In computer science, capability-based addressing is a scheme used by some computers to control access to memory. Under a capability-based addressing scheme, pointers are replaced by protected objects (called capabilities) that can only be created through the use of privileged instructions which may only be executed by the kernel (or some other privileged process authorised to do so). This effectively allows the kernel to control which processes may access which objects in memory without the need to use separate address spaces and therefore requiring a context switch when an access occurs. This allows an efficient implementation of capability-based security.
Read more about Capability-based Addressing: Practical Implementations, Chronology of Systems Adopting Capability-based Addressing
Famous quotes containing the word addressing:
“He took up his pen, which seemed to parch like a martyr in his hand. He began to write, nevertheless, addressing the nine-and-ninety lies of the moment he hoped with for a night of saloperie at the side of the twisted strumpet, Fiction, who lasciviously rolled her eyes at him, hiked up her skirt, and beckoned him on.”
—Alexander Theroux (b. 1940)