term% cat index.txt ========= THIS IS THE JARGON FILE, VERSION 2.3.1 03 JAN 1991 =================
Introduction
************
This document is a collection of slang terms used by various
subcultures of computer hackers. Though some technical material is
included for background and flavor, it is not a technical dictionary;
what we describe here is the language hackers use among themselves for
fun and social communication within their communities.
Though the format is that of a reference, it is also intended that
the material be enjoyable to browse or read straight through. Even a
complete outsider should find at least a chuckle on nearly every page,
and much that is amusingly thought-provoking.
The `hacker culture' is actually a loosely networked collection of
subcultures that is nevertheless conscious of some important shared
experiences, shared roots, and shared values. It has its own myths,
heroes, villains, folk epics, in-jokes, taboos and dreams. Because
hackers as a group are particularly creative people who define
themselves partly by rejection of `normal' values and working habits,
it has unusually rich and conscious traditions for an intentional
culture less than thirty-five years old.
Hackers, as a rule, love word-play and are very conscious in their use
of language. Thus, a compilation of their slang is a particularly
effective window into their culture --- and, in fact, this one is the
latest version of an evolving compilation called the `Jargon File'
maintained by hackers themselves for over fifteen years. This one
(like its ancestors) is primarily a lexicon, but also includes `topic
entries' which collect background or sidelight information on hacker
culture that would be awkward to try and subsume under a single term.
A selection of longer items of hacker folklore and humor are included
in appendix A. The `outside' reader's attention is particularly
directed to Appendix B, the Portrait of J. Random Hacker. Appendix C
is a bibliography of non-technical works which have either influenced
or described the hacker culture.
Because hackerdom is an intentional culture (one which each individual
must choose consciously to join), one should not be surprised that the
line between description and influence can become more than a little
blurred. Earlier Jargon File versions have played a central role in
spreading hacker language and the culture that goes with it to
successively larger populations, and we hope and expect that this one
will do likewise.
Revision History
================
The original `jargon file' (hereafter referred to as `jargon-1') was a
collection of hacker slang from technical cultures including the MIT
AI Lab, the Stanford AI lab, the old ARPANET AI/LISP/PDP-10
communities, Carnegie-Mellon University, and Worcester Polytechnic
Institute. Some entries dated back to the early 1970s. It was
compiled by Raphael Finkel, Don Woods, Mark Crispin, and Guy L. Steele
Jr., and last revised about 1983. Its revisions are all un-numbered
and may be collectively considered `Version 1'.
A late version of jargon-1, expanded with commentary for the mass
market, was edited by by Guy L. Steele into a book published in 1983
as `The Hacker's Dictionary' (Harper & Row CN 1082, ISBN
0-06-091082-8). The other jargon-1 editors (Raphael Finkel, Don Woods
and Mark Crispin) contributed to the revision, as did also Richard M.
Stallman and Geoff Goodfellow. This book is hereafter referred to as
`Steele-1983'. It is now out of print.
This version contains nearly the entire text of a late version of
jargon-1 (a few obsolescent PDP-10-related entries have been dropped
following careful consultation with the editors of Steele-1983). It
merges in about about 80% of the Steele-1983 text, omitting some
framing material and a very few entries introduced in Steele-1983
which are now also obsolescent.
This new version casts a wider net than the old jargon file; its aim
is to cover not just AI but all the technical computing cultures
wherein the true hacker-nature is manifested. More than half of the
entries now derive from USENET and represent slang now current in the
C and UNIX communities.
The present maintainer of the jargon file is Eric S. Raymond
(eric@snark.thyrsus.com) with some assistance from Guy L. Steele
(gls@think.com); these are the persons primarily reflected in the
File's editorial `we', though we take pleasure in acknowledging the
special contribution of the other coauthors of Steele-1983. Please
email all additions, corrections and correspondence relating to the
jargon file to jargon@thyrsus.com (UUCP-only sites without
connections to an autorouting smart site can use
...!uunet!snark!jargon).
(Warning: other email addresses appear in this file *but are not
guaranteed to be correct* later than the revision date on the first
line. *Don't* email us if an attempt to reach your idol bounces
--- we have no magic way of checking addresses or looking up people)
Some snapshot of this on-line version will become the main text of a
`New Hacker's Dictionary' possibly as early as Fall 1991. The
maintainers are committed to updating the on-line version of the
jargon file through and beyond paper publication, and will continue to
make it available to archives and public-access sites as a trust of
the hacker community.
Here is a chronology of the recent on-line revisions:
Version 2.1.1, Jun 12 1990: the jargon file comes alive again after a
seven-year hiatus. Reorganization and massive additions were by Eric
S. Raymond, approved by Guy Steele. Many items of UNIX, C, USENET and
microcomputer-based slang were added at that time (as well as The
Untimely Demise of Mabel The Monkey). Some obsolescent usages (mostly
PDP-10 derived) were moved to appendix B.
Version 2.1.5, Nov 28 1990: changes and additions by ESR in response to
numerous USENET submissions and comment from the First Edition coauthors.
The bibliography (Appendix C) was also appended.
Version 2.2.1, Dec 15 1990: most of the contents of the 1983 paper
edition edited by Guy Steele was merged in. Many more USENET
submissions added, including the International Style and
<COMMONWEALTH HACKISH> material.
Version 2.3.1, Jan 03 1991: the great format change --- case is no
longer smashed in lexicon keys and cross-references. A very few
entries from jargon-1 which were basically straight tech-speak were
deleted; this enabled the rest of Appendix B to be merged back into
main text and the appendix replaced with the Portrait of J. Random
Hacker. More USENET submissions were added.
