The Compatibility reference article from the English Wikipedia on 24-Apr-2004 (provided by Fixed Reference: snapshots of Wikipedia from wikipedia.org)

Compatibility

The term compatibility has the following meanings:

• In telecommunication, the capability of two or more items or components of equipment or material to exist or function in the same system or environment without mutual interference.

• In computing, the ability to execute a given program on different types of computers without modification of the program or the computers.

• The capability that allows the substitution of one subsystem (storage facility), or of one functional unit (e.g. , hardware, software), for the originally designated system or functional unit in a relatively transparent manner, without loss of information and without the introduction of errors.

This is the "Compatibility" reference article from the English Wikipedia. All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License. See also our Disclaimer.