Hardware and Software: How Can We Establish Concurrency between the Two?
Abstract
The function of hardware is fixed, while that of software is evolving throughout its life cycle. Today, even in the case of hardware, most of their functions are realized with software and hardware technology is used to fill the gap between the non-physical world of software and the real physical world around us. So it is no exaggeration to say all products are combinations of hardware and software. Even in the case of software, we must remember it works on the hardware. Hardware is something like an individual living. Once they are created, they start to degrade. In fact, maintenance is a very important task for hardware. But in the case of hardware, the function is fixed so that it is relatively easy because the objective of maintenance is to restore the degraded quality to its original designed level. But software is something like a species. Each software, once born, grows in a different way to adapt to the situation. And many new portions are added on. Therefore, decommissioning becomes very difficult for software. If we realize that most of our products are combinations of hardware and software, we should pay attention to how we should reconcile them and work them together effectively and how we can decommission the system which is composed of both wares, i.e., hardware and software. This paper discusses this issue and describes the potential solution. .