Version numbering: Read versions as <major>.<minor>.<revision>. Major
version 1 is reserved for the `old' (ITS) Jargon File, jargon-1. Major
version 2 encompasses revisions by ESR with assistance from GLS. Someday,
the next maintainer will take over and spawn `version 3'. In general, later
versions will either completely obsolesce or incorporate earlier versions,
so there is generally no point in keeping old versions around.
Our thanks to the other co-authors of Steele-1983 for oveersight and
assistance; also to all the USENETters who contributed entries and
encouragement. Special thanks go to our Scandinavian correspondent
Per Lindberg (per@front.se), author of the remarkable Swedish
language 'zine `Hackerbladet', for bringing FOO! comics to our
attention and smuggling the IBM hacker underground's own baby jargon
file out to us. Also, much gratitude to ace hacker/linguist Joe Keane
(jkg@osc.osc.com) for helping us improve the pronunciation guides;
and to Maarten Litmath for generously allowing the inclusion of the
ASCII pronunciation guide he formerly maintained. Finally, Mark
Brader (msb@sq.sq.com) submitted many, many K of thoughtful comments
and did yeoman service in catching typos and minor usage bobbles.
Format For New Entries
======================
Try to conform to the format already being used --- definitions and
cross-references in angle brackets, pronunciations in slashes,
etymologies in square brackets, single-space after definition numbers
and word classes, etc. Stick to the standard ASCII character set (no
high-half characters or [nt]roff/TeX/Scribe escapes), as one of the
versions generated from the master file is an info document that has
to be viewable on a character tty.
Please note that as of 2.3.1 the preferred format has changed rather
dramatically; please *don't* all-caps your entry keys any more.
Besides preserving case information, this enables the maintainers to
process the File into a rather spiffy [nt]roff document with font
switches via an almost trivial lex(1) program. This is all in aid of
preventing the freely-available on-line document and the book from
diverging.
We are looking to expand the file's range of technical specialties covered.
There are doubtless rich veins of jargon yet untapped in the scientific
computing, graphics, and networking hacker communities; also in numerical
analysis, computer architectures and VLSI design, language design, and many
other related fields. Send us your slang!
We are *not* interested in straight technical terms explained by
textbooks or technical dictionaries unless an entry illuminates
"underground" meanings or aspects not covered by official histories.
We are also not interested in "joke" entries --- there is a lot of
humor in the file but it must flow naturally out of the explanations
of what hackers do and how they think.
It is OK to submit items of slang you have originated if they have spread
to the point of being used by people who are not personally acquainted with
you. We prefer items to be attested by independent submission from two
different sites.
A few new definitions attached to entries are marked [proposed].
These are usually generalizations suggested by editors or USENET
respondents in the process of commenting to previous definitions of
those entries. These are *not* represented as established
jargon.
The jargon file will be regularly maintained and re-posted from now on and
will include a version number. Read it, pass it around, contribute --- this
is *your* monument!
Jargon Construction
===================
There are some standard methods of jargonification which became
established quite early (i.e. before 1970), spreading from such
sources as the MIT Model Railroad Club, the PDP-1 SPACEWAR hackers and
John McCarthy's original crew of LISPers. These include:
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!"
Some verb-doubled constructions have special meanings not immediately
obvious from the verb. These have their own listings in the lexicon.
Soundalike slang: Phonetic distortions of a phrase intended to produce the
effect of a pun or wordplay. Not really similar to the Cockney rhyming
slang it has been compared to in the past, because Cockney substitutions
are opaque whereas hacker rhyming slang is intentionally transparent.
Often made up on the spur of the moment. Standard examples:
Boston Globe => Boston Glob
Herald American => Horrid (or Harried) American
New York Times => New York Slime
Prime Time => Slime Time
Data General => Dirty Genitals
Government Property - Do Not Duplicate (seen on keys)
=> Government Duplicity - Do Not Propagate
for historical reasons => for hysterical raisins
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
Margaret Jacks Hall => Marginal Hacks Hall
The -P convention: turning a word into a question by appending 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.)
At dinnertime:
Q: "Foodp?"
A: "Yeah, I'm pretty hungry." or "T!"
Q: "State-of-the-world-P?"
A: (Straight) "I'm about to go home."
A: (Humorous) "Yes, the world has a state."
On the phone to Florida:
Q: "State-p Florida?"
A: "Been reading JARGON.TXT again, eh?"
[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]
Overgeneralization: A very conspicuous feature of hackerspeak is the
frequency with which names of program tools, command language
primitives, and even assembler opcodes are applied to contexts outside
of computing wherever hackers find amusing analogies to them. Thus,
(to cite one of the best-known examples) UNIX hackers often <grep> for
things rather than *searching* for them. Many of the lexicon
entries are generalizations of exactly this kind.
Hackers enjoy overgeneralization on the grammatical level as well.
Many 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. For example, because
porous => porosity
generous => generosity
hackers happily generalize:
mysterious => mysteriosity
ferrous => ferrocity
Also, note that all nouns can be verbed. e.g.: "All nouns can be
verbed", "I'll mouse it up", "Hang on while I clipboard it over",
"I'm grepping the files". English as a whole is already heading in
this direction (towards pure-positional grammar like Chinese);
hackers are simply a bit ahead of the curve.
Similarly, all verbs can be nouned. Thus:
win -> winnitude, winnage
disgust -> disgustitude
hack -> hackification
Finally, note the prevalence of certain kinds of nonstandard plural
forms. Anything ending in x may form plurals in -xen (see <VAXen> and
<boxen> in the main text). Even words ending in phonetic /k/ alone are
sometimes treated this way; ex. `soxen' for a bunch of socks. Other
funny plurals are `frobbotzim' for the plural of <frobbotz> (see main
text) and `Unices' and `Tenices' (rather than `Unixes' and `Tenexes';
see <UNIX>, <TENEX> in main text). But note that `Unixen' and `Tenexen'
are *never* used; it has been suggested that this is because
-ix and -ex are latin singular endings that "attract" as Latin
plural,
The pattern here, as with other hackish grammatical quirks, is
generalization of an inflectional rule which (in English) is either
an import or a fossil (such as Hebrew plural in `-im', or the
Anglo-Saxon plural in `en') to cases where it isn't normally
considered to apply.
