Overhead (computing)

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Overhead in computer systems consists of shared functions that benefit all users or processes but are not directly attributable to any specific task. It is thus similar to overhead in organizations. Computer system overhead shows up as slower processing, less memory, less network bandwidth, or bigger latency than would be expected from reading the system specifications.^[1] It is a special case of engineering overhead. Overhead can be a deciding factor in software design, with regard to structure, error correction, and feature inclusion. Examples of computing overhead may be found in Object Oriented Programming (OOP), functional programming,^{[citation needed]} data transfer, and data structures.