Difference between revisions of "Branch (computer science)"
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Latest revision as of 17:57, 21 April 2016
In computer science, a branch is an instruction in a computer program that can cause a computer to begin executing a different instruction sequence and thus deviate from its default behavior of executing instructions in order.
Branch (or branching, branched) may also refer to the act of switching execution to a different instruction sequence as a result of executing a branch instruction.
Description
A branch instruction can be either an unconditional branch, which always results in branching, or a conditional branch, which may or may not cause branching, depending on some condition.
Branch instructions are used to implement control flow in program loops and conditionals (i.e., executing a particular sequence of instructions only if certain conditions are satisfied).
Description
A computer program is, fundamentally, the use of instructions executed by a computer.
By default, instructions are executed in sequence as they appear in the program,[a] but the exception to this rule is the execution of branch or jump instructions that (may) cause the computer to begin execution of a different part of the program than the next instruction, thus "jumping" (or "branching") from one part of the program to another.
Branch instructions are used to implement control flow constructs such as conditionals or loops.
A branch instruction can be either an unconditional branch, which always results in branching, or a conditional branch, which may or may not cause branching depending on some condition.
See also
External links
- Branch (computer science) @ Wikipedia