This is not `poor grammar', as hackers are generally quite well
aware of what they are doing when they distort the language. It is
grammatical creativity, a form of playfulness.
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 on a comm link or in
email. Another expression sometimes heard is "complain!", meaning
"I have a complaint!"
Of the five listed constructions, verb doubling, peculiar noun
formations, and (especially!) spoken inarticulations have become quite
general; but rhyming slang is still largely confined to MIT and other
large universities, and the P convention is found only where LISPers
flourish.
Finally, note that many words in hacker jargon have to be
understood as members of sets of comparatives. This is especially
true of the adjectives and nouns used to describe the beauty and
functional quality of code. Here is an approximately correct
spectrum:
MONSTROSITY BRAIN-DAMAGE SCREW BUG LOSE MISFEATURE
CROCK KLUGE HACK WIN FEATURE ELEGANCE PERFECTION
The last is spoken of as a mythical absolute, approximated but never
actually attained. Coinages for describing <lossage> seem to call
forth the very finest in hackish linguistic inventiveness; it has been
truly said that "<Computer geeks> have more words for equipment
failures than Inuits have for snow".
Hacker Speech Style
===================
Features extremely precise diction, careful word choice, a
relatively large working vocabulary, and relatively little use of
contractions or "street slang". Dry humor, irony, puns, and a
mildly flippant attitude are highly valued --- but an underlying
seriousness and intelligence is essential. One should use just
enough jargon to communicate precisely and identify oneself as "in
the culture"; overuse of jargon or a breathless, excessively
gung-ho attitude are considered tacky and the mark of a loser.
This speech style is a variety of the precisionist English normally
spoken by scientists, design engineers, and academics in technical
fields. Unlike the jargon construction methods it is fairly constant
throughout hackerdom.
It has been observed that many hackers are confused by negative
questions --- or, at least, the people they're talking to are often
confused by the sense of their answers. The problem is that they've
done so much coding that distinguishes between
if (going) {
and
if (!going) {
that when they parse the question "Aren't you going?" it seems to be
asking the opposite question from "Are you going?", and so merits an
answer in the opposite sense. This confuses English-speaking
non-hackers because they were taught to answer as though the negative
part weren't there (in some other languages, including Chinese and
Japanese, the hackish interpretation is standard and the problem
wouldn't arise). Hackers often find themselves wishing for a word
like French "si" with which one could unambiguously answer "yes"
to a negative question.
For similar reasons, English-speaking hackers almost never use a
double negative even if they live in a region where colloquial usage
allows it. The thought of uttering something that logically ought to
be an affirmative knowing it will be mis-parsed as a negative tends to
disturb them.
Hacker Writing Style
====================
Hackers tend to use quotes as balanced delimiters like parens, much to
the dismay of American editors. Thus, if "Jim is going" is a
phrase, and so is "Bill runs" and "Spock groks", then hackers
generally prefer to write: "Jim is going", "Bill runs", and
"Spock groks". This is incorrect according to standard American
usage (which would put the continuation commas and the final period
inside the string quotes) but it is counter-intuitive to hackers to
mutilate literal strings with characters that don't belong in them.
The Jargon File follows hackish usage fairly consistently throughout.
Interestingly, this is now preferred practice in Great Britain, though
the older style (which became established for typographical reasons
having to do with the aesthetics of comma and quotes in typeset text)
is still accepted there. Hart's Rules and the Oxford Dictionary for
Writers and Editors call it "new" or "logical" style quoting.
Hackers have also developed a number of punctuation and emphasis
conventions adapted to single-font all-ASCII communications links, and
these are occasionally carried over into written documents even when
normal means of font changes, underlining and the like are available.
One of these is that TEXT IN ALL CAPS IS INTERPRETED AS "LOUD", and
this becomes such a synesthetic reflex that a person who goes to
caps-lock while in <talk mode> (see main text) may be asked to "stop
shouting, please, you're hurting my ears!".
Also, it is common to use bracketing with asterisks to signify
emphasis, as in "What the *hell*?". An alternative form uses paired
slash and backslash: "What the \hell/?". The latter is never used
in text documents, as many formatters treat backslash as an <escape>
and may do inappropriate things with the following text.
Two asterisks in a row, on the other hand, are a shorthand for
exponentiation (this derives from FORTRAN). Thus one might write "2
** 8 = 256".
Another notation for exponentiation one sees more frequently uses the
caret (^, ASCII 1011110); one might write instead "2^8 = 256". This
goes all the way back to Algol-60, which used the archaic ASCII
`up-arrow' that later became caret; this was picked up by Kemeny &
Hall's original BASIC, which in turn influenced the design of the
bc(1) and dc(1) UNIX tools that have probably done most to reinforce
the convention on USENET. The notation is mildly confusing to C
programmers, because `^' means logical XOR in C. Despite this, it was
favored 3-1 over ** in a late-1990 snapshot of USENET. It is used
consistently in this text.
Underlining is often suggested by substituting underscores for spaces
and prepending and appending one underscore to the underlined phrase.
Example: "It is often alleged that Haldeman wrote _The_Forever_War_
in response to Robert Heinlein's earlier _Starship_Troopers_"
On USENET and in the MUD world (see <MUD> in main text) common C
boolean operators (|, !, ==, !=, >, <) are often combined with English
by analogy with mainstream usage of &. The use of prefix `!' as a
loose synonym for `not-' or `no-' is particularly common; thus,
`!clue' is read `no-clue' or `clueless'.
