term% cat index.txt ---
GLOSSARY OF JARGON
Compiled by Guy L. Steele Jr., Raphael Finkel, Donald Woods,
Geoff Goodfellow and Mark Crispin,
with assistance from the MIT and Stanford AI communities
and Worcester Polytechnic Institute.
Some contributions were submitted via the ARPAnet
from miscellaneous sites.
Verb doubling: a standard construction is to double a verb
and use it as a comment on what the implied subject
does. Often used to terminate a conversation. Typical
examples involve WIN, LOSE, HACK, FLAME, BARF, CHOMP:
"The disk heads just crashed." "Lose, lose."
"Mostly he just talked about his --- crock. Flame, flame."
"Boy, what a bagbiter! Chomp, chomp!"
Soundalike slang: similar to Cockney rhyming slang. Often
made up on the spur of the moment. Standard examples:
Boston Globe -> Boston Glob
Herald American -> Horrid (Harried) American
New York Times -> New York Slime
historical reasons -> hysterical raisins
government property - do not duplicate (seen on keys)
-> government duplicity - do not propagate
Often the substitution will be made in such a way as to
slip in a standard jargon word:
Dr. Dobb's Journal -> Dr. Frob's Journal
creeping featurism -> feeping creaturism
Margaret Jacks Hall -> Marginal Hacks Hall
The -P convention: turning a word into a question by append-
ing the syllable "P"; from the LISP convention of
appending the letter "P" to denote a predicate (a
Boolean-valued function). The question should expect a
yes/no answer, though it needn't. (See T and NIL.)
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At dinnertime: "Foodp?" "Yeah, I'm pretty hungry." or "T!"
"State-of-the-world-P?" (Straight) "I'm about to go home."
(Humorous) "Yes, the world has a state."
[One of the best of these is a Gosperism (i.e., due to
Bill Gosper). When we were at a Chinese restaurant, he
wanted to know whether someone would like to share with
him a two-person-sized bowl of soup. His inquiry was:
"Split-p soup?" --GLS]
Peculiar nouns: MIT AI hackers love to take various words
and add the wrong endings to them to make nouns and
verbs, often by extending a standard rule to nonuniform
cases. Examples:
porous => porosity
generous => generosity
Ergo: mysterious => mysteriosity
ferrous => ferocity
Other examples: winnitude, disgustitude, hackification.
Spoken inarticulations: Words such as "mumble," "sigh," and
"groan" are spoken in places where their referent might
more naturally be used. It has been suggested that this
usage derives from the impossibility of representing
such noises in a com link. Another expression sometimes
heard is "complain!"
@BEGIN (primarily CMU) with @END, used humorously in writing
to indicate a context or to remark on the surrounded
text. >From the SCRIBE command of the same name. For
example:
@Begin(Flame)
Predicate logic is the only good programming language.
Anyone who would use anything else is an idiot. Also,
computers should be tredecimal instead of binary.
@End(Flame)
ANGLE BRACKETS (primarily MIT) n. Either of the characters
"<" and ">". See BROKET.
AOS (aus (East coast) ay-ahs (West coast)) [based on a PDP-
10 increment instruction] v. To increase the amount of
something. "Aos the campfire." Usage: considered silly.
See SOS.
ARG n. Abbreviation for "argument" (to a function), used so
often as to have become a new word.
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AUTOMAGICALLY adv. Automatically, but in a way which, for
some reason (typically because it is too complicated, or
too ugly, or perhaps even too trivial), I don't feel
like explaining to you. See MAGIC. Example: Some pro-
grams which produce XGP output files spool them automag-
ically.
BAGBITER 1. n. Equipment or program that fails, usually
intermittently. 2. BAGBITING: adj. Failing hardware or
software. "This bagbiting system won't let me get out
of spacewar." Usage: verges on obscenity. Grammatically
separable; one may speak of "biting the bag." Synonyms:
LOSER, LOSING, CRETINOUS, BLETCHEROUS, BARFUCIOUS,
CHOMPER, CHOMPING.
BANG n. Common alternate name for EXCL (q.v.), especially at
CMU. See SHRIEK.
BAR 1. The second metasyntactic variable, after FOO. "Sup-
pose we have two functions FOO and BAR. FOO calls
BAR..." 2. Often appended to FOO to produce FOOBAR.
BARF [from the "layman" slang, meaning "vomit"] 1. interj.
Term of disgust. See BLETCH. 2. v. Choke, as on input.
May mean to give an error message. "The function com-
pares two fixnums or two flonums, and barfs on anything
else." 3. BARFULOUS, BARFUCIOUS: adj. Said of something
which would make anyone barf, if only for aesthetic rea-
sons.
BELLS AND WHISTLES n. Unnecessary but useful (or amusing)
features of a program. "Now that we've got the basic
program working, let's go back and add some bells and
whistles." Nobody seems to know what distinguishes a
bell from a whistle.
BIGNUMS [from Macsyma] n. 1. In backgammon, large numbers on
the dice. 2. Multiple-precision (sometimes infinitely
extendable) integers and, through analogy, any very
large numbers. 3. EL CAMINO BIGNUM: El Camino Real, a
street through the San Francisco peninsula that origi-
nally extended (and still appears in places) all the way
to Mexico City. It was termed "El Camino Double Preci-
sion" when someone noted it was a very long street, and
then "El Camino Bignum" when it was pointed out that it
was hundreds of miles long.
BIN [short for BINARY; used as a second file name on ITS] 1.
n. BINARY. 2. BIN FILE: A file containing the BIN for
a program. Usage: used at MIT, which runs on ITS. The
equivalent term at Stanford is DMP (pronounced "dump")
FILE. Other names used include SAV ("save") FILE (DEC
and Tenex), SHR ("share") and LOW FILES (DEC), and EXE
("ex'ee") FILE (DEC and Twenex). Also in this category
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are the input files to the various flavors of linking
loaders (LOADER, LINK-10, STINK), called REL FILES.
BINARY n. The object code for a program.
BIT n. 1. The unit of information; the amount of information
obtained by asking a yes-or-no question. "Bits" is
often used simply to mean information, as in "Give me
bits about DPL replicators." 2. [By extension from
"interrupt bits" on a computer] A reminder that some-
thing should be done or talked about eventually. Upon
seeing someone that you haven't talked to for a while,
it's common for one or both to say, "I have a bit set
for you."
BITBLT (bit'blit) 1. v. To perform a complex operation on a
large block of bits, usually involving the bits being
displayed on a bitmapped raster screen. See BLT. 2. n.
The operation itself.
BIT BUCKET n. 1. A receptacle used to hold the runoff from
the computer's shift registers. 2. Mythical destination
of deleted files, GC'ed memory, and other no-longer-
accessible data. 3. The physical device associated with
"NUL:".
BLETCH [from German "brechen," to vomit] 1. interj. Term of
disgust. 2. BLETCHEROUS: adj. Disgusting in design or
function. "This keyboard is bletcherous!" Usage:
slightly comic.
BLT (blit, very rarely belt) [based on the PDP-10 block
transfer instruction; confusing to users of the PDP-11]
1. v. To transfer a large contiguous package of informa-
tion from one place to another. 2. THE BIG BLT: n.
Shuffling operation on the PDP-10 under some operating
systems that consumes a significant amount of computer
time. 3. (usually pronounced B-L-T) n. Sandwich con-
taining bacon, lettuce, and tomato.
BOGOSITY n. The degree to which something is BOGUS (q.v.).
At CMU, bogosity is measured with a bogometer; typical
use: in a seminar, when a speaker says something bogus,
a listener might raise his hand and say, "My bogometer
just triggered." The agreed-upon unit of bogosity is the
microLenat (uL).
BOGUS (WPI, Yale, Stanford) adj. 1. Non-functional. "Your
patches are bogus." 2. Useless. "OPCON is a bogus pro-
gram." 3. False. "Your arguments are bogus." 4.
Incorrect. "That algorithm is bogus." 5. Silly. "Stop
writing those bogus sagas." (This word seems to have
some, but not all, of the connotations of RANDOM.)
[Etymological note from Lehman/Reid at CMU: "Bogus" was
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originally used (in this sense) at Princeton, in the
late 60's. It was used not particularly in the CS
department, but all over campus. It came to Yale, where
one of us (Lehman) was an undergraduate, and (we assume)
elsewhere through the efforts of Princeton alumni who
brought the word with them from their alma mater. In
the Yale case, the alumnus is Michael Shamos, who was a
graduate student at Yale and is now a faculty member
here. A glossary of bogus words was compiled at Yale
when the word was first popularized (e.g., autobogopho-
bia: the fear of becoming bogotified).]
BOUNCE (Stanford) v. To play volleyball. "Bounce, bounce!
Stop wasting time on the computer and get out to the
court!"
BRAIN-DAMAGED [generalization of "Honeywell Brain Damage"
(HBD), a theoretical disease invented to explain certain
utter cretinisms in Multics] adj. Obviously wrong; cre-
tinous; demented. There is an implication that the per-
son responsible must have suffered brain damage, because
he should have known better. Calling something brain-
damaged is really bad; it also implies it is unusable.
BREAK v. 1. To cause to be broken (in any sense). "Your
latest patch to the system broke the TELNET server." 2.
(of a program) To stop temporarily, so that it may be
examined for debugging purposes. The place where it
stops is a BREAKPOINT.
BROKEN adj. 1. Not working properly (of programs). 2.
Behaving strangely; especially (of people), exhibiting
extreme depression.
BROKET [by analogy with "bracket:" a "broken bracket"] (pri-
marily Stanford) n. Either of the characters "<" and
">". (At MIT, and apparently in The Real World (q.v.)
as well, these are usually called ANGLE BRACKETS.)
BUCKY BITS (primarily Stanford) n. The bits produced by the
CTRL and META shift keys on a Stanford (or Knight) key-
board. Rumor has it that the idea for extra bits for
characters came from Niklaus Wirth, and that his nick-
name was "Bucky."
DOUBLE BUCKY adj. Using both the CTRL and META keys. "The
command to burn all LEDs is double bucky F."
