In most languages, if procedure f is declared inside g , then f can only appear as descendent of g in the activation tree. If p is nested immediately inside q , then the access link in p 's activation record points to the activation record for the most recent live activation of q . Non-local v is found by following one or more access links to the activation record that contains v , and then taking the appropriate offset within that record. These locations are fully known at compile time. Procedure frame contains procedure's own locals and arguments passed to called routines.
Frame is normally fixed-size .
Callee executes save instruction, which shifts register window and allocates frame. Callee optionally stores arguments into argument build area of caller's frame. Return Sequence 1. Callee executes restore instruction, which resets register window and deallocates frame.