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Specialist Applications

A large number of applications have been developed which cater for the needs of various specialised professionals. Examples include musicians, architects, lawyers, designers and managers amongst others. Such applications are typically highly focused on a narrow range of tasks related to a particular type of work. As such they have very limited use outside a particular profession and so do not benefit from the wider markets available to less specialised software. This type of application is therefore unlikely to be developed by large software companies. In some cases it will have been written by someone working in the area concerned - initially perhaps for their own use. Once perfected it might then be marketed to colleagues in the profession.

On a larger scale specialised software may have been developed within a company or produced by an external software house to a specification provided by the intended users. Such software is often marketed in order to recoup the initial development costs. If successful it could well provide a good profit since in a specialised market high prices can be asked and often there is little or no competition.

It is a characteristic of specialised software that the user will need a background in the particular subject area in order to make effective use of the package. When selecting specialist software the user is likely to apply criteria relating to functionality and accuracy above others. In addition the specialist is likely to have been trained to work in a particular way so the HCI will be important. This is demonstrated by the development of graphics tablets for CAD and by the use of a piano type keyboard as input for music systems. In most cases the specialist software will be used for trying out ideas or experimenting with possible solutions to problems so the software will need to allow undoing, deleting and backtracking as part of its editing functions.

Often specialist software is 'one off' and it can conflict with the overall corporate IT strategy. In this situation a large organisation will often commission the software with a requirement that it integrates with any existing MIS.

Project Management Software	The management of a large-scale project will involve organising the allocation of human and other resources to tasks and deciding the order in which tasks are to be accomplished. The problem is made complex because certain tasks will need to be completed before others can be started. In a complex project however the will be a number of different sequences available and a number of tasks will continue in parallel. The management is made more difficult in that some tasks will need particular team members with a clearly defined spread of skills while other tasks could be performed by anyone. Project management software helps the manager assign resources to tasks and to sequence the tasks in the most efficient way, identifying and avoiding potential bottlenecks. It will also help the project manager identify the current status of the project and to monitor its progress.
Geographical Information Systems	A GIS provides information related to geographical position. For example it would provide a delivery service with shortest path delivery routes to reduce fuel costs. It might seem a simple problem to identify the most efficient route to take to visit a number of sites but in fact the problem becomes complex remarkably quickly as the number of points increases. This software can also help managers make decisions about siting distribution centres, methods of distribution and locally based advertising and promotional campaigns.
CAD/CAM systems	These systems are well known. They involve high quality monitors with an input device such as a graphics tablet to allow a graphic designer to work in a familiar environment. They encourage experimentation since errors can be undone and they speed up the process of graphic design. In CAM (Computer Aided Manufacturing) systems the design can be passed directly to a loom, knitting machine, lathe etc. to realise the design thus cutting down the time between design and production and eliminating one possible source of error.
Mathematical and Statistical	Much statistical work involves a large amount of 'number crunching' which is best performed by a computer system. Information is often provided in graphical form and the use of the computer to present the information in this format speeds up the work of the statistician leaving him or her free to interpret the results.
Music	One leading area of specialist software development in music is the processing of musical notation. Writing music by hand is a slow and error prone process. A composer would need to write a score containing all the parts for the different instruments. The music for each individual instrument would then be copied out. Specialist software would allow the composer to play each part on a keyboard attached to the computer. The music would appear on the screen where it could be edited using a GUI. When the composer was satisfied then score and parts could be printed. The system has the advantage that the computer can produce a synthesised sound output so that the composer can hear the final result and make any necessary changes.