BUG [from telephone terminology, "bugs in a telephone
cable," blamed for noisy lines; however, Jean Sammet has
repeatedly been heard to claim that the use of the term
in CS comes from a story concerning actual bugs found
wedged in an early malfunctioning computer] n. An
unwanted and unintended property of a program. (People
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can have bugs too (even winners) as in "PHW is a super
winner, but he has some bugs.") See FEATURE.
BUM 1. v. To make highly efficient, either in time or space,
often at the expense of clarity. The object of the verb
is usually what was removed ("I managed to bum three
more instructions.") but can be the program being
changed ("I bummed the inner loop down to seven
microseconds.") 2. n. A small change to an algorithm to
make it more efficient.
BUZZ v. To run in a very tight loop, perhaps without guaran-
tee of getting out.
CANONICAL adj. The usual or standard state or manner of
something. A true story: One Bob Sjoberg, new at the
MIT AI Lab, expressed some annoyance at the use of jar-
gon. Over his loud objections, we made a point of using
jargon as much as possible in his presence, and eventu-
ally it began to sink in. Finally, in one conversation,
he used the word "canonical" in jargon-like fashion
without thinking.
Steele: "Aha! We've finally got you talking jargon too!"
Stallman: "What did he say?"
Steele: "He just used 'canonical' in the canonical way."
CATATONIA (kat-uh-toe'nee-uh) n. A condition of suspended
animation in which the system is in a wedged (CATATONIC)
state.
CDR (ku'der) [from LISP] v. With "down," to trace down a
list of elements. "Shall we cdr down the agenda?"
Usage: silly.
CHINE NUAL n. The Lisp Machine Manual, so called because the
title is wrapped around the cover so only those letters
show.
CHOMP v. To lose; to chew on something of which more was
bitten off than one can. Probably related to gnashing
of teeth. See BAGBITER. A hand gesture commonly accom-
panies this, consisting of the four fingers held
together as if in a mitten or hand puppet, and the
fingers and thumb open and close rapidly to illustrate a
biting action. The gesture alone means CHOMP CHOMP (see
Verb Doubling).
CLOSE n. Abbreviation for "close (or right) parenthesis,"
used when necessary to eliminate oral ambiguity. See
OPEN.
COKEBOTTLE n. Any very unusual character. MIT people
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complain about the "control-meta-cokebottle" commands at
SAIL, and SAIL people complain about the "altmode-
altmode-cokebottle" commands at MIT.
COM MODE (variant: COMM MODE) [from the ITS feature for
linking two or more terminals together so that text
typed on any is echoed on all, providing a means of
conversation among hackers] n. The state a terminal is
in when linked to another in this way. Com mode has a
special set of jargon words, used to save typing, which
are not used orally:
center; l lw(3.5i). BCNU Be seeing you. BTW By
the way ... BYE? T{ Are you ready to unlink? (This
is the standard way to end a com mode conversation; the
other person types BYE to confirm, or else continues the
conversation.) T} CUL See you later. FOO? T{ A
greeting, also meaning R U THERE? Often used in the
case of unexpected links, meaning also "Sorry if I but-
ted in" (linker) or "What's up?" (linkee). T}
FYI For your information... GA T{ Go ahead
(used when two people have tried to type simultaneously;
this cedes the right to type to the other). T}
HELLOP T{ A greeting, also meaning R U THERE? (An
instance of the "-P" convention.) T} MtFBWY May the
Force be with you. (From Star Wars.) NIL No (see
the main entry for NIL). OBTW Oh, by the way ... R
U THERE? Are you there? SEC Wait a second
(sometimes written SEC...). T Yes (see the main
entry for T). TNX Thanks. TNX 1.0E6 Thanks a
million (humorous). <double CRLF> T{ When the typing
party has finished, he types two CRLF's to signal that
he is done; this leaves a blank line between individual
"speeches" in the conversation, making it easier to re-
read the preceding text. T} <name>: T{ When three or
more terminals are linked, each speech is preceded by
the typist's login name and a colon (or a hyphen) to
indicate who is typing. The login name often is shor-
tened to a unique prefix (possibly a single letter) dur-
ing a very long conversation. T} /\/\/\ The equivalent
of a giggle.
At Stanford, where the link feature is implemented by
"talk loops," the term TALK MODE is used in place of COM
MODE. Most of the above "sub-jargon" is used at both
Stanford and MIT.
CONNECTOR CONSPIRACY [probably came into prominence with the
appearance of the KL-10, none of whose connectors match
anything else] n. The tendency of manufacturers (or, by
extension, programmers or purveyors of anything) to come
up with new products which don't fit together with the
old stuff, thereby making you buy either all new stuff
or expensive interface devices.
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CONS [from LISP] 1. v. To add a new element to a list. 2.
CONS UP: v. To synthesize from smaller pieces: "to cons
up an example."
CRASH 1. n. A sudden, usually drastic failure. Most often
said of the system (q.v., definition #1), sometimes of
magnetic disk drives. "Three lusers lost their files in
last night's disk crash." A disk crash which entails the
read/write heads dropping onto the surface of the disks
and scraping off the oxide may also be referred to as a
"head crash." 2. v. To fail suddenly. "Has the system
just crashed?" Also used transitively to indicate the
cause of the crash (usually a person or a program, or
both). "Those idiots playing spacewar crashed the sys-
tem." Sometimes said of people. See GRONK OUT.
CRETIN 1. n. Congenital loser (q.v.). 2. CRETINOUS: adj.
See BLETCHEROUS and BAGBITING. Usage: somewhat ad-
hominem.
CRLF (cur'lif, sometimes crul'lif) n. A carriage return (CR)
followed by a line feed (LF). See TERPRI.
CROCK [probably from "layman" slang, which in turn may be
derived from "crock of shit"] n. An awkward feature or
programming technique that ought to be made cleaner.
Example: Using small integers to represent error codes
without the program interpreting them to the user is a
crock. Also, a technique that works acceptably but
which is quite prone to failure if disturbed in the
least, for example depending on the machine opcodes hav-
ing particular bit patterns so that you can use instruc-
tions as data words too; a tightly woven, almost com-
pletely unmodifiable structure.
CRUFTY [from "cruddy"] adj. 1. Poorly built, possibly overly
complex. "This is standard old crufty DEC software."
Hence CRUFT, n. shoddy construction. Also CRUFT, v.
[from hand cruft, pun on hand craft] to write assembler
code for something normally (and better) done by a com-
piler. 2. Unpleasant, especially to the touch, often
with encrusted junk. Like spilled coffee smeared with
peanut butter and catsup. Hence CRUFT, n. disgusting
mess. 3. Generally unpleasant. CRUFTY or CRUFTIE n. A
small crufty object (see FROB); often one which doesn't
fit well into the scheme of things. "A LISP property
list is a good place to store crufties (or, random
cruft)." [Note: Does CRUFT have anything to do with the
Cruft Lab at Harvard? I don't know, though I was a Har-
vard student. --GLS]
CRUNCH v. 1. To process, usually in a time-consuming or com-
plicated way. Connotes an essentially trivial operation
which is nonetheless painful to perform. The pain may
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be due to the triviality being imbedded in a loop from 1
to 1000000000. "FORTRAN programs do mostly number
crunching." 2. To reduce the size of a file by a compli-
cated scheme that produces bit configurations completely
unrelated to the original data, such as by a Huffman
code. (The file ends up looking like a paper document
would if somebody crunched the paper into a wad.) Since
such compression usually takes more computations than
simpler methods such as counting repeated characters
(such as spaces) the term is doubly appropriate. (This
meaning is usually used in the construction "file
crunch(ing)" to distinguish it from "number
crunch(ing).") 3. n. The character "#". Usage: used at
Xerox and CMU, among other places. Other names for "#"
include SHARP, NUMBER, HASH, PIG-PEN, POUND-SIGN, and
MESH. GLS adds: I recall reading somewhere that most of
these are names for the # symbol IN CONTEXT. The name
for the sign itself is "octothorp."
CTY (city) n. The terminal physically associated with a
computer's operating console.
CUSPY [from the DEC acronym CUSP, for Commonly Used System
Program, i.e., a utility program used by many people]
(WPI) adj. 1. (of a program) Well-written. 2. Function-
ally excellent. A program which performs well and
interfaces well to users is cuspy. See RUDE.
DAEMON (day'mun, dee'mun) [archaic form of "demon," which
has slightly different connotations (q.v.)] n. A program
which is not invoked explicitly, but which lies dormant
waiting for some condition(s) to occur. The idea is
that the perpetrator of the condition need not be aware
that a daemon is lurking (though often a program will
commit an action only because it knows that it will
implicitly invoke a daemon). For example, writing a
file on the lpt spooler's directory will invoke the
spooling daemon, which prints the file. The advantage
is that programs which want (in this example) files
printed need not compete for access to the lpt. They
simply enter their implicit requests and let the daemon
decide what to do with them. Daemons are usually
spawned automatically by the system, and may either live
forever or be regenerated at intervals. Usage: DAEMON
and DEMON (q.v.) are often used interchangeably, but
seem to have distinct connotations. DAEMON was intro-
duced to computing by CTSS people (who pronounced it
dee'mon) and used it to refer to what is now called a
DRAGON or PHANTOM (q.v.). The meaning and pronunciation
have drifted, and we think this glossary reflects
current usage.
DAY MODE See PHASE (of people).
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DEADLOCK n. A situation wherein two or more processes are
unable to proceed because each is waiting for another to
do something. A common example is a program communicat-
ing to a PTY or STY, which may find itself waiting for
output from the PTY/STY before sending anything more to
it, while the PTY/STY is similarly waiting for more
input from the controlling program before outputting
anything. (This particular flavor of deadlock is called
"starvation." Another common flavor is "constipation,"
where each process is trying to send stuff to the other,
but all buffers are full because nobody is reading any-
thing.) See DEADLY EMBRACE.
DEADLY EMBRACE n. Same as DEADLOCK (q.v.), though usually
used only when exactly two processes are involved.
DEADLY EMBRACE is the more popular term in Europe;
DEADLOCK in the United States.