Another habit is that of using enclosure to genericize a term; this
derives from conventions used in <BNF>. Uses like the following are
common:
So this <ethnic> walks into a bar one day, and...
In flat-ASCII renderings of the Jargon File, you will see <> used in
exactly this way to bracket words which themselves have entries in the
File. This isn't done all the time for every such word, but it is
done everywhere that the reader needs specially to be aware that the
term has a jargon meaning and might wish to refer to its entry.
One quirk that shows up frequently in the email style of UNIX hackers
in particular is a tendency for some things which are normally
all-lowercase (including usernames and the names of commands and C
routines) to remain uncapitalized even when they occur at the
beginning of sentences. It is clear that for many hackers, the case of
such identifiers becomes a part of their internal representation and
cannot be overridden without mental effort (an appropriate reflex
because UNIX and C both distinguish cases and confusing them can lead
to lossage). The *rest* of us simply avoid using these
constructions at the beginning of sentences.
Finally, it should be noted that hackers exhibit much less reluctance
to use multiply-nested parentheses than is normal in English. Partly
this is almost certainly due to influence from LISP ((which uses
deeply nested parentheses (like this) in its syntax) (a lot (see?))),
but it has also been suggested that a more basic hacker trait of
enjoying playing with complexity and pushing systems to their limits
is in operation.
International Style
===================
Although the Jargon File remains primarily a lexicon of hacker
usage in American English, we have made some effort to get input from
abroad. Though the hacker-speak of other languages often uses
translations of English slang (often as transmitted to them by earlier
Jargon File versions!) the local variations are interesting, and
knowledge of them may be of some use to traveling hackers.
There are some references to `Commonwealth English'. These are
intended to describe some variations in hacker usage as reported in
the English spoken in Great Britain and the Commonwealth (Canada,
Australia, India etc., though Canada is heavily influenced by American
usage) There is also an entry on COMMONWEALTH HACKISH, which see.
Hackers in Western Europe and (especially) Scandinavia are reported
to often use a mixture of English and their native languages for
technical conversation. Occasionally they develop idioms in their
English usage which are influenced by their native-language styles.
Some of these are reported here.
A note or two on hackish usages in Russian have been added where they
are parallel with and comprehensible to English-speakers.
UNIX Conventions
================
References such as `malloc(3)' and `patch(1)' are to UNIX
facilities (some of which, such as patch(1), are actually freeware
distributed over USENET). The UNIX manuals use `foo(n)' to refer
to item foo in section (n) of the manual, where n=1 is utilities, n=2
is system calls, n=3 is C library routines, n=6 is games, and n=8
(where present) is system administration utilities. Sections 4, 5,
and 7 have changed roles frequently and in any case are not referred
to from any of the entries.
Pronunciation Guide
===================
Pronunciation keys are provided in the jargon listing for all
entries which are neither dictionary words pronounced as in standard
English nor obvious compounds of same. Slashes bracket a phonetic
pronunciation to be interpreted using the following conventions:
1. Syllables are hyphen-separated, except that an apostrophe
or back-apostrophe follows each accented syllable (the
back apostrophe marks a secondary accent in some words of
four or more syllables).
2. Consonants are pronounced as in American English. The letter
"g" is always hard (as in "got" rather than "giant");
"ch" is soft ("church" rather than "chemist"). The letter
"j" is the sound that occurs twice in "judge". The letter
"s" is always as in "pass", never a z sound (but it is
sometimes doubled at the end of syllables to emphasize this).
The digraph `dh' is the th of `these clothes', not of `thick'.
The digraph `kh' is the guttural of `loch' or `l'chaim'.
3. Vowels are represented as follows:
a back, that
ah father, palm
ar far, mark
aw flaw, caught
ay bake, rain
e less, men
ee easy, ski
eir their, software
i trip, hit
ie life, sky
o cot, top
oh flow, sew
oo loot, through
or more, door
ow out, how
oy boy, coin
uh but, some
u put, foot
y yet
yoo few
[y]oo oo with optional fronting as in `news' (noos or nyoos)
An at-sign is used for the "schwa" sound of unstressed or occluded
vowels (the one that is often written with an upside-down "e"). The
schwa vowel is omitted in syllables containing vocalic r, l, m or n;
that is, "kitten" and "color" would be rendered /kit'n/ and
/kul'r/, not /kit'@n/ and /kul'@r/.
Entries are sorted in case-blind ASCII collation order (rather than
the letter-by-letter order ignoring interword spacing common in
mainstream dictionaries). The case-blindness is a feature, not
a bug.
The Jargon Lexicon
******************
{= =}
<@-party> /at-part'ee/ n. (also "@-sign party" /at-sien par'tee/)
Semi-closed parties thrown at SF conventions (esp. the annual
Worldcon) for hackers; one must have a <network address> to get in,
or at least be in company with someone who does. One of the most
reliable opportunities for hackers to meet face to face with people
who might otherwise be represented by mere phosphor dots on their
screens. Compare <boink>.
<@Begin> [primarily CMU] n. SCRIBE equivalent of <\Begin>.
<(TM)> [USENET] ASCII rendition of the trademark symbol, appended to
phrases that the author feels should be recorded for posterity,
perhaps in the Jargon File. Sometimes used ironically as a form of
protest against the recent spate of software and algorithm patents,
and "look and feel" lawsuits.
</dev/null> [from the UNIX null device, used as a data sink] n. A
notional `black hole' in any information space being discussed,
used or referred to. A controversial posting, for example, might
end "Kudos to rasputin@kremlin.org, flames to /dev/null". See
<bit bucket>, <null device>.
