PUBLISHED BY
`Microsoft Press
`
`A Division of ltficrosoft Corporation
`One Merosoft Way
`Redmond, Washington 93052-6399
`
`Copyright ® ZEIIZ by Microsoft (Summation
`
`All rights reserved. No part ofthe contents ofthis book may be reproduced or transmittedin any form
`or by any means without the written permission of the publisher.
`
`Library of Congress Cataloging—in—Publieation Data
`Microsoft Computer Dictionary—Slit ed.
`p. cm.
`ISBN 8—?356-14954
`
`1. Computers—Dictionaries.
`
`2. Microcomputers—Dictionaries.
`
`ACE—€6.35. M5226?
`EIJ4'_[13——dc21
`
`2|I3‘2
`
`ZED? 19714
`
`Printed andhound in the United States of America.
`
`23456'i'89 QM 765432
`
`Distributed in Canada by EB. Penn and Company ltd.
`
`A CIP catalogue record for this hook is available from the British Library.
`
`Microsoft Press books are available through booksellers and distributors worldwide. for further informa-
`tion about international editions, contact your local l‘rticrosoft Corporation office or contact Microsoft
`Press International directly at fax {425} 936-?3 29. Visit our Web site at Tfirslawrnicrosoftcorm'rnspress.
`Send comments to minpmffimicrosofiram.
`
`Active Desktop, Active Directory, AciiveMovie, ActiveStore, ActiveSync, AetiveX, Authenticuje,
`Backfiffiee. Biz'l'allt, Clear'l'ype, DirectfiD, DireetAnimation DirectDraw, Direethipst. Directlilusic,
`DirectPlay. DirectShow, DirectSound, DirectX, Entourage. FuxPro. ErontPage, Hohnail,111telliEye,
`BitelliMouse, IntelliSense, JScript. MapPuint. Microsoft. Microsoft Press, Mobile Explorer. MS-DOS,
`MEN, IMusic Central, NetMeeting, Outlook, PhotoDraw, PowerPoint, SharePoint, UltimateTV, Visio,
`Visual Basic, Visual CH, Visual FoxPro, Visual lnterDev, Visual J++, Visual SourceSafe, Visual Smdin,
`Winfifi, Win32s, Windows, Windows Media, Windows NT. Xbox. are either registered trademarks or
`trademarks of Microsoft Corporationin the United States anda'ur other countries. Other product and
`compares.r names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.
`
`The example companies, organizations. products, domain names, e-n1ail addresses, logos, people, places,
`and events depicted herein are fictitious. No association with any real company, organization. product,
`domain name, e—rnail address, logo, person, place, or event is intended or should be infected.
`
`Acquisitions Editor: Alex Blanton
`Project Editor: Sandra Haynes
`
`Body Part No. EDS-41929
`
`
`
`

`

`Insider attack
`
`Instruction set
`
`Insider attack It. An attack on a network or system car—
`ried out by an individual associated with the hacked sys—
`tem. Insider attacks are typically the work of current or
`former employees of a company or organisation who have
`mowledge of passwords and network vulnerabilities.
`Compare intruder attack.
`
`Ins key :1. See Insert key.
`
`Install vb. To set in place and prepare for operation. Oper-
`ating systems and application programs commonly
`include a disk—based installation, or setup, program that
`does most ofthe work of preparing the program to work
`with the computer. printer. and other devices. Often such a
`program can check for devices attached to the system.
`request the user to choose from sets of options. create a
`place for the program on the hard disk. and modify system
`startup files as necessary.
`lnstallahle device driver it. A device driver that can be
`
`embedded within an operating system. usually in order to
`override an existing. less—functional service.
`
`installable File System Manager a. In Windows 9x
`and Windows 2000. the part of the file system architecture
`responsible for arbitrating access to the different file sys—
`tem components. Acmnym: EFS.
`
`Installation program n. A program whose function is to
`install another program. either on a storage medium or in
`memory. An installation program. also called a setup pro—
`gram. might be used to guide a user through the often
`complex process of setting up an application for a particu-
`lar combination of machine. printer. and monitor.
`
`Installer a. A. program. provided with the Apple Macin—
`tosh operating system. that allows the user to install sys-
`tem upgrades and make boolablc [system] disks.
`
`Instance rr. An object. in object—oriented programming.
`in relation to the class to which it belongs. For example. an
`object myLr'st that belongs to a class List is an instance of
`the class List. See also class. instance variable, instantiate.
`object [definition 2}.
`Instance variable a. A variable associated with an
`
`instance of a class (an object). If a class defines a certain
`variable. each instance of the class has its own copy of that
`variable. See also class, instance. object [definition 2].
`object—oriented programming.
`Instanllate vb. To create an instance of a class. See also
`
`class, instance. object {definition 2].
`
`Instant messaging rt. A service that alerts users when
`friends or colleagues are on line and allows them to com—
`municate with each other in real time through private
`online chat areas. With instant messaging+ a user creates a
`list of other users with whom he or she wishes to commu—
`nicate: when a user from his or her list is on line. the ser-
`vice alerts the user and enables immediate contact with the
`
`other user. While instant messaging has primarily been a
`proprietary service offered by Internet service providers
`such as AOL and MSN. businesses are starting to employ
`instant messaging to increase employee efficiency and
`make expenise more readily available to employees.
`
`Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers rt.
`See l'EEE.
`
`Instruction n. An action statement in any computer lan—
`guage. most often in machine or assembly language. Most
`programs consist of two types of statements: declarations
`and instructions. See also declaration, statement.
`
`Instruction code n. See operation code.
`
`Instruction counter in. See instruction register.
`
`Instruction cycle a. The cycle in which a processor
`retrieves an instruction from memory. decodes it. and car-
`ries it out. The time required for an instruction cycle is the
`sum of the instruction tfetchl time and the execution
`(translate and execute} time and is measured by the num-
`ber of clock ticks tpulses of a processor's internal timer]
`consumed.
`
`Instruction mix rt. The assortment of types of instruc—
`tions contained in a program. such as assignment instruc—
`tions. mathematical insuuctions tllocating—point or
`integer]. control instructions, and indexing insuuctions.
`Knowledge of instruction mixes is important to designers
`ofCPUs because it tells them which instructions should be
`
`shortened to yield the greatest speed. and to designers of
`benchmarks because it enables them to make the bench-
`marks relevant to real tasks.
`
`Instruction pointer rt. See program counter.
`
`Instruction register :1. A register in a central processing
`unit that holds the address ofthc next instruction to be
`executed.
`
`Instruction set It. The set of machine instructions that a
`
`processor recognizes and can execute. See ufso assembler.
`microcode.
`
`276
`
`
`
`

`

`
`
`