Or if a program were to calculate a date "x" days from now, the variable "x" would be an unknown piece of data until we tell the program what "x" is. In programming, it's sometimes required to work with unknown pieces of data. That's when conditions come in handy. Conditions allow a program to perform an action based on the outcome of a previous command.3 Using this type of instruction, we could instruct a program to do one thing if the "x" variable in our latter example turned out to be 7 days, and then do different thing if the variable turned out to be 3 days. But if you take a good look at what's being offered at no cost, you may be in for a big surprise. The quality of today's freeware and open source software created a strong rift among the commercial community and it's literally driving the competition bananas! So much so, that even some well known software development corporations have joined the cause and built a few freeware open source products of their own! You could make a batch file that loads up your favorite websites at once for example, or you could make a batch file that fills your desktop with the most important applications for the day. To do so only requires a little knowledge about the locations of these applications. Let's say that every day we need to load up the Yahoo web browser, Microsoft Word, and then the calculator that comes with Windows. As previously mentioned, preventing dust from entering the computer is extremely important and will reduce the need to open and dust your system in the first place. The severity of outside elements (smoking, humidity, pets, etc.) will ultimately determine how often you'll need to de-dust your machine. But what most new computer users don't realize, is that without an operating system, that computer would be a simple shell of possibilities. A powered computer lacking an operating system wouldn't display anything more than a bunch of confusing text messages that describe the computer's boot process. Touch command software allows users to literally touch objects on a monitor and tell the computer what to do with a finger. Known as "kiosks," these programs are already in use world wide at ATM machines, employment centers, and in health monitoring systems. Neither a mouse nor a keyboard is required.