Magic (programming)
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Magic (programming)
In the context of computer programming, magic is an informal term for abstraction; it is used to describe code that handles complex tasks while hiding that complexity to present a simple interface. The term is somewhat tongue-in-cheek, and often carries bad connotations, implying that the true behavior of the code is not immediately apparent. For example, Perl's polymorphic typing and closure mechanisms are often called "magic". The term implies that the hidden complexity is at least in principle understandable, in contrast to variants which describe arcane techniques that are deliberately hidden or extremely difficult to understand. However, the term can also be applied endearingly, suggesting a "charm" about the code. The action of such abstractions is described as being done "automagically", a portmanteau of "automatically" and "magically". Referential opacity "Magic" refers to procedures which make calculations based on data not clearly provided to them, by accessi ...
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Abstraction (computer Science)
In software engineering and computer science, abstraction is the process of generalizing concrete details, such as attributes, away from the study of objects and systems to focus attention on details of greater importance. Abstraction is a fundamental concept in computer science and software engineering, especially within the object-oriented programming paradigm. Examples of this include: * the usage of abstract data types to separate usage from working representations of data within programs; * the concept of functions or subroutines which represent a specific way of implementing control flow; * the process of reorganizing common behavior from groups of non-abstract classes into abstract classes using inheritance and sub-classes, as seen in object-oriented programming languages. Rationale Computing mostly operates independently of the concrete world. The hardware implements a model of computation that is interchangeable with others. The software is structured in archit ...
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Truth Value
In logic and mathematics, a truth value, sometimes called a logical value, is a value indicating the relation of a proposition to truth, which in classical logic has only two possible values ('' true'' or '' false''). Truth values are used in computing as well as various types of logic. Computing In some programming languages, any expression can be evaluated in a context that expects a Boolean data type. Typically (though this varies by programming language) expressions like the number zero, the empty string, empty lists, and null are treated as false, and strings with content (like "abc"), other numbers, and objects evaluate to true. Sometimes these classes of expressions are called falsy and truthy. For example, in Lisp, nil, the empty list, is treated as false, and all other values are treated as true. In C, the number 0 or 0.0 is false, and all other values are treated as true. In JavaScript, the empty string (""), null, undefined, NaN, +0, −0 and false are ...
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Volatile Variable
In computer programming, a variable is said to be ''volatile'' if its value can be read or modified asynchronously by something other than the current thread of execution. The value of a volatile variable may spontaneously change for reasons such as: sharing values with other threads; sharing values with asynchronous signal handlers; accessing hardware devices via memory-mapped I/O (where you can send and receive messages from peripheral devices by reading from and writing to memory). Support for these use cases varies considerably among the programming languages that have the volatile keyword. Volatility can have implications regarding function calling conventions and how variables are stored, accessed and cached. In C and C++ In C and C++, volatile is a type qualifier, like const, and is a part of a type (e.g. the type of a variable or field). The behavior of the volatile keyword in C and C++ is sometimes given in terms of suppressing optimizations of an optimizing ...
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Memory-mapped I/O
Memory-mapped I/O (MMIO) and port-mapped I/O (PMIO) are two complementary methods of performing input/output (I/O) between the central processing unit (CPU) and peripheral devices in a computer (often mediating access via chipset). An alternative approach is using dedicated I/O processors, commonly known as channels on mainframe computers, which execute their own instructions. Memory-mapped I/O uses the same address space to address both main memory and I/O devices. The memory and registers of the I/O devices are mapped to (associated with) address values, so a memory address may refer to either a portion of physical RAM or to memory and registers of the I/O device. Thus, the CPU instructions used to access the memory (e.g. ) can also be used for accessing devices. Each I/O device either monitors the CPU's address bus and responds to any CPU access of an address assigned to that device, connecting the system bus to the desired device's hardware register, or uses a dedi ...
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Comment (computer Programming)
In computer programming, a comment is text embedded in source code that a translator (compiler or interpreter (computing), interpreter) ignores. Generally, a comment is an annotation intended to make the code easier for a programmer to understand often explaining an aspect that is not readily apparent in the program (non-comment) code. For this article, ''comment'' refers to the same concept in a programming language, markup language, configuration file and any similar context. Some development tools, other than a source code translator, do parse comments to provide capabilities such as API documentation generator, document generation, static analysis, and version control integration. The comparison of programming languages (syntax)#Comments, syntax of comments varies by programming language yet there are repeating patterns in the syntax among languages as well as similar aspects related to comment content. The flexibility supported by comments allows for a wide degree of cont ...
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Typeof
typeof, alternately also typeOf, and TypeOf, is an operator provided by several programming languages to determine the data type of a variable. This is useful when constructing programs that must accept multiple types of data without explicitly specifying the type. In languages that support polymorphism and type casting, the typeof operator may have one of two distinct meanings when applied to an object. In some languages, such as Visual Basic, the typeof operator returns the dynamic type of the object. That is, it returns the true, original type of the object, irrespective of any type casting. In these languages, the typeof operator is the method for obtaining run-time type information. In other languages, such as C# or D and, to some degree, in C (as part of nonstandard extensions and proposed standard revisions),Typeof
in "Using the GNU C ...
