technologies
such as SCSI, RAID, and PCI-X or PCI Express. |
