Code vs. Regulation — What's the Difference?

In communications and information processing, code is a system of rules to convert information—such as a letter, word, sound, image, or gesture—into another form, sometimes shortened or secret, for communication through a communication channel or storage in a storage medium. An early example is an invention of language, which enabled a person, through speech, to communicate what they thought, saw, heard, or felt to others.

Regulation is the management of complex systems according to a set of rules and trends. In systems theory, these types of rules exist in various fields of biology and society, but the term has slightly different meanings according to context.

A system of words, letters, figures, or symbols used to represent others, especially for the purposes of secrecy

A rule or directive made and maintained by an authority

Program instructions

The action or process of regulating or being regulated

A systematic collection of laws or statutes

The act of regulating or the state of being regulated.

Convert (the words of a message) into a code so as to convey a secret meaning

A principle, rule, or law designed to control or govern conduct.

Write code for (a computer program)

A governmental order having the force of law. Also called executive order.

Be the genetic code for (an amino acid or protein)

(Embryology) The capacity of an embryo to continue normal development following injury to or alteration of a structure.

A system of signals used to represent letters or numbers in transmitting messages.

(Sports) The standard playing period for a timed game, prior to overtime or a shootout.

A system of symbols, letters, or words given certain arbitrary meanings, used for transmitting messages requiring secrecy or brevity.

(uncountable) The act of regulating or the condition of being regulated.

An access code.

(countable) A law or administrative rule, issued by an organization, used to guide or prescribe the conduct of members of that organization.

A special command, such as a sequence of keystrokes, that allows a user to activate a hidden or accidental feature in a computer program or video game.

A type of law made by the executive branch of government, usually by virtue of a statute made by the legislative branch giving the executive the authority to do so.

The information that constitutes a specific computer program.

A numbered provision within such kind of law.

A system of symbols and rules that serve as instructions for a computer.

(European Union law) A form of legislative act which is self-effecting, and requires no further intervention by the Member States to become law.

(Genetics) The genetic code.

(genetics) Mechanism controlling DNA transcription.

A systematically arranged and comprehensive collection of laws.

(medicine) Physiological process which consists in maintaining homoeostasis.

A systematic collection of regulations or rules of procedure or conduct

In conformity with applicable rules and regulations.

(Medicine) Code blue.

The act of regulating, or the state of being regulated.

(Slang) A patient whose heart has stopped beating, as in cardiac arrest.

A rule or order prescribed for management or government; prescription; a regulating principle; a governing direction; precept; law; as, the regulations of a society or a school.

To convert (a message, for example) into code.

An authoritative rule

To systematize and arrange (laws and regulations) into a code.

A principle or condition that customarily governs behavior;

To assign a code to (something) for identification or classification

The state of being controlled or governed

To express or convey (words) in a manner that implies a different meaning

(embryology) the ability of an early embryo to continue normal development after its structure has been somehow damaged or altered

To specify the genetic code for an amino acid or a polypeptide

The act of bringing to uniformity; making regular

To specify the genetic code for a trait or characteristic

The act of controlling or directing according to rule;

(Computers) To write or revise a computer program.

Prescribed by or according to regulation;

(Slang) To go into cardiac arrest.

A short symbol, often with little relation to the item it represents.

A body of law, sanctioned by legislation, in which the rules of law to be specifically applied by the courts are set forth in systematic form; a compilation of laws by public authority; a digest.

Any system of principles, rules or regulations relating to one subject.

A set of rules for converting information into another form or representation.

By synecdoche: a codeword, code point, an encoded representation of a character, symbol, or other entity.

A message represented by rules intended to conceal its meaning.

(cryptography) A cryptographic system using a codebook that converts words or phrases into codewords.

Instructions for a computer, written in a programming language; the input of a translator, an interpreter or a browser, namely: source code, machine code, bytecode.

(scientific programming) A program.

(linguistics) A particular lect or language variety.

(medicine) An emergency requiring situation-trained members of the staff.

(informal) A set of unwritten rules that bind a social group.

(computing) To write software programs.

To add codes to a dataset.

To categorise by assigning identifiers from a schedule, for example CPT coding for medical insurance purposes.

(cryptography) To encode.

To encode a protein.

(medicine) To call a hospital emergency code.

To go into a state where a hospital emergency code is required to save one's life.

(medicine) Of a patient, to suffer a sudden medical emergency a code blue such as cardiac arrest.

A body of law, sanctioned by legislation, in which the rules of law to be specifically applied by the courts are set forth in systematic form; a compilation of laws by public authority; a digest.

Any system of rules or regulations relating to one subject; as, the medical code, a system of rules for the regulation of the professional conduct of physicians; the naval code, a system of rules for making communications at sea means of signals.

A set of rules or principles or laws (especially written ones)

A coding system used for transmitting messages requiring brevity or secrecy

(computer science) the symbolic arrangement of data or instructions in a computer program or the set of such instructions

Attach a code to;

Convert ordinary language into code;