DEMENTED adj. Yet another term of disgust used to describe a
program. The connotation in this case is that the pro-
gram works as designed, but the design is bad. For
example, a program that generates large numbers of mean-
ingless error messages implying it is on the point of
imminent collapse.
DEMON (dee'mun) n. A portion of a program that is not
invoked explicitly, but which lies dormant waiting for
some condition(s) to occur. See DAEMON. The distinc-
tion is that demons are usually processes within a pro-
gram, while daemons are usually programs running on an
operating system. Demons are particularly common in AI
programs. For example, a knowledge manipulation program
might implement inference rules as demons. Whenever a
new piece of knowledge was added, various demons would
activate (which demons depends on the particular piece
of data) and would create additional pieces of knowledge
by applying their respective inference rules to the ori-
ginal piece. These new pieces could in turn activate
more demons as the inferences filtered down through
chains of logic. Meanwhile the main program could con-
tinue with whatever its primary task was.
DIABLO (dee-ah'blow) [from the Diablo printer] 1. n. Any
letter-quality printing device. 2. v. To produce
letter-quality output from such a device.
DIDDLE v. To work with in a not particularly serious manner.
"I diddled with a copy of ADVENT so it didn't double-
space all the time." "Let's diddle this piece of code
and see if the problem goes away." See TWEAK and TWID-
DLE.
DIKE [from "diagonal cutters"] v. To remove a module or dis-
able it. "When in doubt, dike it out."
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DMP (dump) See BIN.
DO PROTOCOL [from network protocol programming] v. To per-
form an interaction with somebody or something that fol-
lows a clearly defined procedure. For example, "Let's
do protocol with the check" at a restaurant means to ask
the waitress for the check, calculate the tip and
everybody's share, generate change as necessary, and pay
the bill.
DOWN 1. adj. Not working. "The up escalator is down." 2.
TAKE DOWN, BRING DOWN: v. To deactivate, usually for
repair work. See UP.
DPB (duh-pib') [from the PDP-10 instruction set] v. To plop
something down in the middle.
DRAGON n. (MIT) A program similar to a "daemon" (q.v.),
except that it is not invoked at all, but is instead
used by the system to perform various secondary tasks.
A typical example would be an accounting program, which
keeps track of who is logged in, accumulates load-
average statistics, etc. At MIT, all free TV's display
a list of people logged in, where they are, what they're
running, etc. along with some random picture (such as a
unicorn, Snoopy, or the Enterprise) which is generated
by the "NAME DRAGON." See PHANTOM.
DWIM [Do What I Mean] 1. adj. Able to guess, sometimes even
correctly, what result was intended when provided with
bogus input. Often suggested in jest as a desired
feature for a complex program. A related term, more
often seen as a verb, is DTRT (Do The Right Thing). 2.
n. The INTERLISP function that attempts to accomplish
this feat by correcting many of the more common errors.
See HAIRY.
ENGLISH n. The source code for a program, which may be in
any language, as opposed to BINARY. Usage: slightly
obsolete, used mostly by old-time hackers, though recog-
nizable in context. At MIT, directory SYSENG is where
the "English" for system programs is kept, and SYSBIN,
the binaries. SAIL has many such directories, but the
canonical one is [CSP,SYS].
EPSILON [from standard mathematical notation for a small
quantity] 1. n. A small quantity of anything. "The
cost is epsilon." 2. adj. Very small, negligible; less
than marginal (q.v.). "We can get this feature for
epsilon cost." 3. WITHIN EPSILON OF: Close enough to be
indistinguishable for all practical purposes.
EXCH (ex'chuh, ekstch) [from the PDP-10 instruction set] v.
To exchange two things, each for the other.
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EXCL (eks'cul) n. Abbreviation for "exclamation point." See
BANG, SHRIEK, WOW.
EXE (ex'ee) See BIN.
FAULTY adj. Same denotation as "bagbiting," "bletcherous,"
"losing," q.v., but the connotation is much milder.
FEATURE n. 1. A surprising property of a program. Occasion-
ally documented. To call a property a feature sometimes
means the author of the program did not consider the
particular case, and the program makes an unexpected,
although not strictly speaking an incorrect response.
See BUG. "That's not a bug, that's a feature!" A bug
can be changed to a feature by documenting it. 2. A
well-known and beloved property; a facility. Sometimes
features are planned, but are called crocks by others.
An approximately correct spectrum (these terms are all
used to describe programs or portions thereof, except
for the first two, which are included for completeness):
CRASH STOPPAGE BUG SCREW LOSS MISFEATURE CROCK
KLUGE HACK WIN FEATURE PERFECTION
(The last is never actually attained.)
FEEP 1. n. The soft bell of a display terminal (except for a
VT-52!); a beep. 2. v. To cause the display to make a
feep sound. TTY's do not have feeps. Alternate forms:
BEEP, BLEEP, or just about anything suitably onomato-
poeic. The term BREEDLE is sometimes heard at SAIL,
where the terminal bleepers are not particularly "soft"
(they sound more like the musical equivalent of sticking
out one's tongue). The "feeper" on a VT-52 has been
compared to the sound of a '52 Chevy stripping its
gears.
FENCEPOST ERROR n. The discrete equivalent of a boundary
condition. Often exhibited in programs by iterative
loops. From the following problem: "If you build a
fence 100 feet long with posts ten feet apart, how many
posts do you need?" (Either 9 or 11 is a better answer
than the obvious 10.)
FINE (WPI) adj. Good, but not good enough to be CUSPY. [The
word FINE is used elsewhere, of course, but without the
implicit comparison to the higher level implied by
CUSPY.]
FLAG DAY [from a bit of Multics history involving a change
in the ASCII character set originally scheduled for June
14, 1966] n. A software change which is neither forward
nor backward compatible, and which is costly to make and
costly to revert. "Can we install that without causing
a flag day for all users?"
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FLAKEY adj. Subject to frequent lossages. See LOSSAGE.
FLAME uninteresting subject or with a patently ridiculous
attitude. FLAME ON: v. To continue to flame. See RAVE.
This punning reference to Marvel comics' Human Torch has
been lost as recent usage completes the circle: "Flame
on" now usually means "beginning of flame."
FLAP v. To unload a DECtape (so it goes flap, flap,
flap...). Old hackers at MIT tell of the days when the
disk was device 0 and microtapes were 1, 2,... and
attempting to flap device 0 would instead start a motor
banging inside a cabinet near the disk!
FLAVOR n. 1. Variety, type, kind. "DDT commands come in two
flavors." See VANILLA. 2. The attribute of causing
something to be FLAVORFUL. "This convention yields
additional flavor by allowing one to... ." 3. On the
LispMachine, an object-oriented programming system
("flavors"); each class of object is a flavor.
FLAVORFUL adj. Aesthetically pleasing. See RANDOM and LOS-
ING for antonyms. See also the entry for TASTE.
FLUSH v. 1. To delete something, usually superfluous. "All
that nonsense has been flushed." Standard ITS terminol-
ogy for aborting an output operation. 2. To leave at
the end of a day's work (as opposed to leaving for a
meal). "I'm going to flush now." "Time to flush." 3. To
exclude someone from an activity.
FOO 1. [from Yiddish "feh" or the Anglo-Saxon "fooey!"]
interj. Term of disgust. 2. [from FUBAR (Fucked Up
Beyond All Recognition), from WWII, often seen as
FOOBAR] Name used for temporary programs, or samples of
three-letter names. Other similar words are BAR, BAZ
(Stanford corruption of BAR), and rarely RAG. These
have been used in Pogo as well. 3. Used very generally
as a sample name for absolutely anything. The old "Smo-
key Stover" comic strips often included the word FOO, in
particular on license plates of cars. MOBY FOO: See
MOBY.
FRIED adj. 1. Non-working due to hardware failure; burnt
out. 2. Of people, exhausted. Said particularly of
those who continue to work in such a state. Often used
as an explanation or excuse. "Yeah, I know that fix
destroyed the file system, but I was fried when I put it
in."
FROB 1. n. (MIT) The official Tech Model Railroad Club
definition is "FROB = protruding arm or trunnion," and
by metaphoric extension any somewhat small thing. See
FROBNITZ. 2. v. Abbreviated form of FROBNICATE.
- 14 -
FROBNICATE v. To manipulate or adjust, to tweak. Derived
from FROBNITZ (q.v.). Usually abbreviated to FROB.
Thus one has the saying "to frob a frob." See TWEAK and
TWIDDLE. Usage: FROB, TWIDDLE, and TWEAK sometimes con-
note points along a continuum. FROB connotes aimless
manipulation; TWIDDLE connotes gross manipulation, often
a coarse search for a proper setting; TWEAK connotes
fine-tuning. If someone is turning a knob on an oscil-
loscope, then if he's carefully adjusting it he is prob-
ably tweaking it; if he is just turning it but looking
at the screen he is probably twiddling it; but if he's
just doing it because turning a knob is fun, he's frob-
bing it.
FROBNITZ, pl. FROBNITZEM (frob'nitsm) n. An unspecified phy-
sical object, a widget. Also refers to electronic black
boxes. This rare form is usually abbreviated to FROTZ,
or more commonly to FROB. Also used are FROBNULE, FRO-
BULE, and FROBNODULE. Starting perhaps in 1979, FROBBOZ
(fruh-bahz'), pl. FROBBOTZIM, has also become very popu-
lar, largely due to its exposure via the Adventure
spin-off called Zork (Dungeon). These can also be
applied to non-physical objects, such as data struc-
tures.
FROG (variant: PHROG) 1. interj. Term of disgust (we seem to
have a lot of them). 2. Used as a name for just about
anything. See FOO. 3. n. Of things, a crock. Of peo-
ple, somewhere inbetween a turkey and a toad. 4. Jake
Brown (FRG@SAIL). 5. FROGGY: adj. Similar to BAGBITING
(q.v.), but milder. "This froggy program is taking for-
ever to run!"
FROTZ 1. n. See FROBNITZ. 2. MUMBLE FROTZ: An interjection
of very mild disgust.
FRY v. 1. To fail. Said especially of smoke-producing
hardware failures. 2. More generally, to become non-
working. Usage: never said of software, only of
hardware and humans. See FRIED.
