Modern computers are designed with the need of high-level languages in
mind. The most important technique for structuring programs introduced by
high-level languages is the procedure or function. From one point of view, a
procedure call alters the flow of control just as a jump does, but unlike a
jump, when finished performing its task, a function returns control to the
statement or instruction following the call. This high-level abstraction
is implemented with the help of the stack.
The stack is also used to dynamically allocate the local variables used in
functions, to pass parameters to the functions, and to return values from the
function.
