The Apple Worm is a computer program written for the Apple computer, and especially for the component 6502 microprocessor, which performs the act of dynamic self-relocation. The source code of the Apple Worm is the first program printed in its entirety within the Scientific American. The Apple Worm was designed and developed by James R. Hauser and William R. Buckley.
Because the Apple Worm performs dynamic self-relocation within the one main memory of one computer, it does not constitute a computer virus, an apt if somewhat inaccurate description. Though the analogous behavior of copying code between memories is exactly the act performed by a computer virus, the virus has other characters not present in the worm. Note, such programs do not necessarily cause collateral damage to the computing systems upon which their instructions execute; there is no reliance upon a vector to ensure subsequent execution. This extends to the computer virus; it need not be destructive in order to effect its communication between computational environments.
Read more about Apple Worm: Programs, Other Examples, External Links
Famous quotes containing the words apple and/or worm:
“The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.”
—Swedish proverb, trans. by Verne Moberg.
“A little cooling down of animal excitability and instinct, a little loss of animal toughness, a little irritable weakness and descent of the pain-threshold, will bring the worm at the core of all our usual springs of delight into full view, and turn us into melancholy metaphysicians.”
—William James (1842–1910)