**strong text**a) I tried to research on what exactly is a SOLVER only to find a not clear-cut simple answer. My doubts still remain after going through several sites full of discussions about it. I need to clarify as to whether it is a software product, or is it an opensource tool, or is it a commercial software package? or is it like a library package that one can even design his/her own?
b) All i could find is that people related SOLVER to MS EXCEL, or advanced excel, and there were sources quoting a solver in connection to various programming languages like python, java, C#. I even saw the term's usage with HADOOP.
c) If it happens to be a software package, then, is there any other package comparable to it or better than it, which can perform wider range of tasks(for statistics) than solver???
If my last question "c)" is too broad, plz ignore that part.
Thnx a lot in advance.