<data> To delete something, usually superfluous, or to abort
	an operation.

	"Flush" was standard {ITS} terminology for aborting an output
	operation.  One spoke of the text that would have been
	printed, but was not, as having been flushed.  It is
	speculated that this term arose from a vivid image of flushing
	unwanted characters by hosing down the internal output buffer,
	washing the characters away before they could be printed.

	Compare {drain}.

	2. To force temporarily buffered data to be written to more
	permanent memory.  E.g. flushing buffered disk writes to disk,
	as with {C}'s {standard I/O} library "fflush(3)" call.  This
	sense was in use among {BLISS} programmers at {DEC} and on
	{Honeywell} and {IBM} machines as far back as 1965.  Another
	example of this usage is flushing a {cache} on a {context
	switch} where modified data stored in the cace which belongs
	to one processes must be written out to main memory so that
	the cache can be used by another process.

	[{Jargon File}]

	(2005-07-18)

<data, data processing, jargon> /day't*/ (Or "raw data")
	Numbers, {characters}, {images}, or other method of recording,
	in a form which can be assessed by a human or (especially)
	input into a {computer}, stored and {processed} there, or
	transmitted on some {digital channel}.  Computers nearly
	always represent data in {binary}.

	Data on its own has no meaning, only when interpreted by some
	kind of {data processing system} does it take on meaning and
	become {information}.

	People or computers can find patterns in data to perceive
	information, and information can be used to enhance
	{knowledge}.  Since knowledge is prerequisite to wisdom, we
	always want more data and information.  But, as modern
	societies verge on {information overload}, we especially need
	better ways to find patterns.

	1234567.89 is data.

	"Your bank balance has jumped 8087% to $1234567.89" is
	information.

	"Nobody owes me that much money" is knowledge.

	"I'd better talk to the bank before I spend it, because of
	what has happened to other people" is wisdom.

	(1999-04-30)

<storage> These days, usually used synonymously with {Random
	Access Memory} or {Read-Only Memory}, but in the general sense
	it can be any device that can hold {data} in
	{machine-readable} format.

	(1996-05-25)