Copy-on-write
Programming technique for efficiently duplicating data / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Dear Wikiwand AI, let's keep it short by simply answering these key questions:
Can you list the top facts and stats about Copy-on-write?
Summarize this article for a 10 years old
Copy-on-write (COW), sometimes referred to as implicit sharing[1] or shadowing,[2] is a resource-management technique used in computer programming to efficiently implement a "duplicate" or "copy" operation on modifiable resources.[3] If a resource is duplicated but not modified, it is not necessary to create a new resource; the resource can be shared between the copy and the original. Modifications must still create a copy, hence the technique: the copy operation is deferred until the first write. By sharing resources in this way, it is possible to significantly reduce the resource consumption of unmodified copies, while adding a small overhead to resource-modifying operations.