Because some computer configurations are much faster at reading data than at writing it, updating access times after every read operation can be very expensive.

To write a bit of core memory, the circuitry assumes there has been a read operation and the bit is in the 0 state.

To write a 1 bit, the selected X and Y lines are driven, with current in the opposite direction as for the read operation.

The 'split' variable controls the read operation, and the expansion operation.

It says that a read operation has to return the result of the latest write operation which occurred on that data item.

The operating system was usually programmed to keep retrying a failed read operation, which often would succeed after multiple attempts.

The program requests data transfers by use of the read operation.

Most noted is the read cycle time, the time between successive read operations to an open row.

This is because the underlying data is not changed by the read operation, so the same value is always read.

The read operation can return an arbitrary number.