toggle

toggle

1. a wooden peg or metal rod fixed crosswise through an eye at the end of a rope, chain, or cable, for fastening temporarily by insertion through an eye in another rope, chain, etc.

2. Machinery a toggle joint or a device having such a joint

Collins Discovery Encyclopedia, 1st edition © HarperCollins Publishers 2005

toggle

[′täg·əl]

(computer science)

To switch back and forth between two stable states or modes of operation.

A hardware or software device that carries out this switching action.

(electronics)

To switch over to an alternate state, as in a flip-flop.

(mechanical engineering)

A form of jointed mechanism for the amplification of forces.

McGraw-Hill Dictionary of Scientific & Technical Terms, 6E, Copyright © 2003 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

toggle

To change a bit from whatever state it is in to the other state; to change from 1 to 0 or from 0 to 1. This comes from "toggle switches", such as standard light switches, though the word "toggle" actually refers to the mechanism that keeps the switch in the position to which it is flipped rather than to the fact that the switch has two positions. There are four things you can do to a bit: set it (force it to be 1), clear (or zero) it, leave it alone, or toggle it.

This article is provided by FOLDOC - Free Online Dictionary of Computing (foldoc.org)

toggle

To alternate back and forth between two states by pressing or clicking the same button. For example, the "Last" button on a TV remote control alternates between the last two TV channels selected. In Windows, pressing Alt-Tab switches the user between the last two open application windows that were selected. See toggle switch.

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