<2 infix> n. In translation software written by hackers, infix 2 often
represents the syllable "to" with the connotation "translate
to"; as in dvi2ps (DVI to PostScript), int2string (integer to
string) and texi2roff (Texinfo to [nt]roff).
<\Begin> with \End, used humorously in writing to
indicate a context or to remark on the surrounded text. From the
LaTex 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}
The Scribe users at CMU and elswhere used to use @Begin/@End in
an identical way. On USENET, this construct would more frequently
be rendered as "<FLAME ON>" and "<FLAME OFF>".
{= A =}
<ACK> /ak/ interj. 1. [from the ASCII mnemonic for 0000110]
Acknowledge. Used to register one's presence (compare mainstream
"Yo!"). An appropriate response to <ping> or <ENQ>. 2. [prob.
from the Bloom County comic strip] An exclamation of surprised
disgust, esp. in "Oop ack!". Semi-humorous. 3. Used to politely
interrupt someone to tell them you understand their point. See
<NAK>. Thus, for example, you might cut off an overly long
explanation with "Ack. Ack. Ack. I get it now". See also <NAK>.
There is also a usage "ACK?" (from sense #1) meaning "Are you
there?", often used in email when earlier mail has produced no
reply, or during a lull in <talk mode> to see if the person has
gone away (the standard humorous response is of course <NAK>
(sense #2), i.e. "I'm not here").
<adger> /adj'r/ [UCLA] v. To make a bonehead move that could have been
foreseen with a slight amount of mental effort. E.g., "He started
removing files and promptly adgered the whole project." Compare
<dumbass attack>.
<ad-hockery> /ad-hok'@r-ee/ [Purdue] n. 1. Gratuitous assumptions
made inside certain programs, esp. expert systems, which lead to
the appearance of semi-intelligent behavior, but are in fact
entirely arbitrary. 2. Special-case code to cope with some awkward
input which would otherwise cause a program to <choke>, presuming
normal inputs are dealt with in some cleaner and more regular way.
<ADVENT> /ad'vent/ n. The prototypical computer adventure game, first
implemented on the <PDP-10> by Will Crowther as an attempt at
computer-refereed fantasy gaming, and expanded into a
puzzle-oriented game by Don Woods. Now better known as Adventure,
but the <TOPS-10> operating system only permitted 6-letter
filenames.
This game defined the terse, dryly humorous style now expected in
text adventure games, and popularized several tag lines that have
become fixtures of hacker-speak. "A huge green fierce snake bars
the way!" "I see no X here." (for X some noun). "You are in a
maze of twisty little passages, all alike". The "magic words"
<xyzzy> and <plugh> also derive from this game.
Crowther, by the way, participated in the exploration of the
Mammoth/Flint Ridge cave system; it actually *has* a `Colossal
Cave' and a `Bedquilt' as in the game, and the `Y2' that also turns
up is cavers' jargon for a map reference to a secondary entrance.
<AI koans> pl.n. A series of pastiches of Zen teaching riddles created
at the MIT AI Lab around various major figures of the Lab's
culture. A selection are included in Appendix A. See also <ha ha
only serious> and <HUMOR, HACKER>.
<aliasing bug> [C programmers] n. A class of subtle programming errors
which can arise in code that does dynamic allocation via `malloc(3)'.
If more than one pointer addresses (`aliases for') a given hunk of
storage, it may happen that the storage is freed through one alias
and then referenced through another, leading to subtle (and
possibly intermittent) lossage depending on the state and the
allocation history of the malloc <arena>. Avoidable by use of
allocation strategies that never alias allocated core. Also called
a <stale pointer bug>. See also <precedence lossage>, <smash the
stack>, <fandango on core>, <memory leak>, <overrun screw>, <spam>.
<ALT> [PDP-10] n.obs. Alternate name for the ASCII ESC character,
after the keycap labeling on some older terminals. Also
"ALT-MODE". This character was almost never pronounced
"escape" on an ITS system, in TECO, or under TOPS-10 -- always
ALT, as in "type ALT ALT to end a TECO command" or "ALT U onto
the system" (for "log onto the [ITS] system"). This was
probably because ALT is more convenient to say than "escape",
especially when followed by another ALT or a character (or another
ALT *and* a charcater, for that matter!).
<alt bit> /ahlt bit/ [from alternate] adj. See <meta bit>.
<Aluminum Book> [MIT] n. `Common Lisp: The Language', by Guy L.
Steele Jr., Digital Press, first edition, 1984, second edition
1990. Strictly speaking, only the first edition is the aluminum
book, since the second edition has a yuccky pale green cover. See
also <Blue Book>, <Red Book>, <Green Book>, <Silver Book>, <Purple
Book>, <Orange Book>, <White Book>, <Pink-Shirt Book>, <Dragon
Book>.
<amoeba> /@'mee-b@/ n. Humorous term for the Commodore Amiga
personal computer.
<amp off> [Purdue] v. To run in <background>. From the UNIX shell `&'
operator.
<angle brackets> [primarily MIT] n. Either of the characters "<" and
">" (ASCII less-than or greater-than signs). The <Real World>
angle bracket used by typographers is actually taller than a
less-than or greater-than sign. See <broket>, <ASCII>.
<AOS> /aus/ (East coast), /ay-ahs/ (West coast) [based on a PDP-10
increment instruction] v.,obs. 1. To increase the amount of
something. "Aos the campfire." Usage: considered silly, and now
obsolescent. See <SOS>. Now largely supplanted by <bump>. 2. A
crufty <Multics>-derived OS supported at one time by Data General.
<app> /ap/ n. Short for `application program', as opposed to a systems
program. What systems vendors are forever chasing developers to do
for their environments so they can sell more boxes. Hackers tend
not to think of the things they themselves run as apps; thus, in
hacker parlance the term excludes compilers, program editors,
games, and messaging systems, though a user would consider all
those apps. Oppose <tool>, <operating system>.
