Appendix D
SPRU352G – June 2005 – Revised February 2007
Glossary
D.1 Glossary of Terms
Abstract Interface — An interface defined by a C header whose functions are specified by a structure of function pointers. By convention these interface headers begin with the letter 'i'and the interface name begins with 'I'Such. an interface is "abstract" because, in general, many modules in a system implement the same abstract interface; i.e., the interface defines abstract operations supported by many modules.
Algorithm — Technically, an algorithm is a sequence of operations, each chosen from a finite set of
API — Acronym for Application Programming Interface i.e., a specific set of constants, types, variables, and functions used to programmatically interact with a piece of software.
Asynchronous System Calls — Most system calls block (or "suspend") the calling thread until they complete, and continue its execution immediately following the call. Some systems also provide asynchronous (or
Asynchronous system calls are generally much harder for the programmer to deal with than blocking calls. This complexity is often outweighed by the performance benefits for
Client — The term client is often used to denote any piece of software that uses a function, module, or interface; for example, if the function a() calls the function b(), a() is a client of b(). Similarly, if an application App uses module MOD, App is a client of MOD.
COFF — Common Output File Format. The file format of the files produced by the TI compiler, assembler, and linker.
Concrete Interface — An interface defined by a C header whose functions are implemented by a single module within a system. This is in contrast to an abstract interface where multiple modules in a system may implement the same abstract interface. The header for every module defines a concrete interface.
Context Switch — A context switch is the action of switching a CPU between one thread and another (or transferring control between them). This may involve crossing one or more protection boundaries.
Critical Section — A critical section of code is one in which data that may be accessed by other threads are inconsistent. At a higher level, a critical section can be viewed as a section of code in which a guarantee you make to other threads about the state of some data may not be true.
If other threads can access these data during a critical section, your program may not behave correctly. This may cause it to crash, lock up, produce incorrect results, or do just about any other unpleasant thing you care to imagine.
Other threads are generally denied access to inconsistent data during a critical section (usually through use of locks). If some of your critical sections are too long, however, it may result in your code performing poorly.
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