Just like you can’t ride a bike if the pedals don’t work, software cannot function without hardware. Both hardware and software are necessary for any device to run properly and efficiently. Think of it this way; the bike is the hardware and your body is the software. Without your body, the bike is just a piece of metal and rubber that cannot act on its own. For the bike to travel to your desired destination, your body must direct. For a computer, laptop, tablet, phone, or even your tv to work, software must be programmed with code, written instructions to the hardware so that it can perform specific tasks.

Here is an example of a simple code HTML code.

<h1>HTML</h1>
<p><b>This is a simple html code.<b/><p/>
What you most likely took from this code is the part you’re already familiar with; the sentence “This is simple HTML code.” Just like these strings of letters read as a recognizable sentence, the other characters have meaning as well. For example, the <p> shows that you’re beginning a new paragraph, and the <b> indicates that you want the font to be bold.

There are a variety of programming languages such as Python, Java, C++, C#, PHP, HTML, etc. Each of these programming languages is used in different ways. For example, the programming language used for Facebook is PHP. The two most common languages for designing games are C++ and Java, although there are other languages are popular. The purpose typically helps determine the best programming language to use.

Now the code you saw above couldn’t properly be displayed if the keyboard on the laptop wasn’t working or the screen was broken. The hardware of your computer is something you can physically touch, whether it appears on the outside or the inside of the computer. You are probably familiar with parts such as a mouse, keyboard, movements detector (without a mouse), computer case, and monitor case, but the interior hardware of a computer also includes a hard drive, electric motors, LED lights, and RAM.

Hardware issues can be just as problematic as software issues. I recently had an issue with a laptop I was trying to wipe; it wasn’t letting me complete my task due to a hardware malfunction. I had to open the back of the laptop and then remove the hard drive by unscrewing it. After that, I used the hard drive docking clone station to copy the “good” conditioned hard drive with the “bad” condition hard drive. This process took roughly an hour and after it was done, I put it back into the laptop. I turned on the laptop, and voilà! Cloning the hard drive allowed me to successfully wipe the laptop.

You can’t ride your bike very far with a cast on your leg, and you would be hard pressed to arrive at your desired location if the chain on your bike was broken. Your hardware and software must both be in working order for you to use it. If you have ever needed to work with a piece of technology that needs either software or hardware fixed, you understand the crucial work that they accomplish together.