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JavaScript
JavaScript (), often abbreviated as JS, is a programming language and core technology of the World Wide Web, alongside HTML and CSS. Ninety-nine percent of websites use JavaScript on the client side for webpage behavior. Web browsers have a dedicated JavaScript engine that executes the client code. These engines are also utilized in some servers and a variety of apps. The most popular runtime system for non-browser usage is Node.js. JavaScript is a high-level, often just-in-time–compiled language that conforms to the ECMAScript standard. It has dynamic typing, prototype-based object-orientation, and first-class functions. It is multi-paradigm, supporting event-driven, functional, and imperative programming styles. It has application programming interfaces (APIs) for working with text, dates, regular expressions, standard data structures, and the Document Object Model (DOM). The ECMAScript standard does not include any input/output (I/O), such as netwo ...
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Printf
printf is a C standard library function that formats text and writes it to standard output. The function accepts a format c-string argument and a variable number of value arguments that the function serializes per the format string. Mismatch between the format specifiers and count and type of values results in undefined behavior and possibly program crash or other vulnerability. The format string is encoded as a template language consisting of verbatim text and ''format specifiers'' that each specify how to serialize a value. As the format string is processed left-to-right, a subsequent value is used for each format specifier found. A format specifier starts with a character and has one or more following characters that specify how to serialize a value. The standard library provides other, similar functions that form a family of ''printf-like'' functions. The functions share the same formatting capabilities but provide different behavior such as output to a differen ...
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RISC OS
RISC OS () is an operating system designed to run on ARM architecture, ARM computers. Originally designed in 1987 by Acorn Computers of England, it was made for use in its new line of ARM-based Acorn Archimedes, Archimedes personal computers and was then shipped with other computers produced by the company. Despite the demise of Acorn, RISC OS continues to be developed today by the RISC OS Open community on version 5.0 of the system that was open sourced in 2018. RISC OS is a Modular programming, modular operating system and takes its name from the reduced instruction set computer (RISC) architecture it supports. It incorporates a graphical user interface and a windowing system. Between 1987 and 1998, RISC OS shipped with every ARM-based Acorn computer including the Archimedes line, Acorn's R line (with RISC iX as a dual-boot option), RiscPC, Acorn A7000, A7000, and prototype models such as the Acorn Acorn Computers#NewsPad, NewsPad and Phoebe (computer), Phoebe computer. A vers ...
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Interrupt
In digital computers, an interrupt (sometimes referred to as a trap) is a request for the processor to ''interrupt'' currently executing code (when permitted), so that the event can be processed in a timely manner. If the request is accepted, the processor will suspend its current activities, save its state, and execute a function called an '' interrupt handler'' (or an ''interrupt service routine'', ISR) to deal with the event. This interruption is often temporary, allowing the software to resume normal activities after the interrupt handler finishes, although the interrupt could instead indicate a fatal error. Interrupts are commonly used by hardware devices to indicate electronic or physical state changes that require time-sensitive attention. Interrupts are also commonly used to implement computer multitasking and system calls, especially in real-time computing. Systems that use interrupts in these ways are said to be interrupt-driven. History Hardware interrupts wer ...
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Acorn MOS
The Machine Operating System (MOS) or OS is a discontinued computer operating system (OS) used in Acorn Computers' BBC computer range. It included support for four-channel sound, graphics, file system abstraction, and digital and analogue input/output (I/O) including a daisy-chained expansion bus. The system was single-tasking, monolithic and non- reentrant. Versions 0.10 to 1.20 were used on the BBC Micro, version 1.00 on the Electron, version 2 was used on the B+, and versions 3 to 5 were used in the BBC Master series. The final BBC computer, the BBC A3000, was 32-bit and ran RISC OS, which kept on portions of the Acorn MOS architecture and shared a number of characteristics (e.g. "star commands" CLI, "VDU" video control codes and screen modes) with the earlier 8-bit MOS. Versions 0 to 2 of the MOS were 16  KiB in size, written in 6502 machine code, and held in read-only memory (ROM) on the motherboard. The upper quarter of the 16-bit address space (0xC000 to 0xFF ...
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BBC BASIC
BBC BASIC is an interpreted version of the BASIC programming language. It was developed by Acorn Computers Ltd when they were selected by the BBC to supply the computer for their BBC Literacy Project in 1981. It was originally supplied on an installed ROM for the BBC Microcomputer which used a 6502 microprocessor. When Acorn produced the Archimedes computer which used their ARM processor, further versions of BBC BASIC were produced. Acorn included a built in assembler, first for the 6502 and later for the ARM2 processor. Initially the BBC specified compatibility with Microsoft BASIC. Acorn were already extending their earlier Atom BASIC to include structured programming constructs. Particularly on the later Archimedes computers as the memory constraints reduced, BBC BASIC incorporated a more complete set of structured programming constructs commonly found in the ALGOL 60 group of computer languages. Alongside Acorn's version of BBC BASIC on the Archimedes, third part ...
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