What technique can be used to prevent a function from executing more than once within a given timeframe?

The technique that is specifically designed to prevent a function from executing more than once within a given timeframe is called debouncing. This is particularly useful in scenarios where a function is triggered by events that could happen in rapid succession, such as keystrokes in a search bar or window resizing events.

When debouncing is applied, the function will only execute after a specified period of inactivity. For example, if a user is typing in a search input field, debouncing ensures that the function responsible for querying the search results is only called after the user has stopped typing for a predetermined duration, effectively preventing multiple rapid calls that could degrade performance.

Throttling, on the other hand, allows the execution of the function at regular intervals, ensuring that it runs at most once every specified period of time. This is slightly different than debouncing, as it doesn't wait for the completion of inactivity but instead limits how frequently the function can be called.

Caching refers to storing the results of function calls to enhance performance on later calls, which is unrelated to execution frequency control. Locking typically involves mechanisms to manage access to resources in concurrent programming, and is not a technique used for controlling function execution timing.

Thus, debouncing stands out as the most effective and appropriate