FTP (spelled out, NOT pronounced "fittip") 1. n. The File
Transfer Protocol for transmitting files between systems
on the ARPAnet. 2. v. To transfer a file using the
File Transfer Program. "Lemme get this copy of Wuther-
ing Heights FTP'd from SAIL."
FUDGE 1. v. To perform in an incomplete but marginally
acceptable way, particularly with respect to the writing
of a program. "I didn't feel like going through that
pain and suffering, so I fudged it." 2. n. The resulting
code.
FUDGE FACTOR n. A value or parameter that is varied in an ad
- 15 -
hoc way to produce the desired result. The terms
"tolerance" and "slop" are also used, though these usu-
ally indicate a one-sided leeway, such as a buffer which
is made larger than necessary because one isn't sure
exactly how large it needs to be, and it is better to
waste a little space than to lose completely for not
having enough. A fudge factor, on the other hand, can
often be tweaked in more than one direction. An example
might be the coefficients of an equation, where the
coefficients are varied in an attempt to make the equa-
tion fit certain criteria.
GABRIEL [for Dick Gabriel, SAIL volleyball fanatic] n. An
unnecessary (in the opinion of the opponent) stalling
tactic, e.g., tying one's shoelaces or hair repeatedly,
asking the time, etc. Also used to refer to the perpe-
trator of such tactics. Also, "pulling a Gabriel,"
"Gabriel mode."
GARBAGE COLLECT v., GARBAGE COLLECTION n. See GC.
GARPLY n. (Stanford) Another meta-word popular among SAIL
hackers.
GAS [as in "gas chamber"] interj. 1. A term of disgust and
hatred, implying that gas should be dispensed in gen-
erous quantities, thereby exterminating the source of
irritation. "Some loser just reloaded the system for no
reason! Gas!" 2. A term suggesting that someone or
something ought to be flushed out of mercy. "The
system's wedging every few minutes. Gas!" 3. v. FLUSH
(q.v.). "You should gas that old crufty software." 4.
GASEOUS adj. Deserving of being gassed. Usage: pri-
marily used by Geoff Goodfellow at SRI, but spreading.
GC [from LISP terminology] 1. v. To clean up and throw away
useless things. "I think I'll GC the top of my desk
today." 2. To recycle, reclaim, or put to another use.
3. To forget. The implication is often that one has
done so deliberately. 4. n. An instantiation of the GC
process.
GEDANKEN [from Einstein's term "gedanken-experimenten," such
as the standard proof that E=mc^2] adj. An AI project
which is written up in grand detail without ever being
implemented to any great extent. Usually perpetrated by
people who aren't very good hackers or find programming
distasteful or are just in a hurry. A gedanken thesis
is usually marked by an obvious lack of intuition about
what is programmable and what is not and about what does
and does not constitute a clear specification of a
program-related concept such as an algorithm.
GLASS TTY n. A terminal which has a display screen but
- 16 -
which, because of hardware or software limitations,
behaves like a teletype or other printing terminal. An
example is the ADM-3 (without cursor control). A glass
tty can't do neat display hacks, and you can't save the
output either.
GLITCH [from the Yiddish "glitshen," to slide] 1. n. A sud-
den interruption in electric service, sanity, or program
function. Sometimes recoverable. 2. v. To commit a
glitch. See GRITCH. 3. v. (Stanford) To scroll a
display screen.
GLORK 1. interj. Term of mild surprise, usually tinged with
outrage, as when one attempts to save the results of two
hours of editing and finds that the system has just
crashed. 2. Used as a name for just about anything.
See FOO. 3. v. Similar to GLITCH (q.v.), but usually
used reflexively. "My program just glorked itself."
GOBBLE v. To consume or to obtain. GOBBLE UP tends to imply
"consume," while GOBBLE DOWN tends to imply "obtain."
"The output spy gobbles characters out of a TTY output
buffer." "I guess I'll gobble down a copy of the docu-
mentation tomorrow." See SNARF.
GORP (CMU) [perhaps from the generic term for dried hiker's
food, stemming from the acronym "Good Old Raisins and
Peanuts"] Another metasyntactic variable, like FOO and
BAR.
GRIND v. 1. (primarily MIT) To format code, especially LISP
code, by indenting lines so that it looks pretty.
Hence, PRETTY PRINT, the generic term for such opera-
tions. 2. To run seemingly interminably, performing
some tedious and inherently useless task. Similar to
CRUNCH.
GRITCH 1. n. A complaint (often caused by a GLITCH (q.v.)).
2. v. To complain. Often verb-doubled: "Gritch gritch."
3. Glitch.
GROK [from the novel _S_t_r_a_n_g_e_r _i_n _a _S_t_r_a_n_g_e _L_a_n_d, by Robert
Heinlein, where it is a Martian word meaning roughly "to
be one with"] v. To understand, usually in a global
sense.
GRONK [popularized by the cartoon strip "B.C." by Johnny
Hart, but the word apparently predates that] v. 1. To
clear the state of a wedged device and restart it. More
severe than "to frob" (q.v.). 2. To break. "The tele-
type scanner was gronked, so we took the system down."
3. GRONKED: adj. Of people, the condition of feeling
very tired or sick. 4. GRONK OUT: v. To cease function-
ing. Of people, to go home and go to sleep. "I guess
- 17 -
I'll gronk out now; see you all tomorrow."
GROVEL v. To work interminably and without apparent pro-
gress. Often used with "over." "The compiler grovelled
over my code." Compare GRIND and CRUNCH. Emphatic form:
GROVEL OBSCENELY.
GRUNGY adj. Incredibly dirty or grubby. Anything which has
been washed within the last year is not really grungy.
Also used metaphorically; hence some programs (espe-
cially crocks) can be described as grungy.
GUBBISH [a portmanteau of "garbage" and "rubbish?"] n. Gar-
bage; crap; nonsense. "What is all this gubbish?"
GUN [from the GUN command on ITS] v. To forcibly terminate a
program or job (computer, not career). "Some idiot left
a background process running soaking up half the cycles,
so I gunned it."
HACK n. 1. Originally a quick job that produces what is
needed, but not well. 2. The result of that job. 3.
NEAT HACK: A clever technique. Also, a brilliant prac-
tical joke, where neatness is correlated with clever-
ness, harmlessness, and surprise value. Example: the
Caltech Rose Bowl card display switch circa 1961. 4.
REAL HACK: A crock (occasionally affectionate). v. 5.
With "together," to throw something together so it will
work. 6. To bear emotionally or physically. "I can't
hack this heat!" 7. To work on something (typically a
program). In specific sense: "What are you doing?" "I'm
hacking TECO." In general sense: "What do you do around
here?" "I hack TECO." (The former is time-immediate, the
latter time-extended.) More generally, "I hack x" is
roughly equivalent to "x is my bag." "I hack solid-state
physics." 8. To pull a prank on. See definition 3 and
HACKER (def #6). 9. v.i. To waste time (as opposed to
TOOL). "Whatcha up to?" "Oh, just hacking." 10. HACK UP
(ON): To hack, but generally implies that the result is
meanings 1-2. 11. HACK VALUE: Term used as the reason
or motivation for expending effort toward a seemingly
useless goal, the point being that the accomplished goal
is a hack. For example, MacLISP has code to read and
print roman numerals, which was installed purely for
hack value. HAPPY HACKING: A farewell. HOW'S HACKING?:
A friendly greeting among hackers. HACK HACK: A some-
what pointless but friendly comment, often used as a
temporary farewell. [The word HACK doesn't really have
69 different meanings. In fact, HACK has only one mean-
ing, an extremely subtle and profound one which defies
articulation. Which connotation a given HACK-token has
depends in similarly profound ways on the context.
Similar comments apply to a couple other hacker jargon
items, most notably RANDOM. --Agre]
- 18 -
HACKER [originally, someone who makes furniture with an axe]
n. 1. A person who enjoys learning the details of pro-
gramming systems and how to stretch their capabilities,
as opposed to most users who prefer to learn only the
minimum necessary. 2. One who programs enthusiasti-
cally, or who enjoys programming rather than just theor-
izing about programming. 3. A person capable of appre-
ciating hack value (q.v.). 4. A person who is good at
programming quickly. Not everything a hacker produces
is a hack. 5. An expert at a particular program, or one
who frequently does work using it or on it; example: "A
SAIL hacker." (Definitions 1 to 5 are correlated, and
people who fit them congregate.) 6. A malicious or
inquisitive meddler who tries to discover information by
poking around. Hence "password hacker," "network
hacker."
HACKISH adj. Being or involving a hack. HACKISHNESS n.
HAIR n. The complications which make something hairy.
"Decoding TECO commands requires a certain amount of
hair." Often seen in the phrase INFINITE HAIR, which
connotes extreme complexity.
HAIRY adj. 1. Overly complicated. "DWIM is incredibly
hairy." 2. Incomprehensible. "DWIM is incredibly
hairy." 3. Of people, high-powered, authoritative, rare,
expert, and/or incomprehensible. Hard to explain except
in context: "He knows this hairy lawyer who says there's
nothing to worry about."
HAKMEM n. MIT AI Memo 239 (February 1972). A collection of
neat mathematical and programming hacks contributed by
many people at MIT and elsewhere.
HANDWAVE 1. v. To gloss over a complex point; to distract a
listener; to support a (possibly actually valid) point
with blatantly faulty logic. 2. n. The act of handwav-
ing. "Boy, what a handwave!" The use of this word is
often accompanied by gestures: both hands up, palms for-
ward, swinging the hands in a vertical plane pivoting at
the elbows and/or shoulders (depending on the magnitude
of the handwave); alternatively, holding the forearms
still while rotating the hands at the wrist to make them
flutter. In context, the gestures alone can suffice as
a remark.
HARDWARILY adv. In a way pertaining to hardware. "The sys-
tem is hardwarily unreliable." The adjective "hardwary"
is NOT used. See SOFTWARILY.
HELLO WALL See WALL.
HIRSUTE Occasionally used humorously as a synonym for HAIRY.
