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overrun: n. 1. [techspeak] Term for a frequent consequence of data arriving
faster than it can be consumed, esp. in serial line communications. For
example, at 9600 baud there is almost exactly one character per
millisecond, so if a silo can hold only two
characters and the machine takes longer than 2 msec to get to service the
interrupt, at least one character will be lost. 2. Also applied to non-serial-I/O communications. “I forgot
to pay my electric bill due to mail overrun.” “Sorry, I got
four phone calls in 3 minutes last night and lost your message to
overrun.” When thrashing at tasks, the next
person to make a request might be told “Overrun!” Compare
firehose syndrome. 3. More loosely, may refer to a
buffer overflow not necessarily related to processing time (as in
overrun screw).
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