• Cardware

    Origin

    en + -card + ware

    Full definition of cardware

    Noun

    cardware

    (uncountable)
    1. (computing) Synonym of postcardware
      • 1994, Peter M. Ridge, Sound Blaster: The Official BookTwo of the programs are "cardware" — the authors would be pleased to receive just a postcard.
      • 2005, James Moran, ‎Victoria Hull, Brilliant ECDL (page 29)Other forms of freeware/shareware are cardware/postcardware/emailware - instead of paying, you send the programmer a card or an email saying thanks.
    2. (computing) The software and hardware supporting a smart card system.
      • 1997, Laurens van den Broek, ‎Annet J. Sikkel, Health Cards '97 (page 95)Detailed experience from other economic sectors as well as some partial data for the health sector allows us to calculate a factor the cardware costs have to be multiplied with to get total costs ...
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