A circular buffer is a fixed size buffer used to store incoming information, with a FIFO structure. It overwrites old data when full and allows for random access. It is efficient and useful for numerous applications.
A circular buffer is a type of hardware circuit or area of computer memory used to store incoming information. It is a fixed size buffer and can be understood as a data structure that uses a buffer as if it is connected end to end. It’s called a circular buffer because it gives the impression of circularity. Adding more information when the buffer is full causes the first item stored in the buffer to be overwritten. It is also called ring buffer or cyclic buffer.
An easy way to understand a circular buffer is to imagine a line at a bus station. Data is always added to one end of the row and is always removed from the other end. The head of the line is always the slot where information is added; the end of the line is where the information is removed from. The tail and head appear to be next to each other in the implementation in this type of buffer, although the buffer is, in reality, just a block of memory. Unlike the line in a bus station though, the buffer size is fixed and has a certain maximum capacity.
This means that when the buffer is full, it starts overwriting the overhead data. The maximum buffer capacity must be set in advance, and while this number can be changed at any time, any existing data in the buffer will be lost. Typically, sequential processes use cyclic buffers to exchange information and data entered by one process is read by the other. The first process, called the producer, pushes the data into the buffer, and the second process, known as the consumer, pulls it. Routines also use cyclic buffers for temporary data storage.
The most beneficial attribute of a ring buffer is the way it stores data. Data is not shuffled when an object at the end of the line is removed. If the buffer were non-circular, all data items in the buffer would have to change places when the data was removed. A circular buffer can be thought of as a First In First Out (FIFO) buffer type, while a standard buffer resembles a Last In First Out (LIFO) buffer type.
Because the circular buffer stores data in contiguous regions of memory, it allows for random access to data quickly. This type of buffer is easy to debug and is extremely efficient. It serves as a cache area to store a number of the latest included data. It is also possible to insert and remove data from both ends very quickly, making it ideal for numerous applications.
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