downpointer

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English[edit]

Etymology[edit]

down- +‎ pointer

Noun[edit]

downpointer (plural downpointers)

  1. (computing theory) A pointer in a hierarchical data structure that points to the node that is down from the current node.
    • 1969, Information Processing: Proceedings of the IFIP Congress, page 1249:
      Except at level zero, the downpointer always points down.
    • 1985, Society for Industrial, Applied Mathematics, SIAM Journal on Computing, volume 14, page 244:
      […] this data structure differs from the tree […] illustrated in Fig. 1, only by having downpointers replaced by downtrees.
    • 2004, Allen B. Tucker, Computer Science Handbook, pages 11–25:
      By using the so-called functional approach to data structures Chazelle [1988] developed a compression scheme to encode the downpointers used by Willard [1985] to reduce further the space requirement.
  2. (aviation) An indicator that points toward the ground.
    • 1989, Aviation Space and Environmental Medicine, page 492:
      During one session , the subject used a canopy-mounted downpointer to estimate position in space relative to the ground, and in the other session the subject used a joystick-controlled, inside-out, aircraft attitude indicator.
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