A front end processor, also called a communications processor, is a device which interfaces a number of peripheral devices, such as terminals, disk units, printers and tape units, to the host computer. Data is transferred between the host computer and the front end processor, using a high-speed parallel interface. The front end processor communicates with peripheral devices using slow speed serial interfaces.
A front end processor (FEP) is a program or operating system component that allows computer users to enter complex characters and symbols (such as Japanese, Chinese, Tibetan and Korean characters), using a standard Western keyboard.