Glossary

  1. syntax
    the patterns of symbols in a language and the rules that say what patterns are allowed; the meaning of the syntax is called semantics   See:Ask Me Anything: FAQs on Programs
  2. keywords
    words or symbols with special meaning in a language   See:Basic Instinct♭Most paused scene on VCRs: Elements of An Ox Program
  3. string constant
    a sequence of hard coded characters   See:Basic Instinct♭Most paused scene on VCRs: Elements of An Ox Program
  4. double constant
    a real number that appears in the source code   See:Basic Instinct♭Most paused scene on VCRs: Elements of An Ox Program
  5. matrix constant
    a matrix of hardcoded numbers appearing in the source code   See:Basic Instinct♭Most paused scene on VCRs: Elements of An Ox Program
  6. array constant
    a list of constants in the source code   See:Basic Instinct♭Most paused scene on VCRs: Elements of An Ox Program
  7. statically typed languages
    the content of things (or objects) have one interpretation determined before execution starts at Time0. For example, a variable is declared an integer and will always be treated as an integer. Most statically typed languages have a way to get around this so a single location can be treated as different types during execution. This feature plays an important role in how Ox is written.   See:Basic Instinct♭Most paused scene on VCRs: Elements of An Ox Program
  8. debugging
    the process of finding errors in code   See:Stupid Human Tricks♭David Letterman 1980s: The Programming Cycle
  9. left value or lvalue
    An identifier in a program that has a memory cell associated with that can be modified during execution   See:Express Yourself♭Charles Wright 1970 (before NWA and Madonna): Ox Syntax for Calculations
  10. iterative statement
    a structure in a language that allows a block of code to be repeated more than once, such for and while loops   See:Oops … I Did It Again ♭Britney Spears 2000: Ox Syntax for Repeated Execution
  11. zero-pass loop
    an iterative structure that may not execute the body of the loop once   See:Oops … I Did It Again ♭Britney Spears 2000: Ox Syntax for Repeated Execution
  12. bit or binary digit
    Binary digIT   See:Tim♭Replacements 1985: Hardware for DummiesEconomists
  13. GPU
    Graphical Processing Unit   See:Tim♭Replacements 1985: Hardware for DummiesEconomists
  14. RAM
    random access memory   See:Tim♭Replacements 1985: Hardware for DummiesEconomists
  15. word
    a fixed number of bits in RAM located at an addressed treated as one piece of information   See:Tim♭Replacements 1985: Hardware for DummiesEconomists
  16. IR
    instruction register: location on the CPU that contains the binary instruction to be executed in the next step of the execution cycle   See:Tim♭Replacements 1985: Hardware for DummiesEconomists
  17. assembly language
    a programming language based on machine instructions making it easier for humans to create low-level computer code   See:Machine Head♭Deep Purple Album 1971
  18. unsigned binary integer
    The code for storing non-negative whole numbers in a fixed number of bits. Example: 01012 = 52   See:Numb3rs♭TV Show: Integers & Reals
  19. 2s Complement Arithmetic
    The coding and hardware designed for arithmetic involving signed binary integers   See:Numb3rs♭TV Show: Integers & Reals
  20. bit bucket
    where 1s carried from the leftmost bit in a word go.   See:Numb3rs♭TV Show: Integers & Reals
  21. numeric overflow
    The event of attempting to store the result of an arithmetic operation that is too large to fit in the word being used.   See:Numb3rs♭TV Show: Integers & Reals
  22. mantissa, base, and exponent
    The three integers that code a rational number in scientific notation. The base is 10 for humans and 2 for computers so the base is usually implicit.   See:Numb3rs♭TV Show: Integers & Reals
  23. floating point real number (FPR)
    The code that uses 2 signed integers to represent real numbers   See:Numb3rs♭TV Show: Integers & Reals
  24. floating point operation (FLOP)
    One multiplication or division of two floating point real numbers, a measure of work an algorithm requires   See:Numb3rs♭TV Show: Integers & Reals
  25. round-off error
    When an arithmetic result is not stored exactly because the mantissa required is larger than the hardware mantissa.   See:Numb3rs♭TV Show: Integers & Reals
  26. machine precision
