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When microcomputers first began to be used by the general public, back in the 1970s, most of those who used them were people who were interested in computers for their own sake. If you bought a microcomputer back then, you had to program it yourself - there was very little software available. Programming microcomputers was a hobby in its own right. Very few people were interested in microcomputers for doing other things. But of those few, genealogists were prominent.
Genealogists realized that computers could store and keep track of the relationships between the people in a family far better than any paper filing system. One of the first genealogy programs for microcomputers was Roots, written by Commsoft for the Heath/Zenith microcomputer, followed shortly by Roots/M, for the CP/M operating system. The latest version is Roots IV, and it is still one of the standards by which genealogy programs have been judged.
There are many different kinds of computer programs that can be used for genealogy. The ones that are most commonly used, however, are the lineage-linked genealogy programs. These are database programs especially designed for recording genealogical information. They are called "lineage-linked" because they are designed to link parents to children, and so to keep track of the relationships between all the people in the database.
Genealogists also make use of other programs - general database programs, which are designed to store and retrieve information, though they do not necessarily store family links, unless they are specifically programmed to do so. Word processors are used for writing letters, and for writing up the results of one's research for publication. Spreadsheets have been used, as have numerous other programs. Almost any kind of program can have genealogical uses.
This is one of the most frequently-asked questions, and also one of the most difficult to answer. A lot depends on what you want to do, and what you want the program to do. Different people have different needs, and a program that meets one person's needs might not meet someone else's needs.
If you're new to genealogical computing, and have never used a genealogy program before, I suggest that you begin with one of the more popular shareware programs. A shareware program is one you can "try before you buy". If you like it, and it does most of what you want, then you can register it by paying a fee to the author. If it doesn't do everything you want, then make a list of the features you would like to see, and then start asking other people if they know of a program that has those features. There is a page with a list of some of the more popular shareware programs.
Just about any genealogy program will perform the basic tasks of of entering basic genealogical information - name, date and place of birth, marriage and death of each person, and linking parents to children. They will also print the basic reports - pedigree charts, and family group sheets. A program should also be able to import and export data in the GEDCOM format. If it cannot do all those things, it is not worth looking at.
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