forward compatibility

<jargon>

The ability to accept input from later versions of itself.

Forward compatibility is harder to achieve than backward compatibility, since, in the backward case, the input format is know whereas a forward compatible system needs to cope gracefully with unknown future features. An example of future compatibility is the stipulation that a web browser should ignore HTML tags it does not recognise.

See also extensible.

Last updated: 2003-06-23

Nearby terms:

forward chaining ♦ forward compatibility ♦ forward compatible ♦ forward delta

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