lexical scope

In computer programming, scope is an enclosing context where values and expressions are associated. Various programming languages have various types of scopes. The type of scope determines what kind of entities it can contain and how it affects them -- or semantics. Scopes can:contain declarations or definitions of identifiers;contain statements and/or expressions which define an executable algorithm or part thereof;nest or be nested.
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<programming> (Or "static scope") In a lexically scoped language, the scope of an identifier is fixed at compile time to some region in the source code containing the identifier's declaration. This means that an identifier is only accessible within that region (including procedures declared within it).
This contrasts with dynamic scope where the scope depends on the nesting of procedure and function calls at run time.
Statically scoped languages differ as to whether the scope is limited to the smallest block (including begin/end blocks) containing the identifier's declaration (e.g. C, Perl) or to whole function and procedure bodies (e.g. ?), or some larger unit of code (e.g. ?). The former is known as static nested scope.
(2001-09-07)