pipe
)A temporary software connection between two programs or commands. Normally, the operating system accepts input from the keyboard and sends output to the display screen. Sometimes, however, it is useful to use the output from one command as the input for a second command, without passing the data through the keyboard or display screen. Pipes were invented for these situations.
One of the best examples of pipe usage is linking the command that lists files in a directory to a command that sorts data. By piping the two commands together, you can display the files in sorted order. In UNIX and DOS, the pipe symbol is a vertical bar (|). The DOS command to list files in alphabetical order, therefore, would be:
DIR | SORT
Read Also:
- pipeline burst cache
A type of memory cache built into many modern DRAM controller and chipset designs. Pipeline burst caches use two techniques – a burst mode that pre-fetches memory contents before they are requested, and pipelining so that one memory value can be accessed in the cache at the same time that another memory value is accessed […]
- Pipelining
(n.) (1) A technique used in advanced microprocessors where the microprocessor begins executing a second instruction before the first has been completed. That is, several instructions are in the pipeline simultaneously, each at a different processing stage. The pipeline is divided into segments and each segment can execute its operation concurrently with the other segments. […]
- pit
The recessed area on a CD or DVD where data is stored. CDs and DVDs store data in lands and pits. The lands represent 1 and the pits represent 0 in binary computing. The bits are read by the disc drive that uses a laser beam to distinguish between the lands and pits based on […]
- pitch
(1) For fixed-pitch (or monospaced) fonts, pitch refers to the number of characters printed per inch. Pitch is one characteristic of a monospaced font. Common pitch values are 10 and 12. In proportional-pitch fonts, different characters have different widths, depending on their size. For example, the letter d would be wider than the letter I. […]
- Pixel
Short for Picture Element, a pixel is a single point in a graphic image. Graphics monitors display pictures by dividing the display screen into thousands (or millions) of pixels, arranged in rows and columns. The pixels are so close together that they appear connected. The number of bits used to represent each pixel determines how […]