W
 
while statement
A C and C++ looping statement that contains the word while followed by an expression in parentheses (the condition) and a statement (the action). IBM.
white space
Anything in a program that is not code. Space characters, tab characters, form feed characters, new-line characters, and, when referring to source code, comments are all considered white space.
wide characters
(1) Characters whose range of values can represent distinct codes for all members of the largest extended character set specified among the supporting locales. (2) Elements of type wchar_t that, when processed sequentially, can represent text. Some other values can also support wide characters. See narrow characters.
Win32
The name of a 32-bit application programming interface (API) developed by Microsoft Corporation.
Win32 API
(1) A set of Win32 functions that can be called from source code. (2) A 32-bit version of the 16-bit Windows 3.1 API (native to Windows NT).
Win32s
A subset of the Win32 API that can run under Windows 3.x. (The s stands for subset.)
Windows NT
An operating system on which the Win32 API is implemented. It is a portable, high-end operating system, which supports multitasking. It is the only operating system that allows implementation of the Win32 APIs on machine architectures based on processors other than the x86 series, and it supports multiple processors. See Win32 API.
Windows 95
(1) A 32-bit operating system using the Win32 API that runs 32-bit applications. Windows 95 is a multitasking, multithreaded operating system that can control multiple programs at once. VisualAge C++, Version 4.0 does not support Windows 95.
word boundary
Any storage position at which data must be aligned for certain processing operations. The halfword boundary must be divisible by 2, the fullword boundary by 4, and the doubleword boundary by 8. IBM.
working directory
See current working directory.
Workplace Shell interface
The object-oriented, graphical user interface of OS/2, Version 2.0 and later versions.
WPS
See Workplace Shell interface.
write
(1) To output characters to a file, such as standard output or standard error. Unless otherwise stated, standard output is the default output destination for all uses of the term write. X/Open. (2) To make a permanent or transient recording of data in a storage device or on a data medium. I, ANSI.
 
IBM Copyright 2003