2014-04-26 10:52:28 -04:00
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mode bit
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2014-04-26 11:54:15 -04:00
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n. [common] A flag , usually in hardware, that selects between two (usually
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quite different) modes of operation. The connotations are different from
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flag bit in that mode bits are mainly written during a boot or set-up phase,
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are seldom explicitly read, and seldom change over the lifetime of an
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ordinary program. The classic example was the EBCDIC-vs.-ASCII bit (#12) of
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the Program Status Word of the IBM 360.
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