- 19 -
HOOK n. An extraneous piece of software or hardware included
in order to simplify later additions or debug options.
For instance, a program might execute a location that is
normally a JFCL, but by changing the JFCL to a PUSHJ one
can insert a debugging routine at that point.
HUMONGOUS, HUMUNGOUS See HUNGUS.
HUNGUS (hung'ghis) [perhaps related to current slang
"humongous;" which one came first (if either) is
unclear] adj. Large, unwieldy, usually unmanageable.
"TCP is a hungus piece of code." "This is a hungus set
of modifications."
IMPCOM See TELNET.
INFINITE adj. Consisting of a large number of objects;
extreme. Used very loosely as in: "This program pro-
duces infinite garbage."
IRP (erp) [from the MIDAS pseudo-op which generates a block
of code repeatedly, substituting in various places the
car and/or cdr of the list(s) supplied at the IRP] v. To
perform a series of tasks repeatedly with a minor sub-
stitution each time through. "I guess I'll IRP over
these homework papers so I can give them some random
grade for this semester."
JFCL (djif'kl or dja-fik'l) [based on the PDP-10 instruction
that acts as a fast no-op] v. To cancel or annul some-
thing. "Why don't you jfcl that out?" [The license
plate on Geoff Goodfellow's BMW is JFCL.]
JIFFY n. 1. Interval of CPU time, commonly 1/60 second or 1
millisecond. 2. Indeterminate time from a few seconds
to forever. "I'll do it in a jiffy" means certainly not
now and possibly never.
JOCK n. Programmer who is characterized by large and some-
what brute force programs. The term is particularly
well-suited for systems programmers.
J. RANDOM See RANDOM.
JRST (jerst) [based on the PDP-10 jump instruction] v. To
suddenly change subjects. Usage: rather rare. "Jack be
nimble, Jack be quick; Jack jrst over the candle stick."
JSYS (jay'sis), pl. JSI (jay'sigh) [Jump to SYStem] See UUO.
KLUGE (kloodj) alt. KLUDGE [from the German "kluge," clever]
n. 1. A Rube Goldberg device in hardware or software.
2. A clever programming trick intended to solve a par-
ticular nasty case in an efficient, if not clear,
- 20 -
manner. Often used to repair bugs. Often verges on
being a crock. 3. Something that works for the wrong
reason. 4. v. To insert a kluge into a program. "I've
kluged this routine to get around that weird bug, but
there's probably a better way." Also KLUGE UP. 5. KLUGE
AROUND: To avoid by inserting a kluge. 6. (WPI) A
feature which is implemented in a RUDE manner.
LDB (lid'dib) [from the PDP-10 instruction set] v. To
extract from the middle.
LIFE n. A cellular-automaton game invented by John Horton
Conway, and first introduced publicly by Martin Gardner
(Scientific American, October 1970).
LINE FEED (standard ASCII terminology) 1. v. To feed the
paper through a terminal by one line (in order to print
on the next line). 2. n. The "character" that causes
the terminal to perform this action.
LINE STARVE (MIT) Inverse of LINE FEED.
LOGICAL [from the technical term "logical device," wherein a
physical device is referred to by an arbitrary name]
adj. Understood to have a meaning not necessarily
corresponding to reality. E.g., if a person who has
long held a certain post (e.g., Les Earnest at SAIL)
left and was replaced, the replacement would for a while
be known as the "logical Les Earnest." The word VIRTUAL
is also used. At SAIL, "logical" compass directions
denote a coordinate system in which "logical north" is
toward San Francisco, "logical west" is toward the
ocean, etc., even though logical north varies between
physical (true) north near SF and physical west near San
Jose. (The best rule of thumb here is that El Camino
Real by definition always runs logical north-and-south.)
LOSE [from MIT jargon] v. 1. To fail. A program loses when
it encounters an exceptional condition. 2. To be excep-
tionally unaesthetic. 3. Of people, to be obnoxious or
unusually stupid (as opposed to ignorant). 4. DESERVE
TO LOSE: v. Said of someone who willfully does the wrong
thing; humorously, if one uses a feature known to be
marginal. What is meant is that one deserves the conse-
quences of one's losing actions. "Boy, anyone who tries
to use MULTICS deserves to lose!" LOSE LOSE: a reply or
comment on a situation.
LOSER n. An unexpectedly bad situation, program, programmer,
or person. Especially "real loser."
LOSS n. Something which loses. WHAT A (MOBY) LOSS!: inter-
jection.
- 21 -
LOSSAGE n. The result of a bug or malfunction.
LPT (lip'it) n. Line printer, of course.
LUSER See USER.
MACROTAPE n. An industry standard reel of tape, as opposed
to a MICROTAPE.
MAGIC adj. 1. As yet unexplained, or too complicated to
explain. (Arthur C. Clarke once said that magic was
as-yet-not-understood science.) "TTY echoing is con-
trolled by a large number of magic bits." "This routine
magically computes the parity of an eight-bit byte in
three instructions." 2. (Stanford) A feature not gen-
erally publicized which allows something otherwise
impossible, or a feature formerly in that category but
now unveiled. Example: The keyboard commands which
override the screen-hiding features.
MARGINAL adj. 1. Extremely small. "A marginal increase in
core can decrease GC time drastically." See EPSILON. 2.
Of extremely small merit. "This proposed new feature
seems rather marginal to me." 3. Of extremely small pro-
bability of winning. "The power supply was rather mar-
ginal anyway; no wonder it crapped out." 4. MARGINALLY:
adv. Slightly. "The ravs here are only marginally
better than at Small Eating Place."
MICROTAPE n. Occasionally used to mean a DECtape, as opposed
to a MACROTAPE. This was the official DEC term for the
stuff until someone consed up the word "DECtape."
MISFEATURE n. A feature which eventually screws someone,
possibly because it is not adequate for a new situation
which has evolved. It is not the same as a bug because
fixing it involves a gross philosophical change to the
structure of the system involved. Often a former
feature becomes a misfeature because a tradeoff was made
whose parameters subsequently changed (possibly only in
the judgment of the implementors). "Well, yeah, it's
kind of a misfeature that file names are limited to six
characters, but we're stuck with it for now."
MOBY [seems to have been in use among model railroad fans
years ago. Entered the world of AI with the Fabritek
256K moby memory of MIT-AI. Derived from Melville's
_M_o_b_y _D_i_c_k (some say from "Moby Pickle").] 1. adj. Large,
immense, or complex. "A moby frob." 2. n. The maximum
address space of a machine, hence 3. n. 256K words, the
size of a PDP-10 moby. (The maximum address space means
the maximum normally addressable space, as opposed to
the amount of physical memory a machine can have. Thus
the MIT PDP-10s each have two mobies, usually referred
- 22 -
to as the "low moby" (0-777777) and "high moby"
(1000000-1777777), or as "moby 0" and "moby 1." MIT-AI
has four mobies of address space: moby 2 is the PDP-6
memory, and moby 3 the PDP-11 interface.) In this sense
"moby" is often used as a generic unit of either address
space (18. bits' worth) or of memory (about a megabyte,
or 9/8 megabyte (if one accounts for difference between
32- and 36-bit words), or 5/4 megacharacters). 4. A
title of address (never of third-person reference), usu-
ally used to show admiration, respect, and/or friendli-
ness to a competent hacker. "So, moby Knight, how's the
CONS machine doing?" 5. adj. In backgammon, doubles on
the dice, as in "moby sixes," "moby ones," etc. MOBY
FOO, MOBY WIN, MOBY LOSS: standard emphatic forms. FOBY
MOO: a spoonerism due to Greenblatt.
MODE n. A general state, usually used with an adjective
describing the state. "No time to hack; I'm in thesis
mode." Usage: in its jargon sense, MODE is most often
said of people, though it is sometimes applied to pro-
grams and inanimate objects. "If you're on a TTY, E
will switch to non-display mode." In particular, see DAY
MODE, NIGHT MODE, and YOYO MODE; also COM MODE, TALK
MODE, and GABRIEL MODE.
MODULO prep. Except for. From mathematical terminology: one
can consider saying that 4=22 "except for the 9's" (4=22
mod 9). "Well, LISP seems to work okay now, modulo that
GC bug."
MOON n. 1. A celestial object whose phase is very important
to hackers. See PHASE OF THE MOON. 2. Dave Moon
(MOON@MC).
MUMBLAGE n. The topic of one's mumbling (see MUMBLE). "All
that mumblage" is used like "all that stuff" when it is
not quite clear what it is or how it works, or like "all
that crap" when "mumble" is being used as an implicit
replacement for obscenities.
MUMBLE interj. 1. Said when the correct response is either
too complicated to enunciate or the speaker has not
thought it out. Often prefaces a longer answer, or
indicates a general reluctance to get into a big long
discussion. "Well, mumble." 2. Sometimes used as an
expression of disagreement. "I think we should buy it."
"Mumble!" Common variant: MUMBLE FROTZ. 3. Yet another
metasyntactic variable, like FOO.
MUNCH (often confused with "mung," q.v.) v. To transform
information in a serial fashion, often requiring large
amounts of computation. To trace down a data structure.
Related to CRUNCH (q.v.), but connotes less pain.
- 23 -
MUNCHING SQUARES n. A display hack dating back to the PDP-1,
which employs a trivial computation (involving XOR'ing
of x-y display coordinates - see HAKMEM items 146-148)
to produce an impressive display of moving, growing, and
shrinking squares. The hack usually has a parameter
(usually taken from toggle switches) which when well-
chosen can produce amazing effects. Some of these,
discovered recently on the LISP machine, have been
christened MUNCHING TRIANGLES, MUNCHING W'S, and MUNCH-
ING MAZES.
MUNG (variant: MUNGE) [recursive acronym for Mung Until No
Good] v. 1. To make changes to a file, often large-
scale, usually irrevocable. Occasionally accidental.
See BLT. 2. To destroy, usually accidentally, occasion-
ally maliciously. The system only mungs things mali-
ciously.
