Chapter 6, Problem 1RQ

Explanation of Solution

Descriptor:

• The descriptor is nothing but collection of the attributes of a variable.
• It is an area of memory which stores the attributes of a variable in an implementation.
• If the attributes are all static, then the descriptors are required only at compile time. These descriptors are built by the compiler, usually as a part of the symbol table, and are used during compilation.
• For dynamic attributes, all of the descriptor must be maintained during execution. Here, the descriptor is used by the run-time system.
• Generally, it is used for type checking and building the code for the allocation and deallocation operations.