Lesson plan
Bounded pointer
In computer science, a bounded pointer is a pointer that is augmented with additional information that enable the storage bounds within which it may point to be deduced. This additional information sometimes takes the form of two pointers holding the upper and lower addresses of the storage occupied by the object to which the bounded pointer points. Use of bound information makes it possible for a compiler to generate code that performs bounds checking, i.e. that tests if a pointer's value lies within the bounds prior to dereferencing the pointer or modifying the value of the pointer. If the bounds are violated some kind of exception may be raised. This is especially useful for data constructs such as arrays in C.
Article summary
In computer science, a bounded pointer is a pointer that is augmented with additional information that enable the storage bounds within which it may point to be deduced. This additional information sometimes takes the form of two pointers holding the upper and lower addresses of the storage occupied by the object to which the bounded pointer points. Use of bound information makes it possible for a compiler to generate code that performs bounds checking, i.e. that tests if a pointer's value lies within the bounds prior to dereferencing the pointer or modifying the value of the pointer. If the bounds are violated some kind of exception may be raised. This is especially useful for data constructs such as arrays in C.
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Discussion questions
- Summarise the article in your own words. Which single claim would you verify first, and why?
- Which claim in this article is most likely to be revised as the sources update? How would you check its current status?
- If two sources disagreed about one of these facts, what would you need in order to trust one over the other?
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Key claims and bibliography are generated from the same tracked claims and sources as the article page.