N adj. 1. Some large and indeterminate number of objects;
"There were N bugs in that crock!" Also used in its ori-
ginal sense of a variable name. 2. An arbitrarily large
(and perhaps infinite) number. 3. A variable whose
value is specified by the current context. "We'd like
to order N wonton soups and a family dinner for N-1." 4.
NTH: adj. The ordinal counterpart of N. "Now for the
Nth and last time... ." In the specific context "Nth-
year grad student," N is generally assumed to be at
least 4, and is usually 5 or more. See also 69.
NIGHT MODE See PHASE (of people).
NIL [from LISP terminology for "false"] No. Usage: used in
reply to a question, particularly one asked using the
"-P" convention. See T.
OBSCURE adj. Used in an exaggeration of its normal meaning,
to imply a total lack of comprehensibility. "The reason
for that last crash is obscure." "FIND's command syntax
is obscure." MODERATELY OBSCURE implies that it could be
figured out but probably isn't worth the trouble.
OPEN n. Abbreviation for "open (or left) parenthesis," used
when necessary to eliminate oral ambiguity. To read
aloud the LISP form (DEFUN FOO (X) (PLUS X 1)) one might
say: "Open def-fun foo, open eks close, open, plus eks
one, close close." See CLOSE.
PARSE [from linguistic terminology] v. 1. To determine the
syntactic structure of a sentence or other utterance
(close to the standard English meaning). Example: "That
was the one I saw you." "I can't parse that." 2. More
generally, to understand or comprehend. "It's very sim-
ple; you just kretch the glims and then aos the zotz."
"I can't parse that." 3. Of fish, to have to remove the
- 24 -
bones yourself (usually at a Chinese restaurant). "I
object to parsing fish" means "I don't want to get a
whole fish, but a sliced one is okay." A "parsed fish"
has been deboned. There is some controversy over
whether "unparsed" should mean "bony," or also mean
"deboned."
PATCH 1. n. A temporary addition to a piece of code, usually
as a quick-and-dirty remedy to an existing bug or mis-
feature. A patch may or may not work, and may or may
not eventually be incorporated permanently into the pro-
gram. 2. v. To insert a patch into a piece of code.
PDL (piddle or puddle) [acronym for Push Down List] n. 1. A
LIFO queue (stack); more loosely, any priority queue;
even more loosely, any queue. A person's pdl is the set
of things he has to do in the future. One speaks of the
next project to be attacked as having risen to the top
of the pdl. "I'm afraid I've got real work to do, so
this'll have to be pushed way down on my pdl." See PUSH
and POP. 2. Dave Lebling (PDL@DM).
PESSIMAL [Latin-based antonym for "optimal"] adj. Maximally
bad. "This is a pessimal situation."
PESSIMIZING COMPILER n. A compiler that produces object code
that is worse than the straightforward or obvious trans-
lation.
PHANTOM n. (Stanford) The SAIL equivalent of a DRAGON
(q.v.). Typical phantoms include the accounting pro-
gram, the news-wire monitor, and the lpt and xgp
spoolers.
PHASE (of people) 1. n. The phase of one's waking-sleeping
schedule with respect to the standard 24-hour cycle.
This is a useful concept among people who often work at
night according to no fixed schedule. It is not uncom-
mon to change one's phase by as much as six hours/day on
a regular basis. "What's your phase?" "I've been get-
ting in about 8 PM lately, but I'm going to work around
to the day schedule by Friday." A person who is roughly
12 hours out of phase is sometimes said to be in "night
mode." (The term "day mode" is also used, but less fre-
quently.) 2. CHANGE PHASE THE HARD WAY: To stay awake
for a very long time in order to get into a different
phase. 3. CHANGE PHASE THE EASY WAY: To stay asleep
etc.
PHASE OF THE MOON n. Used humorously as a random parameter
on which something is said to depend. Sometimes implies
unreliability of whatever is dependent, or that relia-
bility seems to be dependent on conditions nobody has
been able to determine. "This feature depends on having
- 25 -
the channel open in mumble mode, having the foo switch
set, and on the phase of the moon."
PLUGH [from the Adventure game] v. See XYZZY.
POM n. Phase of the moon (q.v.). Usage: usually used in the
phrase "POM dependent" which means flakey (q.v.).
POP [based on the stack operation that removes the top of a
stack, and the fact that procedure return addresses are
saved on the stack] dialect: POPJ (pop-jay), based on
the PDP-10 procedure return instruction. v. To return
from a digression. By verb doubling, "Popj, popj" means
roughly, "Now let's see, where were we?"
PPN (pip'in) [DEC terminology, short for Project-Programmer
Number] n. 1. A combination "project" (directory name)
and programmer name, used to identify a specific direc-
tory belonging to that user. For instance, "FOO,BAR"
would be the FOO directory for user BAR. Since the name
is restricted to three letters, the programmer name is
usually the person's initials, though sometimes it is a
nickname or other special sequence. (Standard DEC setup
is to have two octal numbers instead of characters;
hence the original acronym.) 2. Often used loosely to
refer to the programmer name alone. "I want to send you
some mail; what's your ppn?" Usage: not used at MIT,
since ITS does not use ppn's. The equivalent terms
would be UNAME and SNAME, depending on context, but
these are not used except in their technical senses.
PROTOCOL See DO PROTOCOL.
PSEUDOPRIME n. A backgammon prime (six consecutive occupied
points) with one point missing.
PTY (pity) n. Pseudo TTY, a simulated TTY used to run a job
under the supervision of another job. PTYJOB (pity-job)
n. The job being run on the PTY. Also a common
general-purpose program for creating and using PTYs.
This is DEC and SAIL terminology; the MIT equivalent is
STY.
PUNT [from the punch line of an old joke: "Drop back 15
yards and punt"] v. To give up, typically without any
intention of retrying.
PUSH [based on the stack operation that puts the current
information on a stack, and the fact that procedure call
addresses are saved on the stack] dialect: PUSHJ (push-
jay), based on the PDP-10 procedure call instruction.
v. To enter upon a digression, to save the current dis-
cussion for later.
- 26 -
QUES (kwess) 1. n. The question mark character ("?"). 2.
interj. What? Also QUES QUES? See WALL.
QUUX [invented by Steele. Mythically, from the Latin semi-
deponent verb QUUXO, QUUXARE, QUUXANDUM IRI; noun form
variously QUUX (plural QUUCES, Anglicized to QUUXES) and
QUUXU (genitive plural is QUUXUUM, four U's in seven
letters).] 1. Originally, a meta-word like FOO and
FOOBAR. Invented by Guy Steele for precisely this pur-
pose when he was young and naive and not yet interacting
with the real computing community. Many people invent
such words; this one seems simply to have been lucky
enough to have spread a little. 2. interj. See FOO;
however, denotes very little disgust, and is uttered
mostly for the sake of the sound of it. 3. n. Refers to
one of four people who went to Boston Latin School and
eventually to MIT:
THE GREAT QUUX: Guy L. Steele, Jr.
THE LESSER QUUX: David J. Littleboy
THE MEDIOCRE QUUX: Alan P. Swide
THE MICRO QUUX: Sam Lewis
(This taxonomy is said to be similarly applied to three
Frankston brothers at MIT.) QUUX, without qualifica-
tion, usually refers to The Great Quux, who is somewhat
infamous for light verse and for the "Crunchly" car-
toons. 4. QUUXY: adj. Of or pertaining to a QUUX.
RANDOM adj. 1. Unpredictable (closest to mathematical defin-
ition); weird. "The system's been behaving pretty ran-
domly." 2. Assorted; undistinguished. "Who was at the
conference?" "Just a bunch of random business types." 3.
Frivolous; unproductive; undirected (pejorative). "He's
just a random loser." 4. Incoherent or inelegant; not
well organized. "The program has a random set of mis-
features." "That's a random name for that function."
"Well, all the names were chosen pretty randomly." 5.
Gratuitously wrong, i.e., poorly done and for no good
apparent reason. For example, a program that handles
file name defaulting in a particularly useless way, or a
routine that could easily have been coded using only
three ac's, but randomly uses seven for assorted non-
overlapping purposes, so that no one else can invoke it
without first saving four extra ac's. 6. In no particu-
lar order, though deterministic. "The I/O channels are
in a pool, and when a file is opened one is chosen ran-
domly." n. 7. A random hacker; used particularly of high
school students who soak up computer time and generally
get in the way. 8. (occasional MIT usage) One who lives
at Random Hall. J. RANDOM is often prefixed to a noun
to make a "name" out of it (by comparison to common
names such as "J. Fred Muggs"). The most common uses
are "J. Random Loser" and "J. Random Nurd" ("Should J.
- 27 -
Random Loser be allowed to gun down other people?"), but
it can be used just as an elaborate version of RANDOM in
any sense. [See also the note at the end of the entry
for HACK.]
RANDOMNESS n. An unexplainable misfeature; gratuitous
inelegance. Also, a hack or crock which depends on a
complex combination of coincidences (or rather, the com-
bination upon which the crock depends). "This hack can
output characters 40-57 by putting the character in the
accumulator field of an XCT and then extracting 6 bits
-- the low two bits of the XCT opcode are the right
thing." "What randomness!"
RAPE v. To (metaphorically) screw someone or something,
violently. Usage: often used in describing file-system
damage. "So-and-so was running a program that did abso-
lute disk I/O and ended up raping the master directory."
RAVE (WPI) v. 1. To persist in discussing a specific sub-
ject. 2. To speak authoritatively on a subject about
which one knows very little. 3. To complain to a person
who is not in a position to correct the difficulty. 4.
To purposely annoy another person verbally. 5. To
evangelize. See FLAME. Also used to describe a less
negative form of blather, such as friendly bullshitting.
REAL USER n. 1. A commercial user. One who is paying "real"
money for his computer usage. 2. A non-hacker. Someone
using the system for an explicit purpose (research pro-
ject, course, etc.). See USER.
REAL WORLD, THE n. 1. In programming, those institutions at
which programming may be used in the same sentence as
FORTRAN, COBOL, RPG, IBM, etc. 2. To programmers, the
location of non-programmers and activities not related
to programming. 3. A universe in which the standard
dress is shirt and tie and in which a person's working
hours are defined as 9 to 5. 4. The location of the
status quo. 5. Anywhere outside a university. "Poor
fellow, he's left MIT and gone into the real world."
