Is the stack in memory actually a stack?

Question

In memory there is a section called stack that starts at the top and grows down towards the heap. Is this stack the same thing as a LIFO stack? Is the heap at the bottom a FIFO?

When you do "push" and "pop", does that alter the stack in memory?

Answer 1

The stack is in fact a LIFO stack.

It's created by the program itself while the program is running. The code that controls the stack is created at compilation time.

Farther reading:

Hardware Stacks

Call Stack

X86 Addressing Modes