Flowchart: get values from functions. Rectangle or Paralellogram

Question

I need to create a flowchart for one of my algorithms and one step is calling a function (that I don't wish to explain in the flowchart) and assigning the returned value to a variable.

float x = get_random(0,1);

I am wondering if I should use rectangle or (non 90 degree) paralellogram in this case.

On wikipedia I find:

rectangles: Process. This shape is used to show that something is performed. Examples: "Add 1 to X", "replace identified part", "save changes", etc....

paralellogram: Input/Output. Involves receiving data and displaying processed data. Can only move from input to output and not vice versa. Examples: Get X from the user; display X.

While I do suspect it's not file system IO or std IO, it does fit "Involves receiving data". Which symbol should I use?

Answer 1

Fundamentally, I/O is for communicating externally, i.e. with other processes (or with humans) whether that is done via channels/pipes/sockets, or via disc files.

(Herein I use the word process in the sense of processes as programs running on an operating system. I realize that the word process, in flowcharting, is used for the notion of any computation such as using a procedure or doing an assignment statement, so there's opportunity for confusion; so, I'll use the term computation instead for that notion.)

Reading/writing to a file is an indirect method of communicating with another process, often a future process/run of the same program, yet still, potentially to multiple other programs (some not yet running).

Computation, internal to the process, is processing and doesn't qualify as I/O. Function calls represent processing rather than I/O, even though there are values returned.

Still, we have to draw a line somewhere as in many modern languages, I/O is done via function calls. So, I'd say that if the call is a black box (because it is in a library that you don't own/control), and known by language or its standard libraries to perform I/O I'd describe it as I/O. If the call is a white box that can be described by its own flowchart, I'd mark its use as processing here, and describe its I/O in its own flowchart. And otherwise, I'd describe calls as processing.

On that basis, the call to get_random appears as processing rather than I/O that is communicating with an external (past, present or future) process.