Used pejoratively by those not in residence there. In
conversation, talking of someone who has entered the
real world is not unlike talking about a deceased per-
son.
RECURSION n. See RECURSION, TAIL RECURSION.
REL See BIN.
RIGHT THING, THE n. That which is "obviously" the correct or
appropriate thing to use, do, say, etc. Use of this
term often implies that in fact reasonable people may
disagree. "Never let your conscience keep you from
- 28 -
doing the right thing!" "What's the right thing for LISP
to do when it reads '(.)'?"
RUDE (WPI) adj. 1. (of a program) Badly written. 2. Func-
tionally poor, e.g. a program which is very difficult to
use because of gratuitously poor (random?) design deci-
sions. See CUSPY.
SACRED adj. Reserved for the exclusive use of something (a
metaphorical extension of the standard meaning). "Accu-
mulator 7 is sacred to the UUO handler." Often means
that anyone may look at the sacred object, but clobber-
ing it will screw whatever it is sacred to.
SAGA (WPI) n. A cuspy but bogus raving story dealing with N
random broken people.
SAV (save) See BIN.
SEMI 1. n. Abbreviation for "semicolon," when speaking.
"Commands to GRIND are prefixed by semi-semi-star" means
that the prefix is ";;*", not 1/4 of a star. 2. Prefix
with words such as "immediately," as a qualifier. "When
is the system coming up?" "Semi-immediately."
SERVER n. A kind of DAEMON which performs a service for the
requester, which often runs on a computer other than the
one on which the server runs.
SHIFT LEFT (RIGHT) LOGICAL [from any of various machines'
instruction sets] 1. v. To move oneself to the left
(right). To move out of the way. 2. imper. Get out of
that (my) seat! Usage: often used without the "logi-
cal," or as "left shift" instead of "shift left." Some-
times heard as LSH (lish), from the PDP-10 instruction
set.
SHR (share or shir) See BIN.
SHRIEK See EXCL. (Occasional CMU usage.)
69 adj. Large quantity. Usage: Exclusive to MIT-AI. "Go
away, I have 69 things to do to DDT before worrying
about fixing the bug in the phase of the moon output
routine." [Note: Actually, any number less than 100 but
large enough to have no obvious magic properties will be
recognized as a "large number." There is no denying that
"69" is the local favorite. I don't know whether its
origins are related to the obscene interpretation, but I
do know that 69 decimal = 105 octal, and 69 hexadecimal
= 105 decimal, which is a nice property. --GLS]
SLOP n. 1. A one-sided fudge factor (q.v.). Often intro-
duced to avoid the possibility of a fencepost error
- 29 -
(q.v.). 2. (used by compiler freaks) The ratio of code
generated by a compiler to hand-compiled code, minus 1;
i.e., the space (or maybe time) you lose because you
didn't do it yourself.
SLURP v. To read a large data file entirely into core before
working on it. "This program slurps in a 1K-by-1K
matrix and does an FFT."
SMART adj. Said of a program that does the Right Thing
(q.v.) in a wide variety of complicated circumstances.
There is a difference between calling a program smart
and calling it intelligent; in particular, there do not
exist any intelligent programs.
SMOKING CLOVER n. A psychedelic color munch due to Gosper.
SMOP [Simple (or Small) Matter of Programming] n. A piece of
code, not yet written, whose anticipated length is sig-
nificantly greater than its complexity. Usage: used to
refer to a program that could obviously be written, but
is not worth the trouble.
SNARF v. To grab, esp. a large document or file for the pur-
pose of using it either with or without the author's
permission. See BLT. Variant: SNARF (IT) DOWN. (At
MIT on ITS, DDT has a command called :SNARF which grabs
a job from another (inferior) DDT.)
SOFTWARE ROT n. Hypothetical disease the existence of which
has been deduced from the observation that unused pro-
grams or features will stop working after sufficient
time has passed, even if "nothing has changed." Also
known as "bit decay."
SOFTWARILY adv. In a way pertaining to software. "The sys-
tem is softwarily unreliable." The adjective "softwary"
is NOT used. See HARDWARILY.
SOS 1. (ess-oh-ess) n. A losing editor, SON OF STOPGAP. 2.
(sahss) v. Inverse of AOS, from the PDP-10 instruction
set.
SPAZZ 1. v. To behave spastically or erratically; more
often, to commit a single gross error. "Boy, is he
spazzing!" 2. n. One who spazzes. "Boy, what a spazz!"
3. n. The result of spazzing. "Boy, what a spazz!"
SPLAT n. 1. Name used in many places (DEC, IBM, and others)
for the ASCII star ("*") character. 2. (MIT) Name used
by some people for the ASCII pound-sign ("#") character.
3. (Stanford) Name used by some people for the
Stanford/ITS extended ASCII circle-x character. (This
character is also called "circle-x," "blobby," and
- 30 -
"frob," among other names.) 4. (Stanford) Name for the
semi-mythical extended ASCII circle-plus character. 5.
Canonical name for an output routine that outputs what-
ever the the local interpretation of splat is. Usage:
nobody really agrees what character "splat" is, but the
term is common.
SUPDUP v. To communicate with another ARPAnet host using the
SUPDUP program, which is a SUPer-DUPer TELNET talking a
special display protocol used mostly in talking to ITS
sites. Sometimes abbreviated to SD.
STATE n. Condition, situation. "What's the state of NEWIO?"
"It's winning away." "What's your state?" "I'm about to
gronk out." As a special case, "What's the state of the
world?" (or, more silly, "State-of-world-P?") means
"What's new?" or "What's going on?"
STOPPAGE n. Extreme lossage (see LOSSAGE) resulting in some-
thing (usually vital) becoming completely unusable.
STY (pronounced "sty," not spelled out) n. A pseudo-
teletype, which is a two-way pipeline with a job on one
end and a fake keyboard-tty on the other. Also, a stan-
dard program which provides a pipeline from its control-
ling tty to a pseudo-teletype (and thence to another
tty, thereby providing a "sub-tty"). This is MIT termi-
nology; the SAIL and DEC equivalent is PTY.
SUPERPROGRAMMER n. See "wizard," "hacker." Usage: rare.
(Becoming more common among IBM and Yourdon types.)
SWAPPED adj. From the use of secondary storage devices to
implement virtual memory in computer systems. Something
which is SWAPPED IN is available for immediate use in
main memory, and otherwise is SWAPPED OUT. Often used
metaphorically to refer to people's memories ("I read
TECO ORDER every few months to keep the information
swapped in.") or to their own availability ("I'll swap
you in as soon as I finish looking at this other prob-
lem.").
SYSTEM n. 1. The supervisor program on the computer. 2. Any
large-scale program. 3. Any method or algorithm. 4.
The way things are usually done. Usage: a fairly ambi-
guous word. "You can't beat the system." SYSTEM HACKER:
one who hacks the system (in sense 1 only; for sense 2
one mentions the particular program: e.g., LISP HACKER)
T [from LISP terminology for "true"] 1. Yes. Usage: used in
reply to a question, particularly one asked using the
"-P" convention). See NIL. 2. See TIME T.
TAIL RECURSION n. See TAIL RECURSION.
- 31 -
TALK MODE See COM MODE.
TASTE n. (primarily MIT-DMS) The quality in programs which
tends to be inversely proportional to the number of
features, hacks, and kluges programmed into it. Also,
TASTY, TASTEFUL, TASTEFULNESS. "This feature comes in N
tasty flavors." Although TASTEFUL and FLAVORFUL are
essentially synonyms, TASTE and FLAVOR are not.
TECO (tee'koe) [acronym for Text Editor and COrrector] 1. n.
A text editor developed at MIT, and modified by just
about everybody. If all the dialects are included, TECO
might well be the single most prolific editor in use.
Noted for its powerful pseudo-programming features and
its incredibly hairy syntax. 2. v. To edit using the
TECO editor in one of its infinite forms; sometimes used
to mean "to edit" even when not using TECO! Usage: rare
at SAIL, where most people wouldn't touch TECO with a
TENEX pole. [Historical note: DEC grabbed an ancient
version of MIT TECO many years ago when it was still a
TTY-oriented editor. By now, TECO at MIT is highly
display-oriented and is actually a language for writing
editors, rather than an editor. Meanwhile, the outside
world's various versions of TECO remain almost the same
as the MIT version of ten years ago. DEC recently tried
to discourage its use, but an underground movement of
sorts kept it alive.] [Since this note was written I
found out that DEC tried to force their hackers by
administrative decision to use a hacked up and generally
lobotomized version of SOS instead of TECO, and they
revolted. --MRC]
TELNET v. To communicate with another ARPAnet host using the
TELNET protocol. TOPS-10 people use the word IMPCOM
since that is the program name for them. Sometimes
abbreviated to TN. "I usually TN over to SAIL just to
read the AP News."
TENSE adj. Of programs, very clever and efficient. A tense
piece of code often got that way because it was highly
bummed, but sometimes it was just based on a great idea.
A comment in a clever display routine by Mike Kazar:
"This routine is so tense it will bring tears to your
eyes. Much thanks to Craig Everhart and James Gosling
for inspiring this hack attack." A tense programmer is
one who produces tense code.
TERPRI (tur'pree) [from the LISP 1.5 (and later, MacLISP)
function to start a new line of output] v. To output a
CRLF (q.v.).
THEORY n. Used in the general sense of idea, plan, story, or
set of rules. "What's the theory on fixing this TECO
loss?" "What's the theory on dinner tonight?"
- 32 -
("Chinatown, I guess.") "What's the current theory on
letting losers on during the day?" "The theory behind
this change is to fix the following well-known screw..."
THRASH v. To move wildly or violently, without accomplishing
anything useful. Swapping systems which are overloaded
waste most of their time moving pages into and out of
core (rather than performing useful computation), and
are therefore said to thrash.
