A slot is a specific place at an airport where a plane can take off or land. Slots are very limited, and there are strict rules that airlines must follow to keep their slots. Airlines that do not comply can lose their slots to other airlines. Airline flight schedules are usually based on two seasons, with slots allocated to airlines in advance of those seasons. Getting slots is a highly competitive process, and top prices are paid for slots at the busiest airports.
A machine that pays out credits based on the arrangement of symbols on a spinning reel. Many slot machines have a theme, and the symbols and bonus features vary accordingly. The earliest slots used mechanical reels to display and determine results, but modern digital technology has enabled variations on the basic concept. For example, many modern slot games have Megaways – multiple paylines that give the player more chances to win.
The pay table of a slot game lists all the possible combinations of symbols and the amount that can be won for landing them on a payline. It also lists any special symbols, such as the Wild symbol or Scatter symbols. In addition, the pay table will specify whether there are any bonus features that can be triggered when landing three or more scatter or bonus symbols.
To play a slot machine, the user inserts cash or, in ticket-in, ticket-out (TITO) machines, a paper ticket with a barcode into a slot on the machine. The machine then activates the reels and stops them to rearrange the symbols, generating combinations as they do so. If the machine reaches a winning combination, the player receives credits based on the payout schedule set by the manufacturer.
A narrow notch, groove, or opening, as a keyway in a machine, a slit for coins in a vending machine, or an unmarked area in ice hockey that gives a player a good vantage point. Also called slit, slat, or slot.
An authorization for an aircraft to fly at a particular time and place, as authorized by the airport or air traffic control. A slot is a critical component of the planning process at busy airports, and helps to avoid repeated delays caused by too many flights trying to land or take off simultaneously.
A slot is the portion of a computer processor that holds the operation issue and data path machinery for one or more execution units. In very long instruction word (VLIW) computers, the slot is also known as an execute pipeline. The VLIW architecture is popular in server farms because of its ability to scale up performance without adding additional hardware. However, the slot model is not well suited to desktop or mobile computing devices, where the CPU and GPU are separate chips. In these devices, the CPU processes instructions and the GPU handles graphics. The scalability of the VLIW slot is limited by the power and heat that must be dissipated by the underlying processor to maintain acceptable temperatures.