literal

• In programming languages, a lexical unit that directly represents a value; for example, 14 represents the integer fourteen, "APRIL" represents the string of characters APRIL, 3.0005E2 represents the number 300.05. (I).

• A symbol or a quantity in a source program that is itself data, rather than a reference to data. IBM.

• A character string whose value is given by the characters themselves; for example, the numeric literal 7 has the value 7, and the character literal CHARACTERS has the value CHARACTERS. IBM.