What do the application icons in the upper-left hand side of the notification panel mean? On my Samsung Galaxy SIII, I am used to controlling which applications are running at any given time by holding the Home hardware button and then swiping any apps I want to close from the list of running apps that shows up. In the following screenshot, I have held down the Home hardware button and closed all running application by tapping the icon that shows up in the lower-right hand side consisting of a list with an X in front
of it:



(click the image to see its larger variant)

However, what puzzles me is that no applications are running, therefore shouldn't those icons in the upper-left hand side of the notification bar disappear so as to tell the user that these apps are no longer running? Perhaps I have missed the purpose of those icons in the upper-left hand side of the notification bar.

Perhaps someone could explain what they mean.
OK, I figured out, those icons do not correspond to which applications are running,
but rather, to those applications which have awaiting new information for the user.
When the user drags the notification panel from the top of the screen, those same
icons appear next to the name of the application sending the notification and the
message posted by such application also appears next to the application name in
the list. This should answer the question.