sample:A discrete piece of waveform data represented by a single numerical value. Sampling is the process of converting analog data to digital data by taking samples of the analog waveform at regular intervals.
sampling rate:The rate at which a waveform audio driver performs audio-to-digital or digital- to-audio conversion. For CD-DA, the sampling rate is 44.1 kHz.
scale:A transformation that alters the apparent size of an object.
scan code:A device-dependent value that identifies a physical key on the keyboard. Each key on a keyboard generates two unique scan codes—one when the user presses the key and the other when the user releases the key.
scan line:A single row of adjacent pixels on a video display.
scroll bar:An element of the Windows user interface that converts mouse or keyboard input into values that a window procedure can use to shift the contents of a window's client area either horizontally or vertically.
scroll bar control:A predefined control window that belongs to the SCROLLBAR window class.
scroll box:A movable area in a scroll bar that indicates the position of the information currently displayed in the associated window. The position of the scroll box is relative to the total amount of information available for display.
scrolling:Shifting a data object in a window's client area in order to see parts of the object that extend beyond the border of the client area.
scrolling range:The minimum and maximum values that a scroll bar can report.
seek:With file I/O, seek means to change the current position in the file. The current position is the location where the next read or write operation will take place. With a media device (such as a hard disk), seek means to position the media so a certain sector can be accessed. The seek involves a physical movement of the device, so the time it takes can often be perceived by the user.
sequence:See MIDI sequence.
sequencer:See MIDI sequencer.
server:In the context of mailslots, a process that creates a mailslot and which can read messages from it.
share mode:A characteristic of a file. Indicates whether a file is to be shared for reading, writing, both, or neither.
shared memory:Memory that two or more processes can read from and write to. If the file mapping object that references the shared memory has a name, the memory is referred to as “named shared memory.”
shear:A transformation that alters the apparent length and orientation of vertical or horizontal lines in an object.
signature:A 4-byte value that identifies an enhanced metafile.
simple device:An MCI device that does not require a device element (data file) for playback. The MCI compact-disc audio driver is an example of a simple device.
SMPTE:(Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers) An association of engineers involved in movie, television, and video production. SMPTE also refers to SMPTE time, the timing standard that this group adopted.
SMPTE division type:One of four SMPTE timing formats. SMPTE time is expressed in hours, minutes, seconds, and frames. The SMPTE division type specifies the frames-per-second value corresponding to a given SMPTE time. For example, a SMPTE time of one hour, 30 minutes, 24 seconds, and 15 frames is useful only if the frames-per-second value, or SMPTE division type, is known.
SMPTE offset:A MIDI event that designates the SMPTE time at which playback of a MIDI file is to start. SMPTE offsets are used only with MIDI files using SMPTE division type.
SMPTE time:A standard representation of time developed for the video and film industries. SMPTE time is used with MIDI audio because many people use MIDI to score films and video. SMPTE time is an absolute time format expressed in hours, minutes, seconds, and frames. Standard SMPTE division types are 24, 25, and 30 frames per second.
solid brush:A logical brush that was created from an 8-pixel by 8-pixel bitmap which contains 64 pixels of the same color.
square-wave synthesizer:A synthesizer that produces sound by adding square waves of various frequencies. A square wave is a rectangular waveform.
standard resource:A resource whose format is defined and recognized by Windows. Standard resources include icons, cursors, menus, dialog boxes, bitmaps, fonts, keyboard accelerator tables, message-table entries, string-table entries, and version data.
standard scroll bar:A scroll bar created as part of the nonclient area of an overlapped, pop-up, or child window.
standard VGA:A video adapter that supports a resolution of 640 by 480 pixels and 16 simultaneous colors.
stock brush:One of seven logical brushes maintained by Windows.
stock pen:A cosmetic pen that is created and maintained by the window manager. There are three stock pens: a black pen, a white pen, and an invisible pen.
streaming:The process of transferring infor-mation from a storage device, such as a hard disk or CD-ROM, to a device driver. Rather than transferring all the information in a single data copy, the
subtractive color-technology:The color technology used by ink-based printers that uses three primary colors: cyan, yellow, and magenta. Other colors (except white) are obtained by combining two or more of the primaries in varying amounts. White is defined as the absence of the primaries.
super VGA:A video adapter that supports resolutions higher than 640 by 480 pixels and/or more than 16 simultaneous colors.
System menu:A pop-up menu, defined mainly by the system, that typically contains commands used to set a window's size or position, close a window or application, or activate a different application.
system paging file:Storage file that the kernel uses to hold pages of memory swapped out of RAM.
system palette:An array that identifies all of the colors which can be displayed simultaneously on a device. For most displays, this array is a subset of all possible colors that can appear on the display.
System Time:The “real-time” clock format. System time uses a data structure containing individual members for the date and time.