content-addressable memory

Content-addressable memory (CAM) is a special type of computer memory used in certain very-high-speed searching applications. It is also known as associative memory, associative storage, or associative array, although the last term is more often used for a programming data structure. It compares input search data (tag) against a table of stored data, and returns the address of matching data (or in the case of associative memory, the matching data). Several custom computers, like the Goodyear STARAN, were built to implement CAM, and were designated associative computers.