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Semipredicate Problem
In computer programming, a semipredicate problem occurs when a subroutine intended to return a useful value can fail, but the signalling of failure uses an otherwise valid return value. The problem is that the caller of the subroutine cannot tell what the result means in this case. Example The division operation yields a real number, but fails when the divisor is zero. If we were to write a function that performs division, we might choose to return 0 on this invalid input. However, if the dividend is 0, the result is 0 too. This means that there is no number we can return to uniquely signal attempted division by zero, since all real numbers are in the range of division. Practical implications Early programmers handled potentially exceptional cases such as division using a convention requiring the calling routine to verify the inputs before calling the division function. This had two problems: first, it greatly encumbered all code that performed division (a very common operat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Computer Programming
Computer programming or coding is the composition of sequences of instructions, called computer program, programs, that computers can follow to perform tasks. It involves designing and implementing algorithms, step-by-step specifications of procedures, by writing source code, code in one or more programming languages. Programmers typically use high-level programming languages that are more easily intelligible to humans than machine code, which is directly executed by the central processing unit. Proficient programming usually requires expertise in several different subjects, including knowledge of the Domain (software engineering), application domain, details of programming languages and generic code library (computing), libraries, specialized algorithms, and Logic#Formal logic, formal logic. Auxiliary tasks accompanying and related to programming include Requirements analysis, analyzing requirements, Software testing, testing, debugging (investigating and fixing problems), imple ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sign Bit
In computer science, the sign bit is a bit in a signed number representation that indicates the sign of a number. Although only signed numeric data types have a sign bit, it is invariably located in the most significant bit position, so the term may be used interchangeably with "most significant bit" in some contexts. Almost always, if the sign bit is 0, the number is non-negative (positive or zero). If the sign bit is 1 then the number is negative. Formats other than two's complement integers allow a signed zero: distinct "positive zero" and "negative zero" representations, the latter of which does not correspond to the mathematical concept of a negative number. When using a complement representation, to convert a signed number to a wider format the additional bits must be filled with copies of the sign bit in order to preserve its numerical value, a process called '' sign extension'' or ''sign propagation''. Sign bit weight in Two's complement Two's complement is by far th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Object-oriented Language
Object-oriented programming (OOP) is a programming paradigm based on the concept of '' objects''. Objects can contain data (called fields, attributes or properties) and have actions they can perform (called procedures or methods and implemented in code In communications and information processing, code is a system of rules to convert information—such as a letter, word, sound, image, or gesture—into another form, sometimes shortened or secret, for communication through a communicati ...). In OOP, computer programs are designed by making them out of objects that interact with one another. Many of the most widely used programming languages (such as C++, Java (programming language), Java, and Python (programming language), Python) support object-oriented programming to a greater or lesser degree, typically as part of multi-paradigm, multiple paradigms in combination with others such as imperative programming and declarative programming. Significant object-orient ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Error Code
In computing, an error code (or a return code) is a numeric or alphanumeric code that indicates the nature of an error and, when possible, why it occurred. Error codes can be reported to end users of software, returned from communication protocols, or used within programs as a method of representing anomalous conditions. In consumer products Error codes are commonly encountered on displays of consumer electronics to users in order to communicate or specify an error. They can also be indicated by lights or beeps, e.g., if a device does not have a display. They are commonly reported by consumer electronics when users bring electronics to perform tasks that they cannot do (e.g., dividing by zero), or when the program within a device encounters an anomalous condition. Error codes reported by consumer electronics are used to help diagnose and repair technical problems. An error code can be communicated to relevant support staff to identify potential fixes, or can simplify resear ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Exit Status
In computing, the exit status (also exit code or exit value) of a terminated process is an integer number that is made available to its parent process (or caller). In DOS, this may be referred to as an errorlevel. When computer programs are executed, the operating system creates an abstract entity called a process in which the book-keeping for that program is maintained. In multitasking operating systems such as Unix or Linux, new processes can be created by active processes. The process that spawns another is called a ''parent process'', while those created are ''child processes''. Child processes run concurrently with the parent process. The technique of spawning child processes is used to delegate some work to a child process when there is no reason to stop the execution of the parent. When the child finishes executing, it exits by calling the ''exit'' system call. This system call facilitates passing the exit status code back to the parent, which can retrieve this v ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Output Parameter
