Glossary - Java Software Solutions: Foundations of Program Design - page 648

element— A value or object stored in another
object such as an array.
element type— See array element type.
else— A Java reserved word that designates the
portion of code in an if statement that will be
executed if the condition is false.
enable— Make a graphical user interface compo-
nent active so that it can be used. See also disable.
encapsulation— The characteristic of an object
that limits access to the variables and methods
contained in it. All interaction with an object
occurs through a well-defined interface that
supports a modular design.
equality operator— One of two Java operators
that returns a boolean result based on whether
two values are equal (==) or not equal (!=).
equivalence category— A range of function-
ally equivalent input values as specified by the
requirements of the software component. Used
when developing black-box test cases.
error— (1) Any defect in a design or program.
(2) An object that can be thrown and processed
by special catch blocks, though usually errors
should not be caught. See also compile-time
error, exception, logical error, run-time error,
syntax error.
escape sequence— In Java, a sequence of char-
acters beginning with the backslash charac-
ter (\), used to indicate a special situation
when printing values. For example, the escape
sequence \t specifies that a horizontal tab
should be printed.
exception— (1) A situation that arises during
program execution that is erroneous or out of the
ordinary. (2) An object that can be thrown and
processed by special catch blocks. See also error.
exception handler— The code in a catch clause
of a try statement, executed when a particular
type of exception is thrown.

exception propagation— The process that
occurs when an exception is thrown: control
returns to each calling method in the stack
trace until the exception is caught and handled
or until the exception is thrown from the main
method, terminating the program.
exponent— The portion of a floating point
value's internal representation that specifies
how far the decimal point is shifted. See also
mantissa.
expression— A combination of operators and
operands that produce a result.
extends— A Java reserved word used to specify
the parent class in the definition of a child class.
event— (1) A user action, such as a mouse click
or key press. (2) An object that represents a
user action, to which the program can respond.
See also event-driven programming.
event-driven programming— An approach to
software development in which the program
is designed to acknowledge that an event has
occurred and to act accordingly. See also event.
false— A Java reserved word that serves as one
of the two boolean literals ( true and false ).
fetch-decode-execute— The cycle through
which the CPU continually obtains instructions
from main memory and executes them.
FIFO— See first-in, first-out.
file— A named collection of data stored on a
secondary storage device such as a disk. See
also text file.
file chooser— A graphical user interface com-
ponent, usually displayed as a dialog box, that
allows the user to select a file from a storage
device.
file server— A computer in a network, usually
with a large secondary storage capacity, that is
dedicated to storing software needed by many
network users.