<arena> [UNIX] n. The area of memory attached to a process by `brk(2)'
and `sbrk(2)' and used by `malloc(3)' as dynamic storage. So named
from a semi-mythical `malloc: corrupt arena' message supposedly
emitted when some early versions became terminally confused. See
<overrun screw>, <aliasing bug>, <memory leak>, <smash the stack>.
<arg> /arg/ n. Abbreviation for "argument" (to a function), used so
often as to have become a new word (like "piano" from
"pianoforte"). "The sine function takes one arg, but the
arc-tangent function can take either one or two args". Compare
<param>, <var>.
<asbestos cork award> n. Once, long ago at MIT, there was a <flamer>
so consistently obnoxious that another hacker designed, had made,
and distributed posters announcing that said flamer had been
recognized by the "asbestos cork award". Persons in any doubt as
to the intended application of the cork should consult the
etymology under <flamer>. Since then, it is agreed that only a
select few have risen to the heights of bombast required to earn
this dubious dignity --- but there's no agreement on *which*
few.
<asbestos longjohns> n. Metaphoric garments often donned by <USENET>
posters just before emitting a remark they expect will elicit
<flamage>. Also "asbestos underwear", "asbestos overcoat",
etc.
<ASCII> [American Standard Code for Information Interchange] /as'kee/
n. Common slang names for ASCII characters are collected here. See
individual entries for <bang>, <close>, <excl>, <open>, <ques>,
<semi>, <shriek>, <splat>, <twiddle>, <what>, <wow>, and <Yu-Shiang
whole fish>. This list derives from revision 2.2 of the USENET
ASCII pronunciation guide. Single characters are listed in ASCII
order, character pairs are sorted in by first member. For each
character, "official" names appear first, then others in order of
popularity (more or less).
!
exclamation point, exclamation, bang, factorial, excl,
ball-bat, pling, smash, shriek, cuss, wow, hey, wham
"
double quote, quote, dirk, literal mark, rabbit ears
#
number sign, sharp, crunch, mesh, hex, hash, flash, grid,
pig-pen, tictactoe, scratchmark, octothorpe, thud
$
dollar sign, currency symbol, buck, cash, string (from
BASIC), escape (from <TOPS-10>), ding, big-money, cache
%
percent sign, percent, mod, double-oh-seven
&
ampersand, amper, and, address (from C), andpersand
'
apostrophe, single quote, quote, prime, tick, irk, pop,
spark
()
open/close parenthesis, left/right parenthesis,
paren/thesis, lparen/rparen, parenthisey, unparenthisey,
open/close round bracket, ears, so/already, wax/wane
*
asterisk, star, splat, wildcard, gear, dingle, mult
+
plus sign, plus, add, cross, intersection
,
comma, tail
-
hyphen, dash, minus sign, worm
.
period, dot, decimal point, radix point, point, full stop,
spot
/
virgule, slash, stroke, slant, diagonal, solidus, over, slat
:
colon
;
semicolon, semi
<>
angle brackets, brokets, left/right angle, less/greater
than, read from/write to, from/into, from/toward, in/out,
comesfrom/ gozinta (all from UNIX), funnel, crunch/zap,
suck/blow
=
equal sign, equals, quadrathorp, gets, half-mesh
?
question mark, query, whatmark, what, wildchar, ques, huh,
hook
@
at sign, at, each, vortex, whorl, whirlpool, cyclone, snail,
ape, cat
V
vee, book
[]
square brackets, left/right bracket, bracket/unbracket,
bra/ket, square/unsquare, U turns
\
reversed virgule, backslash, bash, backslant, backwhack,
backslat, escape (from UNIX), slosh.
^
circumflex, caret, uparrow, hat, chevron, sharkfin, to ("to
the power of"), fang
_
underscore, underline, underbar, under, score, backarrow
`
grave accent, grave, backquote, left quote, open quote,
backprime, unapostrophe, backspark, birk, blugle, back tick,
push
{}
open/close brace, left/right brace, brace/unbrace, curly
bracket, curly/uncurly, leftit/rytit, embrace/bracelet
|
vertical bar, bar, or, or-bar, v-bar, pipe, gozinta, thru,
pipesinta (last four from UNIX)
~
tilde, squiggle, approx, wiggle, twiddle, swung dash, enyay
Some other common usages cause odd overlaps. The ``$'', ``#'', and ``&''
chars, for example, are all pronunced `hex' in different
communities because various assemblers use them as a prefix tag for
hexadecimal constants (in particular, $ in the 6502 world and & on
the Sinclair and some other Z80 machines).
<asymptotic> adj. Infinitely close to. This is used in a
generalization of its mathematical meaning to allege that something
is <within epsilon of> some standard, reference or goal (see
<epsilon>).
<autobogotiphobia> /aw'to-boh-got'@-foh`bee-uh/ n. See <bogotify>.
<automagically> /aw-toh-maj'i-klee/ or /aw-toh-maj'i-k@l-ee/ adv.
Automatically, but in a way which, for some reason (typically
because it is too complicated, or too ugly, or perhaps even too
trivial), the speaker doesn't feel like explaining to you. See
<magic>. "The C-INTERCAL compiler generates C, then automagically
invokes `cc(1)' to produce an executable."
<awk> n. 1. [UNIX] An interpreted language developed by Aho, Weinberg
and Kernighan, characterized by: C-like syntax, a BASIC-like
approach to variable typing and declarations, associative arrays,
and field-oriented text processing. See also <PERL>. 2. Editing
term for an expression awkward to manipulate through normal regular
expression facilities.
