Anybody who has used a computer or been on the internet has seen the message "runtime error" appear on their screen. To the novice or inexperienced user, this can be somewhat startling if it has not been experienced before. It is not the fault of the computer or even the person operating it. This message is caused by a problem with the software program -- specifically the code that was written does not support the particular operating system that is being employed to run it.

There are a variety of causes for these types of problems, the most likely being bugs that were known by the programmers. (A bug is a problem with a particular piece of software). Unfortunately, they couldn't do anything about these types of issues at the time of release. Another reason that is frequently cited is lack of memory. While this doesn't show up on the screen, it is one of the most likely explanations for a runtime error being displayed.

Occasionally, an internal error triggers this message. This can be something trivial such as a bad command or file name or a major issue such as the command.com program not loading. (command.com is the main kernel for an operating system). Either way, the runtime error message will be shown on the users screen.

While this type of message used to trigger major alarms, most computer systems can simply be rebooted to fix the problem. On the rare instance that this doesn't correct the issue, there are other things that can be done to restore the operating system to its previous state. One easy fix is to increase the amount of memory currently installed in the machine. This creates more "room" for all of the programs to run as needed.

Another great way to get around this issue is to have the machine checked for malware. This can include spyware programs, trojan horses, viruses, worms and cookies. All of these can cause the machine to run slowly and eat up valuable resources, causing the runtime error message. By removing the source of the problem, the solution becomes obvious.

After getting rid of the malware, the machine can also be defragmented (moving files close together), so the access time will be faster. It all comes down to regaining the speed that was evident as a new machine. It can be done, but doing it right takes time.