interprocess communication

interprocess communication

[¦in·tər‚prä·səs kə‚myü·ə′kā·shən]

(computer science)

The communication between computer programs running concurrently under the control of the same operating system.

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

IPC

(1) (IP Camera) See network camera.

(2) (InterProcess Communication) The exchange of data between one program and another either within the same computer or over a network. An IPC protocol generally expects a response to a request. Examples are Dynamic Data Exchange in Windows and Interapplication Communications in the Mac (see DDE and IAC).

IPCs are performed automatically by the applications. For example, a spreadsheet program might query a database program to retrieve data. A manual example of an IPC is performed when users copy and paste data from one file to another.

(3) (Instructions Per Clock cycle) The number of instructions that can be executed by a CPU in one tick of the clock. This is accomplished by various pipelining techniques that determine which instructions can be executed in parallel and keeping often-used instructions in a cache. See pipeline processing.

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