An Etymological Dictionary of Astronomy and Astrophysics
English-French-Persian

The primary component of a → computer that processes instructions. It runs the → operating system and → applications, constantly receiving input from the user or active → software programs. The CPU has two typical components: 1) Control Unit, which extracts instructions from memory and decodes and executes them. 2) Arithmetic Logic Unit (ALU), which handles arithmetic and logical operations.

→ central; → processing; → unit.