Information AboutExecutable |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT EXECUTABLE | |
| computer file systems | |
| programming language implementation | |
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of a binary executable file]] An executable or '''executable file''', in Computer Science , is a File whose contents are meant to be interpreted as a Program by a Computer . Most often, it contains the Binary representation of Machine Instruction s of a specific Processor (in which case the executable may also be referred to as a Binary ) Whether a file is an executable is mostly a matter of convention; some Operating Systems designate executable files by specific naming convention (such as the name ending in a Filename Extension ".bin" or ".exe") or noted alongside the file in its Metadata (such as the "execute" Permission Bit s under Unix-like Operating System s). Modern executables On most modern Architectures , an executable file contains much information that is not part of the program itself, such as information on the environment required to run the program, Debugging and Symbolic information, or other Housekeeping information used by the operating system to prepare the program to be run. System calls Executables contain Calls to operating system services in addition to regular machine instructions. This means that executables are usually operating system-specific in addition to being processor-specific. FORMATS COM (.com) (DOS) PE (.exe, .dll, .ocx, .sys, .scr) (Windows) ELF (Unix and Unix-like) Mach-O (Mac) For a list of more executable Formats , see the lists at Object File . SCRIPTS See Also: Scripting languages Not all applications exist in a form readable only by machines. Related, but generally mutually incompatible, are Scripting Languages . Unlike binaries, these applications do not go through a compilation step before being delivered to an end user. They are generally human-readable. In a sense, a script exists as both the source code and the "binary" at the same time. |
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