In computer programming, a parameter, a.k.a. formal argument, is a variable that represents an argument, a.k.a. actual argument, a.k.a. actual parameter, to a subroutine call.. A function's signature defines its parameters. A call invocation involves evaluating each argument expression of a call and associating the result with the corresponding parameter. For example, consider subroutine def add(x, y): return x + y. Variables x and y are parameters. For call add(2, 3), the expressions 2 and 3 are arguments. For call add(a+1, b+2), the arguments are a+1 and b+2. Parameter passing is defined by a programming language. Evaluation strategy defines the semantics for how parameters can be declared and how arguments are passed to a subroutine. Generally, with call by value, a parameter acts like a new, local variable initialized to the value of the argument. If the argument is a variable, the subroutine cannot modify the argument state because the parameter is a copy. With call by refe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pointer (computer Programming)
In computer science, a pointer is an object in many programming languages that stores a memory address. This can be that of another value located in computer memory, or in some cases, that of memory-mapped computer hardware. A pointer ''references'' a location in memory, and obtaining the value stored at that location is known as ''dereferencing'' the pointer. As an analogy, a page number in a book's index could be considered a pointer to the corresponding page; dereferencing such a pointer would be done by flipping to the page with the given page number and reading the text found on that page. The actual format and content of a pointer variable is dependent on the underlying computer architecture. Using pointers significantly improves performance for repetitive operations, like traversing iterable data structures (e.g. strings, lookup tables, control tables, linked lists, and tree structures). In particular, it is often much cheaper in time and space to copy and deref ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Call By Address
In a programming language, an evaluation strategy is a set of rules for evaluating expressions. The term is often used to refer to the more specific notion of a ''parameter-passing strategy'' that defines the kind of value that is passed to the function for each parameter (the ''binding strategy'') and whether to evaluate the parameters of a function call, and if so in what order (the ''evaluation order''). The notion of reduction strategy is distinct, although some authors conflate the two terms and the definition of each term is not widely agreed upon. A programming language's evaluation strategy is part of its high-level semantics. Some languages, such as PureScript, have variants with different evaluation strategies. Some declarative languages, such as Datalog, support multiple evaluation strategies. The calling convention consists of the low-level platform-specific details of parameter passing. Example To illustrate, executing a function call f(a,b) may first evaluate t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Syntactic Sugar
In computer science, syntactic sugar is syntax within a programming language that is designed to make things easier to read or to express. It makes the language "sweeter" for human use: things can be expressed more clearly, more concisely, or in an alternative style that some may prefer. Syntactic sugar is usually a shorthand for a common operation that could also be expressed in an alternate, more verbose, form: The programmer has a choice of whether to use the shorter form or the longer form, but will usually use the shorter form since it is shorter and easier to type and read. For example, many programming languages provide special syntax for referencing and updating array elements. Abstractly, an array reference is a procedure of two arguments: an array and a subscript vector, which could be expressed as get_array(Array, vector(i,j)). Instead, many languages provide syntax such as Array ,j/code>. Similarly an array element update is a procedure consisting of three arguments, fo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Associative Map
In computer science, an associative array, key-value store, map, symbol table, or dictionary is an abstract data type that stores a collection of (key, value) pairs, such that each possible key appears at most once in the collection. In mathematical terms, an associative array is a function with ''finite'' domain. It supports 'lookup', 'remove', and 'insert' operations. The dictionary problem is the classic problem of designing efficient data structures that implement associative arrays. The two major solutions to the dictionary problem are hash tables and search trees..Dietzfelbinger, M., Karlin, A., Mehlhorn, K., Meyer auf der Heide, F., Rohnert, H., and Tarjan, R. E. 1994"Dynamic Perfect Hashing: Upper and Lower Bounds". SIAM J. Comput. 23, 4 (Aug. 1994), 738-761. http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=182370 It is sometimes also possible to solve the problem using directly addressed arrays, binary search trees, or other more specialized structures. Many programming langua ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Common Lisp
Common Lisp (CL) is a dialect of the Lisp programming language, published in American National Standards Institute (ANSI) standard document ''ANSI INCITS 226-1994 (S2018)'' (formerly ''X3.226-1994 (R1999)''). The Common Lisp HyperSpec, a hyperlinked HTML version, has been derived from the ANSI Common Lisp standard. The Common Lisp language was developed as a standardized and improved successor of Maclisp. By the early 1980s several groups were already at work on diverse successors to MacLisp: Lisp Machine Lisp (aka ZetaLisp), Spice Lisp, NIL and S-1 Lisp. Common Lisp sought to unify, standardise, and extend the features of these MacLisp dialects. Common Lisp is not an implementation, but rather a language specification. Several implementations of the Common Lisp standard are available, including free and open-source software and proprietary products. Common Lisp is a general-purpose, multi-paradigm programming language. It supports a combination of procedural, functional ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
