From: 11454725@eng2.eng.monash.edu.au (JOLAN EVANS)
Subject: Re: Use of "dereference"
Organization: Faculty of Engineering, Monash University 
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1992 16:49:38 GMT

In article <1992Jul27.133616.1@wombat.newcastle.edu.au> eepjm@wombat.newcastle.edu.au (Peter Moylan) writes:
>In article <11454725.19.712045108@eng2.eng.monash.edu.au>, 11454725@eng2.eng.monash.edu.au (JOLAN EVANS) writes:
>> Use of "derefence"
>> 
>>       In one of my first year computer science subjects my lecturer uses 
>> the word dereference. From the context in which he uses it, to my best 
>> knowledge, it means "given a reference to a variable x, obtain its value". I 
>> can not find it in The Macquarie Dictionary ( a relatively large Australian 
>> English language dictionary), Revised Edition or the Hamlyn Dictionary of 
>> Computing. The Macquarie Dictionary, Revised Edition is a little dated do I 
>> was wondering if it's in any larger and/or more up to date dictionary/
>> dictionary of computing. My immeditate thoughts as to the etymology if it is 
>> a recently invented word is the contraction of "decode" and "reference". Any 
>> thoughts?

>Others have already given good answers, but I'd just like to add this
>suggestion: don't bother looking up the Macquarie Dictionary for anything
>related to computers.  Most of the time you won't find the word you're
>looking for - which is perhaps understandable, given that many such
>words are new jargon - and the rest of the time you risk finding
>definitions with which computer-literate people would not agree.
>(Check out "microcomputer" and "microprocessor", for example; they have
>the definitions back to front.)

>I like this dictionary - for most purposes it's my favourite - but in
>this one area they seem not to have checked their entries with
>anyone competent in the area.

If I had a dictionary with me at the time (or just thought a little more
about it) I would have realised that de is the prefix for reversal, or as
another poster put it inverse, as can be seen with "code" and "decode". My
thinking was probably clouded by my attempt to simultaneously understand the
lecture material which involved the word and decipher the meaning of the new
word.

The only reason why I looked it up in the Macquarie was because upon
questioning my lecturer about the meaning of the word he gave me the
impression that the use of the word was not confined to computer science.
This notion was further reinforced when I couldn't find the word in my
computing dictionary. I looked it up in the Macquarie because I find knowing
the general meaning of a word very helpful in understanding the often harder
to understand meaning in computer science. I most certainly
don't use the Macquarie as a computing dictionary. I probably know more
computing terms than what it contains. Does any one know if the Second
Edition is any better with respect to computer terms.

Does anybody know of a good computer science dictionary? My idea of good is a
concept by concept rather than word by word format. Of course this means
extra page flipping from the indexed word to the concept containing its
explanation. But the benefits are that you can quickly look at all the
related words and equivalent terms. It would also probably be shorter because
of less repitition. I have seen a book similar to what I am talking about but
it was more on introductory computing rather than in depth computer science.

Does anybody know if `The New Hacker's Dictionary' is available by ftp and if
so where from?

Not really on the topic, can anybody shed some light on why my original
post supposedly had 0 lines. I think this is what is preventing me from
forwarding a copy to myself. (I only get an address header with no message.)

Thanks to everybody has responded so far,