Glossary 

Code

A program or section of program. Sometimes used as a verb - ie: the creation of code

Kludge

A piece of code that corrects a problem in a separate piece of code

Rendering

A fancy word for 'drawing stuff'

Double Buffering

A technique where drawing commands are executed to a hidden buffer and then flipped into view at a later time

Front Buffer

A section of memory, or 'buffer' containing graphics that are visible on the screen. Drawing to the front buffer directly affects what the user sees on-screen

Back Buffer

A section of memory, or 'buffer', containing graphics that are NOT visible on the screen. Drawing to the back buffer has no effect on what the user sees on-screen

Refresh Rate

The rate at which the screen updates its graphics - typically in the range 50-85 times a second. This rate differs from graphics mode to graphics mode, graphics driver to graphics driver and PC to PC - ie: a very unpredictable quantity

Frame Time

The reciprocal of refresh rate - ie: how long it takes for a screen to update its graphics

Code Tweaking

Performing many minor changes to a piece of code in the hope of a disproportionately large speed increase

Frame-syncing

Allowing a games timing to be determined by the screen refresh rate

IDE

An acronym for Integrated development environment. Basically just a flash term for a program that lets you write programs!

Compiler

A program that takes a program in one computer language and converts it to another. Typically, the output language is machine code.

BASIC

Beginners All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code - a cool language that refuses to die!