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<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><title>flat</title><link rel="stylesheet" href="../../jargon.css" type="text/css"/><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets V1.61.0"/><link rel="home" href="../index.html" title="The Jargon File"/><link rel="up" href="../F.html" title="F"/><link rel="previous" href="flash-crowd.html" title="flash crowd"/><link rel="next" href="flat-ASCII.html" title="flat-ASCII"/></head><body><div class="navheader"><table width="100%" summary="Navigation header"><tr><th colspan="3" align="center">flat</th></tr><tr><td width="20%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="flash-crowd.html">Prev</a> </td><th width="60%" align="center">F</th><td width="20%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="flat-ASCII.html">Next</a></td></tr></table><hr/></div><dt><a id="flat"/><dt xmlns="" id="flat"><b>flat</b>: <span xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" class="grammar">adj.</span></dt></dt><dd><p> 1. [common] Lacking any complex internal structure. &#8220;<span class="quote">That
<a href="../B/bitty-box.html"><i class="glossterm">bitty box</i></a> has only a flat filesystem, not a
hierarchical one.</span>&#8221; The verb form is <a href="flatten.html"><i class="glossterm">flatten</i></a>.
</p></dd><dd><p> 2. Said of a memory architecture (like that of the
<a href="../V/VAX.html"><i class="glossterm">VAX</i></a> or 680x0) that is one big linear address space
(typically with each possible value of a processor register corresponding
to a unique core address), as opposed to a <span class="firstterm">segmented</span> architecture (like that of the 80x86)
in which addresses are composed from a base-register/offset pair (segmented
designs are generally considered <a href="../C/cretinous.html"><i class="glossterm">cretinous</i></a>).</p></dd><dd><p>Note that sense 1 (at least with respect to filesystems) is usually
used pejoratively, while sense 2 is a
<a href="../G/Good-Thing.html"><i class="glossterm">Good Thing</i></a>.</p></dd><div class="navfooter"><hr/><table width="100%" summary="Navigation footer"><tr><td width="40%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="flash-crowd.html">Prev</a> </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="u" href="../F.html">Up</a></td><td width="40%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="flat-ASCII.html">Next</a></td></tr><tr><td width="40%" align="left" valign="top">flash crowd </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="h" href="../index.html">Home</a></td><td width="40%" align="right" valign="top"> flat-ASCII</td></tr></table></div></body></html>