Memory operation: reading is not destructive, writing is destructive, and memory is volatile.
Since memory locations can be randomly accessed by their addresses, memory is referred to as RAM (random-access memory). Since memory locations can be read from or written to, memory is frequently referred to as RWM (read write memory). Reading from memory is not destructive, meaning that it does not change the memory contents. Writing to memory is destructive, since what is written to a location replaces what was stored before. Memory is volatile meaning that memory contents are lost when the computer is shut down or when power goes off.