    A measure of how accurate arithmetic is on a computer system. It equals the smallest floating point number that, if subtracted from 1.0, results in a value strictly less than 1.0.   See:Numb3rs♭TV Show: Integers & Reals
  27. Overflow
    When an arithmetic operation results in a magnitude too large to store.   See:Numb3rs♭TV Show: Integers & Reals
  28. NaN
    Not a Number: a special bit pattern that is treated as an undefined real number.   See:Numb3rs♭TV Show: Integers & Reals
  29. fuzziness
    The tolerance for determining whether two floating point reals are equal.   See:Numb3rs♭TV Show: Integers & Reals
  30. ASCII code
    A 8-bit code for storing Western European characters and printer controls.   See:Memento♭I've forgotten already: Memory & Addresses
  31. Unicode
    A 16-bit code for storing characters of all languages   See:Memento♭I've forgotten already: Memory & Addresses
  32. string
    One or more characters   See:Memento♭I've forgotten already: Memory & Addresses
  33. pointer
    A data type that stores an address in memory and often information about the thing stored at the memory location.   See:Memento♭I've forgotten already: Memory & Addresses
  34. run time
    a point in time while a program is executing. RT0 is the moment the program begins to execute.   See:The Ties that Bind♭Bruce Springsteen 1980: When Things Happen in a Program
  35. static feature of a language
    An aspect of a program that is determined before execution begins   See:The Ties that Bind♭Bruce Springsteen 1980: When Things Happen in a Program
  36. user-defined type
    a way a computer language allows a user to create new types of data storage.   See:The Ties that Bind♭Bruce Springsteen 1980: When Things Happen in a Program
  37. heterogeneous array
    A data type that consists of one or more values that need not be the same type.   See:The Ties that Bind♭Bruce Springsteen 1980: When Things Happen in a Program
  38. executable file
    a file that consists of binary instructions that can be loaded into memory and take over the CPU   See:Across The Great Divide♭The Band 1969: The Two Kinds of Programming Languages
  39. interpreter
    A program that is executes code from its associated language and ensures machine instructions to carry out the code are executed.   See:Across The Great Divide♭The Band 1969: The Two Kinds of Programming Languages
  40. compiled language
    A language that can produce an executable file and does not require an interpreter.   See:Across The Great Divide♭The Band 1969: The Two Kinds of Programming Languages
  41. gcc
    The GNU C Compiler.    See:Across The Great Divide♭The Band 1969: The Two Kinds of Programming Languages
  42. token list
    a list of all the individual items gleaned from a program to be parsed for meaning   See:Across The Great Divide♭The Band 1969: The Two Kinds of Programming Languages
  43. parse tree
    a structure that is created during syntax analysis in order to produce object code   See:Across The Great Divide♭The Band 1969: The Two Kinds of Programming Languages
  44. object code
    a binary file that contains the instructions implied by a program, whether machine instructions or pseudo-code; it cannot be executed directly because code from outside libraries must be linked into it first   See:Across The Great Divide♭The Band 1969: The Two Kinds of Programming Languages
  45. linker
    the program that combines object files with library files in order to produce an executable file or prepares the interpreter to execute   See:Across The Great Divide♭The Band 1969: The Two Kinds of Programming Languages
  46. pass-by-value
    A feature of a computer languages in which the value of function arguments are sent not the argument itself   See:Fun, Fun, Fun♭Beach Boys 1964: Functions
  47. Run Time Environment
    Part of the operating system and programming language that provides services to a program, such as input and output   See:The Style Council♭Paul Weller's group after the Jam: 
  48. serial execution
    One instruction of a program is executed at a time, the mode of a single CPU computer.   See:One Way or Another♭Blondie 1979: Parallel Execution
  49. shared memory
    A parallel programming design in which all threads or cores reference the same memory cells   See:One Way or Another♭Blondie 1979: Parallel Execution
  50. Multi-threading
