IPL (initial program load) is a mainframe term for the loading of the operating system into the computer’s main memory . A mainframe operating system (such as OS/390) contains many megabytes of code that is customized by each installation, requiring some time to load the code into the memory. On a personal computer, booting or re-booting (re-starting) is the equivalent to IPLing (the term is also used as a verb) .
DEFINITION of mesh network
A mesh network is a local area network (LAN) that employs one of two connection arrangements, full mesh topology or partial mesh topology. In the full mesh topology, each node (workstation or other device) is connected directly to each of the others. In the partial mesh topology, some nodes are connected to all the others, but some of the nodes are connected only to those other nodes with which they exchange the most data.
DEFINITION of layer
1) In computer programming, layering is the organization of programming into separate functional components that interact in some sequential and hierarchical way, with each layer usually having an interface only to the layer above it and the layer below it.
DEFINITION of object-oriented programming
Object-oriented programming (OOP) is a programming language model organized around objects rather than “actions” and data rather than logic. Historically, a program has been viewed as a logical procedure that takes input data, processes it, and produces output data.
DEFINITION of microchip
A microchip (sometimes just called a “chip”) is a unit of packaged computer circuitry (usually called an integrated circuit) that is manufactured from a material such as silicon at a very small scale. Microchips are made for program logic (logic or microprocessor chips) and for computer memory (memory or RAM chips).
DEFINITION of Point-to-Point Tunneling Protocol
Point-to-Point Tunneling Protocol (PPTP) is a protocol (set of communication rules) that allows corporations to extend their own corporate network through private “tunnels” over the public Internet. Effectively, a corporation uses a wide-area network as a single large local area network. A company no longer needs to lease its
DEFINITION of physical layer
In the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) communications model, the physical layer supports the electrical or mechanical interface to the physical medium. For example, this layer determines how to put a stream of bits from the upper (data link) layer on to the pins for a parallel printer interface, an optical fiber transmitter, or a radio carrier.
DEFINITION of sector
On a computer diskette or hard disk, a sector is one of the “pie slices” the diskette or disk is divided into. Dividing the circular medium into pie slices is a way to organize it so that data can be located by the read/write heads of the drive. The diskette or disk is also divided into a number of concentric circles. Data can be located
DEFINITION of root directory
In a computer file system that is organized as a hierarchy or tree, the root directory is the directory that includes all other directories. (Unlike a real tree, a tree file system has only one root!) In UNIX-based as well as in other operating systems, the root directory has no name. It is simply represented by the special character that separates directories in a file system.
DEFINITION of Resilient File System
ReFS (Resilient File System) is a file system designed for next-generation operating systems, such as Windows Server 8. ReFS combats bit rot (the corruption of bits in a file system over time) through disk scrubbing tasks that read and validate data. It maintains a high level of compatibility with NTFS and builds on that foundation
