Editing Operating system (section)

==Diversity of operating systems and portability==
If an application is written for use on a specific operating system, and is [[ported]] to another OS, the functionality required by that application may be implemented differently by that OS (the names of functions, meaning of arguments, etc.) requiring the application to be adapted, changed, or otherwise [[software maintenance|maintained]].<!--There really ought to be a discussion of ''software modules'' somewhere, such as those that are neither API's nor Plug-Ins (not sure what those are), but which are either hard (on cartridge), soft (on diskette), or otherwise installable by downloading). -->

This cost in supporting operating systems diversity can be avoided by instead writing applications against [[software platform]]s such as [[Java (software platform)|Java]] or [[Qt (software)|Qt]]. These abstractions have already borne the cost of adaptation to specific operating systems and their [[system library|system libraries]].

Another approach is for operating system vendors to adopt standards. For example, [[POSIX]] and [[operating system abstraction layer|OS abstraction layers]] provide commonalities that reduce porting costs.