TICK n. 1. Interval of time; basic clock time on the com-
puter. Typically 1/60 second. See JIFFY. 2. In simu-
lations, the discrete unit of time that passes "between"
iterations of the simulation mechanism. In AI applica-
tions, this amount of time is often left unspecified,
since the only constraint of interest is that caused
things happen after their causes. This sort of AI simu-
lation is often pejoratively referred to as "tick-tick-
tick" simulation, especially when the issue of simul-
taneity of events with long, independent chains of
causes is handwaved.
TIME T n. 1. An unspecified but usually well-understood
time, often used in conjunction with a later time T+1.
"We'll meet on campus at time T or at Louie's at time
T+1." 2. SINCE (OR AT) TIME T EQUALS MINUS INFINITY: A
long time ago; for as long as anyone can remember; at
the time that some particular frob was first designed.
TOOL v.i. To work; to study. See HACK (def #9).
TRAP 1. n. A program interrupt, usually used specifically to
refer to an interrupt caused by some illegal action tak-
ing place in the user program. In most cases the system
monitor performs some action related to the nature of
the illegality, then returns control to the program.
See UUO. 2. v. To cause a trap. "These instructions
trap to the monitor." Also used transitively to indicate
the cause of the trap. "The monitor traps all
input/output instructions."
TTY (titty) n. Terminal of the teletype variety, character-
ized by a noisy mechanical printer, a very limited char-
acter set, and poor print quality. Usage: antiquated
(like the TTY's themselves). Sometimes used to refer to
any terminal at all; sometimes used to refer to the par-
ticular terminal controlling a job.
TWEAK v. To change slightly, usually in reference to a
value. Also used synonymously with TWIDDLE. See FROB-
NICATE and FUDGE FACTOR.
TWENEX n. The TOPS-20 operating system by DEC. So named
because TOPS-10 was a typically crufty DEC operating
- 33 -
system for the PDP-10. BBN developed their own system,
called TENEX (TEN EXecutive), and in creating TOPS-20
for the DEC-20 DEC copied TENEX and adapted it for the
20. Usage: DEC people cringe when they hear TOPS-20
referred to as "Twenex," but the term seems to be catch-
ing on nevertheless. Release 3 of TOPS-20 is suffi-
ciently different from release 1 that some (not all)
hackers have stopped calling it TWENEX, though the writ-
ten abbreviation "20x" is still used.
TWIDDLE n. 1. tilde (ASCII 176, "~"). Also called "squig-
gle," "sqiggle" (sic--pronounced "skig'gul"), and "twad-
dle," but twiddle is by far the most common term. 2. A
small and insignificant change to a program. Usually
fixes one bug and generates several new ones. 3. v. To
change something in a small way. Bits, for example, are
often twiddled. Twiddling a switch or knob implies much
less sense of purpose than toggling or tweaking it; see
FROBNICATE.
UP adj. 1. Working, in order. "The down escalator is up."
2. BRING UP: v. To create a working version and start
it. "They brought up a down system."
USER n. A programmer who will believe anything you tell him.
One who asks questions. Identified at MIT with "loser"
by the spelling "luser." See REAL USER. [Note by GLS: I
don't agree with RF's definition at all. Basically,
there are two classes of people who work with a program:
there are implementors (hackers) and users (losers).
The users are looked down on by hackers to a mild degree
because they don't understand the full ramifications of
the system in all its glory. (A few users who do are
known as real winners.) It is true that users ask ques-
tions (of necessity). Very often they are annoying or
downright stupid.]
UUO (you-you-oh) [short for "Un-Used Operation"] n. A DEC-10
system monitor call. The term "Un-Used Operation" comes
from the fact that, on DEC-10 systems, monitor calls are
implemented as invalid or illegal machine instructions,
which cause traps to the monitor (see TRAP). The SAIL
manual describing the available UUO's has a cover pic-
ture showing an unidentified underwater object. See
YOYO. [Note: DEC sales people have since decided that
"Un-Used Operation" sounds bad, so UUO now stands for
"Unimplemented User Operation."] Tenex and Twenex sys-
tems use the JSYS machine instruction (q.v.), which is
halfway between a legal machine instruction and a UUO,
since KA-10 Tenices implement it as a hardware instruc-
tion which can be used as an ordinary subroutine call
(sort of a "pure JSR").
VANILLA adj. Ordinary flavor, standard. See FLAVOR. When
- 34 -
used of food, very often does not mean that the food is
flavored with vanilla extract! For example, "vanilla-
flavored wonton soup" (or simply "vanilla wonton soup")
means ordinary wonton soup, as opposed to hot and sour
wonton soup.
VAXEN [from "oxen," perhaps influenced by "vixen"] n. pl.
The plural of VAX (a DEC machine).
VIRGIN adj. Unused, in reference to an instantiation of a
program. "Let's bring up a virgin system and see if it
crashes again." Also, by extension, unused buffers and
the like within a program.
VIRTUAL adj. 1. Common alternative to LOGICAL (q.v.), but
never used with compass directions. 2. Performing the
functions of. Virtual memory acts like real memory but
isn't.
VISIONARY n. One who hacks vision (in an AI context, such as
the processing of visual images).
WALDO [probably taken from the story "Waldo," by Heinlein,
which is where the term was first used to mean a mechan-
ical adjunct to a human limb] Used at Harvard, particu-
larly by Tom Cheatham and students, instead of FOOBAR as
a meta-syntactic variable and general nonsense word.
See FOO, BAR, FOOBAR, QUUX.
WALL [shortened form of HELLO WALL, apparently from the
phrase "up against a blank wall"] (WPI) interj. 1. An
indication of confusion, usually spoken with a quizzical
tone. "Wall??" 2. A request for further explication.
WALLPAPER n. A file containing a listing (e.g., assembly
listing) or transcript, esp. a file containing a tran-
script of all or part of a login session. (The idea was
that the LPT paper for such listings was essentially
good only for wallpaper, as evidenced at SAIL where it
was used as such to cover windows.) Usage: not often
used now, esp. since other systems have developed other
terms for it (e.g., PHOTO on TWENEX). The term possibly
originated on ITS, where the commands to begin and end
transcript files are still :WALBEG and :WALEND, with
default file DSK:WALL PAPER.
WATERBOTTLE SOCCER n. A deadly sport practiced mainly by
Sussman's graduate students. It, along with chair bowl-
ing, is the most evident manifestation of the "locker
room atmosphere" said to reign in that sphere. (Sussman
doesn't approve.) [As of 11/82, it's reported that the
sport has given way to a new game called "disc-boot,"
and Sussman even participates occasionally.]
- 35 -
WEDGED [from "head wedged up ass"] adj. To be in a locked
state, incapable of proceeding without help. (See
GRONK.) Often refers to humans suffering misconcep-
tions. "The swapper is wedged." This term is sometimes
used as a synonym for DEADLOCKED (q.v.).
WHAT n. The question mark character ("?"). See QUES.
Usage: rare, used particularly in conjunction with WOW.
WHEEL n. 1. A privilege bit that canonically allows the pos-
sessor to perform any operation on a timesharing system,
such as read or write any file on the system regardless
of protections, change or or look at any address in the
running monitor, crash or reload the system, and
kill/create jobs and user accounts. The term was
invented on the TENEX operating system, and carried over
to TOPS-20, Xerox-IFS and others. 2. A person who
posses a wheel bit. "We need to find a wheel to unwedge
the hung tape drives."
WHEEL WARS [from LOTS at Stanford University] A period dur-
ing which student wheels hack each other by attempting
to log each other out of the system, delete each other's
files, or otherwise wreak havoc, usually at the expense
of the lesser users.
WIN [from MIT jargon] 1. v. To succeed. A program wins if
no unexpected conditions arise. 2. BIG WIN: n. Serendi-
pity. Emphatic forms: MOBY WIN, SUPER WIN, HYPER-WIN
(often used interjectively as a reply). For some reason
SUITABLE WIN is also common at MIT, usually in reference
to a satisfactory solution to a problem. See LOSE.
WINNAGE n. The situation when a lossage is corrected, or
when something is winning. Quite rare. Usage: also
quite rare.
WINNER 1. n. An unexpectedly good situation, program, pro-
grammer or person. 2. REAL WINNER: Often sarcastic, but
also used as high praise.
WINNITUDE n. The quality of winning (as opposed to WINNAGE,
which is the result of winning). "That's really great!
Boy, what winnitude!"
WIZARD n. 1. A person who knows how a complex piece of
software or hardware works; someone who can find and fix
his bugs in an emergency. Rarely used at MIT, where
HACKER is the preferred term. 2. A person who is per-
mitted to do things forbidden to ordinary people, e.g.,
a "net wizard" on a TENEX may run programs which speak
low-level host-imp protocol; an ADVENT wizard at SAIL
may play Adventure during the day.
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WORMHOLE n. A location in a monitor which contains the
address of a routine, with the specific intent of making
it easy to substitute a different routine. The follow-
ing quote comes from "Polymorphic Systems," vol. 2, p.
54:
"Any type of I/O device can be substituted for the stan-
dard device by loading a simple driver routine for that
device and installing its address in one of the
monitor's
__________
*The term has been used to describe a hypothetical
astronomical situation where a black hole connects to
the of the universe. When this happens, information can
pass through the wormhole, in only one direction, much
as pass down the monitor's wormholes."
WOW See EXCL.
XGP 1. n. Xerox Graphics Printer. 2. v. To print something
on the XGP. "You shouldn't XGP such a large file."
XYZZY [from the Adventure game] adj. See PLUGH.
YOYO n. DEC service engineers' slang for UUO (q.v.). Usage:
rare at Stanford and MIT, has been found at random DEC
installations.
YOYO MODE n. State in which the system is said to be when it
rapidly alternates several times between being up and
being down.
YU-SHIANG WHOLE FISH n. The character gamma (extended SAIL
ASCII 11), which with a loop in its tail looks like a
fish. Usage: used primarily by people on the MIT LISP
Machine. Tends to elicit incredulity from people who
hear about it second-hand.
ZERO v. 1. To set to zero. Usually said of small pieces of
data, such as bits or words. 2. To erase; to discard
all data from. Said of disks and directories, where
"zeroing" need not involve actually writing zeroes
throughout the area being zeroed.
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