Are Program Options selected when a piece of software is initially written, or are they loaded to a program?

My initial belief was that they were integrated into the program when it was coded. Reviewing the section, however, I am no longer certain, and am inclined to believe you can load them onto programs in a manner similar to autosofts.


Edit: I am also unable to find the Shield program anywhere - is this Complex Form (Technomancer) only?

Shield is in the BBB.

Options are coded into programs, but it is a seperate programing test. You can't just take an option and plug it into any program, but have to have the programs source code. Then you program up the option based on that source code, combine them together, and compile.

Shield is not in the BBB (SR4 or SR4A). The only place I have been able to find it is the New Complex Forms section of Unwired. I just do not get why it would be a Complex Form & not a Program.

That's why Shield is CF only.

Which only explains why Technomancers use Shield. It does not explain why Hackers do not.

No it explains why the dev's thought that TM's needed an advantage over normal Hackers in the defences department.

I didn't say it was right or wrong, merely pointed out that it was there.