ASCII
American Standard Code for Information Interchange. A
standardized numeric coding system for representing
characters, such as numbers, letters, and graphic symbols. Each
of the 256 ASCII codes occupies one byte of storage. All
computers, printers, and programs can use files transmitted in
standard ASCII code. Extended ASCII codes can be used only
by hardware and software designed to interpret them.
Asynchronous
A method of data transmission in which one machine sends
data, one character at a time, to another machine at variable
intervals that do not need to be synchronized to a timing
device, such as a system clock.
AUTOEXEC.BAT file
The batch file your computer runs automatically whenever you
load MS-DOS. It configures the installed system devices and
sets various user preferences. See also Bach file.
Automatic speed
The processor
speed setting that
allows the computer to switch
automatically from high speed to low speed when it accesses a
diskette drive. See also Copy-protected
program
and Key
disk.
Backup
An extra copy of a program, data file, or disk, that is created in
case your working copy is damaged or lost.
Base memory
see Conventional Memory.
2 Glossary