{= B =}
<backbone cabal> n. A group of large-site administrators who pushed
through the <Great Renaming> and reined in the chaos of <USENET>
during most of the 1980s. The cabal mailing list disbanded in late
1988 after a bitter internal catfight, but the net hardly noticed.
<back door> n. A hole in the security of a system deliberately left in
place by designers or maintainers. The motivation for this is not
always sinister; some operating systems, for example, come out of
the box with privileged accounts intended for use by field service
or the vendor's maintenance programmers. Historically, back doors
have often lurked in systems longer than anyone expected or
planned, and a few have become widely known. The famous RTM worm
of late 1988, for example, used a back door in the BSD UNIX
`sendmail(1)' utility. Syn. <trap door>; may also be called a
"wormhole". See also <iron box>, <cracker>, <worm>, <logic
bomb>.
<background> vt.,adj. A task running in background is detached from
the terminal where it was started (and often running at a lower
priority); oppose <foreground>. Nowadays this term is primarily
associated with <UNIX>, but it was appears first to have been used
in this sense on OS/360. By extension, to do a task "in
background" is to do it whenever <foreground> matters are not
claiming your undivided attention, and "to background" something
means to relegate it to a lower priority. Compare <amp off>,
<slopsucker>.
<Bad Thing> [from the 1926 Sellers & Yeatman parody `1066 and All
That'] n. Something which can't possibly result in improvement of
the subject. This term is always capitalized, as in "Replacing
all of the 9600 baud modems with bicycle couriers would be a Bad
Thing." Oppose <Good Thing>. British correspondents confirm that
<Bad Thing> and <Good Thing> (and prob. therefore <Right Thing> and
<Wrong Thing>) come from the book referenced in the etymology,
which discusses rulers who were Good Kings, but Bad Things. This
has apparently acreated mainstream idiom on their side of the pond.
<bagbiter> /bag'biet-@r/ n. 1. Something, such as a program or a
computer, that fails to work, or works in a remarkably clumsy
manner. Example: "This text editor won't let me make a file with
a line longer than 80 characters! What a bagbiter!" 2. A person
who has caused you some trouble, inadvertently or otherwise,
typically by failing to program the computer properly. Synonyms:
<loser>, <cretin>, <chomper>. 3. Also in the form <bagbiting> adj.
Having the quality of a bagbiter. `This bagbiting system won't let
me compute the factorial of a negative number.' Compare <losing>,
<cretinous>, <bletcherous>, <barfucious> (under <barf>) and
<chomping> (under <chomp>). 4. <bite the bag> vi. To fail in some
manner. "The computer keeps crashing every five minutes." "Yes,
the disk controller is really biting the bag." The original
loading of these terms was almost undoubtedly obscene, probably
referring to the scrotum, but in their current usage they have
become almost completely sanitized.
<bamf> /bamf/ [from old X-men comics] interj. Notional sound made by a
person or object teleporting in or out of the hearer's vicinity.
Often used in <virtual reality> (esp. <MUD>) electronic fora when a
character wishes to make a dramatic entrance or exit.
<bandwidth> n. 1. Used by hackers in a generalization of its technical
meaning as the volume of information per unit time that a computer,
person or transmission medium can handle. "Those are amazing
graphics but I missed some of the detail --- not enough bandwidth,
I guess." 2. Attention span. 3. Very loosely, total data volume.
"Never underestimate the bandwidth of a station-wagon full of
magtapes." 4. On <USENET>, a measure of network capacity that is
often wasted by people complaining about how network news items
posted by others are a waste of bandwidth.
<bang> 1. n. Common spoken name for `!' (ASCII 33), especially when
used in pronouncing a <bang path> in spoken hackish. In elder days
this was considered a CMUish usage, with MIT and Stanford hackers
preferring <excl> or <shriek>; but the spread of UNIX has carried
<bang> with it (esp. via the term <bang path>) and it is now
certainly the most common spoken name for `!'. Note that it is
used exclusively for non-emphatic written `!'; one would not say
"Congratulations bang.", but if one wanted to specify the exact
characters "FOO!", one would speak "Eff oh oh bang". See
<shriek>, <ASCII>. 2. interj. An exclamation signifying roughly
"I have achieved enlightenment!" or "The dynamite has cleared
out my brain!". Often used to acknowledge that one has
perpetrated a <thinko> immediately after one has been called on it
<bang path> n. An old-style UUCP electronic-mail address specifying
hops to get from some assumed-reachable location to the addressee,
so called because each hop is signified by a <bang> sign. Thus the
path "...!bigsite!foovax!barbox!me" directs correspondents to
route their mail to machine bigsite (presumably a well-known
location accessible to everybody) and from there through the
machine "foovax" to the account of user "me" on "barbox".
See <Internet address>, <network, the>, and <sitename>.
<bar> /bar/ 1. The second metasyntactic variable, after <foo> and
before <baz>. "Suppose we have two functions FOO and BAR. FOO
calls BAR..." 2. Often appended to <foo> to produce <foobar>.
<bare metal> n. 1. New computer hardware, unadorned with such snares
and delusions as an <operating system>, <HLL> or even assembler.
Commonly in the phrase "programming on the bare metal" which
refers to the arduous work of <bit-bashing> needed to create these
basic tools for a new machine. Real bare-metal programming
involves things like building boot proms and BIOS chips,
implementing basic monitors used to test device drivers, and
writing the assemblers that will be used to write the compiler back
ends that will give the new machine a real development environment.
2. The same phrase is also used to describe a style of
<hand-hacking> that relies on bit-level peculiarities of a
particular hardware design, esp. tricks for speed and space
optimization that rely on crocks like overlapping opcodes (or, in
one famous case, interleaving of opcodes on a magnetic drum to
minimize fetch delays due to the device's rotational latency).
