Computer Interfaces and Programming
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Ellipses are often used in an operating system's taskbars or web browser tabs to indicate longer titles than will fit. Hovering the cursor over the tab often displays a tooltip of the full title. When many programs are open, or during a "tab explosion" in web browsing, the tabs may be reduced in size so much that no characters from the actual titles show, and ellipses take up all the space besides the program icon or favicon.
In many user interface guidelines, a "…" after the name of a command implies that the user will need to provide further information, for example in a subsequent dialog box, before the action can be completed. A typical example is the Save As… command, which after being clicked will usually require the user to enter a filename, as opposed to Save where the file will usually be saved under its existing name.
An ellipsis character after a status message signifies that an operation may take some time, as in "Downloading updates…".
The ellipsis is used as an operator in some programming languages. The precise meaning varies by language, but it generally involves something dealing with multiple items. See Ellipsis (programming operator).
Read more about this topic: Ellipsis
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