Industrial Engineer · phase 4 of 16 · noun
Array
Indexed collection of elements that all share the same data type.
The Explain card
- Plain English
- An array is a row of values that all share one type, reached by an index. Element zero, element one, and so on up to the size you declared.
- Example
- A tag called Zone_Temp with twenty REAL elements holds twenty oven zones. A loop steps the index from 0 to 19 and checks every zone with the same three rungs.
- Why it matters
- Arrays turn twenty copies of the same logic into one copy and a counter. An index that runs past the last element faults the controller on most platforms, and that fault stops the machine in the middle of whatever it was doing.
- Hook
- Same shape, many slots, one name.
Word knowledge
How the word is built, where it came from, and what it sits beside in memory.
In a sentence
The PLC program uses an array to store the fault codes read from eight variable frequency drives.
How it is built
- a- historical prefix toward
- rai historical root order or arrangement
Where it came from
- Origin
- Middle English from Anglo-French arrai, related to Old French areer
- Entered the language
- 14th century
- What changed
- The sense moved from orderly arrangement to troops or objects placed in order, then to structured data in computing.
How it is spelled
- Pattern
- Final -ay represents the long a sound.
Spelled like
- display
- relay
- decay
Broken into chunks
-
arr
- arrange
- arrival
-
ay
- delay
- pathway
Where it sits in the deck
Phase 4: PLC Memory, Tags, and Instructions
The data a program moves and the instructions that move it, from a single true or false value up to a structured array.
