John Wilder Tukey was an American mathematician and statistician, best known for the development of the fast Fourier Transform (FFT) algorithm and box plot. The Tukey range test, the Tukey lambda distribution, the Tukey test of additivity, and the Teichmüller–Tukey lemma all bear his name. He is also credited with coining the term bit and the first published use of the word software.

Software is a collection of programs and data that tell a computer how to perform specific tasks. Software often includes associated software documentation. This is in contrast to hardware, from which the system is built and which actually performs the work.