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Procrustean assignment

Procrustean assignment noun: a form of assignment to fixed-length string variables in which a shorter value is padded to the necessary length while a longer one is truncated.

Noun

Procrustean assignment (uncountable)

  1. (dated, rare) A form of assignment to fixed-length string variables in which a shorter value is padded to the necessary length while a longer one is truncated.
    • […]the string that is being assigned to it is cut off on the right if it is too long, or filled out with spaces if it is too short - this is called Procrustean assignment[…]1982, Steven Vickers, Robin Bradbeer, Sinclair ZX Spectrum: BASIC Programming
    • […] that Procrustean assignment that the Manual goes on about: string arrays always have a fixed length of word.1983, Ian Stewart, Robin Jones, Machine code and better BASIC, page 51

Origin of Procrustean assignment

After the legendary highwayman Procrustes, who stretched or cut his victims to make them fit a bed.

Questions about Procrustean assignment

What does Procrustean assignment mean?
Procrustean assignment means a form of assignment to fixed-length string variables in which a shorter value is padded to the necessary length while a longer one is truncated.
What part of speech is Procrustean assignment?
Procrustean assignment is a noun.

Words near Procrustean assignment in the dictionary

  1. procreatrix
  2. Procris
  3. Procrus
  4. procrusculum
  5. procrustean
  6. Procrustean assignment
  7. procrustean bed
  8. procrustean beds
  9. procrusteanism
  10. procrusteanize
  11. procrusteanized

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Procrustean assignment (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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