What is the difference between a program an executable and a process

Key Differences Between Program and Process A program is a definite group of ordered operations that are to be performed. On the other hand, an instance of a program being executed is a process. The nature of the program is passive as it does nothing until it gets executed whereas a process is dynamic or active in nature as it is an instance of executing program and perform the specific action.

A program has a longer lifespan because it is stored in the memory until it is not manually deleted while a process has a shorter and limited lifespan because it gets terminated after the completion of the task. In contrast, a program just requires memory for storage. Comments Nice. Cleared my blurry perception of process and program. Leave a Reply Cancel reply Your email address will not be published. Program is stored on disk in some file and does not require any other resources.

Report a Bug. Previous Prev. Next Continue. Home Testing Expand child menu Expand. SAP Expand child menu Expand. Web Expand child menu Expand. Must Learn Expand child menu Expand. Big Data Expand child menu Expand. A process is the active execution of the executable on the CPU and in the memory. Process is a part of a program. Process is the part where logic of that particular program exsists. Program is given as a set of process. In some cases we may divide a problem into number of parts.

At these times we write a seperate logic for each part known as process. A program is a blueprint. Like a blueprint for a building. There is no building, but an abstraction of how a building would look like. While constructing a Building, there are many things happening at the same time. You are preparing the concrete, building multiple rooms at the same time, Laying the electrical cables etc.

These would be Threads. Program does not use the CPU resister set but process use the CPU resister set to store the intermediate and final result. Stack Overflow for Teams — Collaborate and share knowledge with a private group. Create a free Team What is Teams? Collectives on Stack Overflow. Learn more. What are the differences between a Program, an Executable, and a Process?

Ask Question. Asked 9 years ago. Active 2 years, 4 months ago. Viewed 22k times. Essentially, an Executable is a file in a format that the computer can directly execute as opposed to source files which cannot be directly executed and must first be compiled.

An executable is the result of a compilation. I mentioned that the operating system recognizes executable, it does so via the extension.

A common extension used for windows executable files is. Once an executable has been executed a process begins.