unwind the stack
During the execution of a procedural language, one is said to "unwind the stack"
from a called procedure up to a caller when one discards the stack frame and any
number of frames above it, popping back up to the level of the given caller. In
C this is done with "longjmp"/"setjmp", in Lisp with "throw/catch". See also
smash the stack.
[Jargon File]
Nearby terms:
unswizzle « untyped « unwind-protect « unwind the
stack
» UN*X » unzip » up
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