    A low-level parallel processing architecture in which segments of code within a program are executed simultaneously and then each thread waits until all our finished with the segment   See:One Way or Another♭Blondie 1979: Parallel Execution
  51. Message Passing Interface
    A standard for multiple copies of a program executing simultaneously to pass information   See:One Way or Another♭Blondie 1979: Parallel Execution
  52. forward-step derivative
    computing a derivative by computing the function at $x$ and $x+h$   See:Roll With the Changes♭REO Speedwagon 1978: Differential Calculus
  53. Hessian
    the matrix of second partial derivatives of a real-valued function   See:Roll With the Changes♭REO Speedwagon 1978: Differential Calculus
  54. Jacobian
    The matrix of first partial derivatives for a vector valued function. If the function is real-valued then the Jacobian is the gradient vector   See:Roll With the Changes♭REO Speedwagon 1978: Differential Calculus
  55. closed-form solution
    An answer to a mathematical formula that involves no coding. Example: the quadratic formula is a closed form solution to solving a quadratic equation.   See:Non-Linear Systems
  56. argmax
    The argument of a function that achieves the maximum value   See:Optimization
  57. sequential optimization
    an algorithm to optimize an objective function starting from some pre-determined starting vector   See:Optimization
  58. Newton's method
    An iterative optimization algorithm that uses the function's gradient and Hessian   See:Climb Every Mountain:♭Sound of Music 1965 Gradient and Hessian Based Optimization
  59. quasi-Newton
    A class of optimization algorithms that approximate the objective's Hessian but otherwise works like Newton   See:Climb Every Mountain:♭Sound of Music 1965 Gradient and Hessian Based Optimization
  60. BFGS
    Broyden-Fletcher-Goldfarb-Shanno. The most used quasi-Newton method for optimization.   See:Climb Every Mountain:♭Sound of Music 1965 Gradient and Hessian Based Optimization
  61. Nelder-Mead
    An optimization algorithm that uses no gradient information. It is one of the most used algorithms in some areas of economics because it is effective and robust when gradient-based algorithms are not.   See:Finding Nemo♭Movie: The Nelder-Mead Amoeba Algorithm
  62. Sequential Quadratic Programming (SQP)
    An optimization algorithm that accounts for constraints as in Kuhn-Tucker problems   See:Bound for Glory♭Book / Movie 1976: Contrained Optimization
  63. random experiment
    an uncertain situation   See:Known Unknowns♭Donald Rumsfeld 2003
  64. random variable
    a numerical value associated with random outcomes   See:Known Unknowns♭Donald Rumsfeld 2003
  65. discrete random variable
    discreterv   See:Known Unknowns♭Donald Rumsfeld 2003
  66. continuous random variable
    a random variable that can take on any value over an interval or intervals of the real line   See:Known Unknowns♭Donald Rumsfeld 2003
  67. cumulative distribution function (cdf)
    Prob(X<x)   See:Known Unknowns♭Donald Rumsfeld 2003
  68. pdf of a discrete
    pdf1   See:Known Unknowns♭Donald Rumsfeld 2003
  69. pdf of a continuous random variable
    the derivative of the cdf   See:Known Unknowns♭Donald Rumsfeld 2003
  70. the joint cumulative distribution function (joint cdf)
    Prob(X<x,Y<y), for example   See:Known Unknowns♭Donald Rumsfeld 2003
  71. joint pdf
    the probability all the individual random variables take on the specified values   See:Known Unknowns♭Donald Rumsfeld 2003
  72. joint pdf
    the partial derivative of the cdf with respect to all the individual random variables   See:Known Unknowns♭Donald Rumsfeld 2003
  73. statistically independent
    the joint distribution of random variables factors into the product the marginal distributions   See:Known Unknowns♭Donald Rumsfeld 2003
  74. $Z\sim {\cal N}(0,1)$
    Z   See:Known Unknowns♭Donald Rumsfeld 2003
  75. $X\sim {\cal N}(\mu,\sigma^2)$
    normal   See:Known Unknowns♭Donald Rumsfeld 2003
  76. seed
    The current value(s) that determine the next random number generated by a pRNG. It is changed each time a value is generated.   See:Known Unknowns♭Donald Rumsfeld 2003
  77. internal rate of return (IRR)
    the interest rate that makes the present value of stream of values equal to 0   See:Rates of Return
  78. internal rate of return (IRR)
    itle   See:Rates of Return