This sort of thing has become less common as the relative costs of
programming time and machine resources have changed, but is still
found in heavily constrained environments like industrial embedded
systems. See <real programmer>.
<barf> /barf/ [from mainstream slang meaning "vomit"] 1. interj.
Term of disgust. See <bletch>. 2. To say "Barf!" or emit some
similar expression of disgust. 3. vi. To fail to work because of
unacceptable input. May mean to give an error message. Examples:
"The division operation barfs if you try to divide by zero."
(that is, division by zero fails in some unspecified spectacular
way) "The text editor barfs if you try to read in a new file
before writing out the old one." 4. Also <barfulous>,
<barfucious>: adj. Said of something which would make anyone barf,
if only for aesthetic reasons. See <choke>, <gag>. Note that in
Commonwealth English, "barf" is generally replaced by "puke" or
"vom". <barf> is sometimes also used as a metasyntactic variable
like <foo> or <bar>.
<baroque> adj. Feature-encrusted; complex; gaudy; verging on
excessive. Said of hardware or (esp.) software designs, this has
many of the connotations of <elephantine> or <monstrosity> but is
less extreme and not pejorative in itself.
<baud barf> /bawd barf/ n. The garbage one gets on the monitor when
using a modem connection with some protocol setting (esp. line
speed) incorrect, or when someone picks up a voice extension on the
same line, or when really bad line noise disrupts the connection.
Baud barf is not completely <random>, by the way; hackers with a
lot of serial-line experience can usually tell whether the device
at the other end is expecting a higher or lower speed than the
terminal is set to. *Really* experienced ones can identify
particular speeds.
<baz> /baz/ 1. The third metasyntactic variable, after <foo> and <bar>
and before <qux>. "Suppose we have three functions FOO, BAR, and
BAZ. FOO calls BAR, which calls BAZ..." 2. interj. Term of mild
annoyance. In this usage the term is often drawn out for two or
three seconds, producing an effect not unlike the bleating of a
sheep; /baaaaaaz/. 3. Occasionally appended to <foo> to produce
FOOBAZ.
<beam> [from Star Trek Classic's "Beam me up, Scotty!"] vt. To
transfer <softcopy> of a file electronically; most often in
combining forms such as "beam me a copy" or "beam that over to
his site". Compare <blast>, <snarf>, <BLT>.
<beep> n.,v. Syn. <feep>. This term seems to be preferred among micro
hobbyists.
<bells and whistles> [by analogy with steam calliopes] n. Features
added to a program or system to make it more <flavorful> from a
hacker's point of view, without necessarily adding to its utility
for its primary function. Distinguished from <chrome> which is
intended to attract users. "Now that we've got the basic program
working, let's go back and add some bells and whistles." However,
no one seems to know what distinguishes a bell from a whistle.
<benchmark> n. An inaccurate measure of computer performance. "In
the computer industry, there are three kinds of lies: lies, damn
lies, and benchmarks." Well known ones include Dhrystone,
Whetstone, Rhealstone (see <h infix>) and LINPACK. See also
<machoflops>, <MIPS>.
<berklix> /ber'kliks/ n.,adj. Contraction of Berkeley UNIX. See
<BSD>. Not used at Berkeley itself. May be more common among
<suits> attempting to sound like cognoscenti than hackers, who
usually just say `BSD'.
<Berzerkely> [from "berserk"] /b@r-zer'klee/ [from the name of a
now-deceased record label] n. Humorous, distortion of "Berkeley"
used esp. to refer to the practices or products of the <BSD> UNIX
hackers. See <software bloat>, <Missed'em-five>.
<beta> /bay'-ta/ n. 1. In the <Real World> software often goes through
two stages of testing: Alpha (in-house) and Beta (out-house?).
Software is said to be "in beta". 2. Beta software is
notoriously buggy, hence anything that is new and experimental is
"in beta". As in, "His girlfriend is in beta".
<BFI> n. See <brute force and ignorance>.
<bible> n. As used by hackers, usually refers to one of a small number
of fundamental source books including <Knuth> or <K&R>.
<biff> /bif/ [USENET] n. The most famous <pseudo>, and the
prototypical <newbie>. Articles from BIFF are characterized by all
upper case letters sprinkled liberally with bangs, typos, "cute"
misspellings (EVRY BUDY LUVS GOOD OLD BIFF CUZ HE"S A K00L DOOD AN
HE RITES REEL AWESUM THINGZ IN CAPITULL LETTRS LIKE THIS!!!), a
long <sig block> (sometimes even a <doubled sig>), and unbounded
naivete. BIFF posts articles using his elder brother's VIC-20.
BIFF's location is a mystery, as his articles appear to come from a
variety of sites. However, BITNET seems to be the most frequent
origin. The theory that BIFF is a denizen of BITNET is supported
by BIFF's (unfortunately invalid) electronic mail address:
BIFF@BIT.NET. See also <doubled sig>.
<biff> v. To notify someone of incoming mail; from the BSD utility
`biff(1)' which was in turn named after the implementor's dog.
<big-endian> [From Swift's `Gulliver's Travels' via a famous 1980
paper `On Holy Wars and a Plea for Peace' by Danny Cohen] adj.
Describes a computer architecture in which, within a given 16- or
32-bit word, lower byte addresses have higher significance (the
word is stored `big-end-first'). Most processors including the IBM
370 family and the <PDP-10> and Motorola microprocessor families
and most of the various RISC designs current in 1990 are
big-endian. See <little-endian>, <middle-endian>, <NUXI problem>.
<Big Grey Wall> n. What greets a <VMS> user searching for
documentation. A full VMS kit comes on a pallet, the documentation
taking up around 15 feet of shelf space before adding layered
products such as compilers, databases, multivendor networking,
programming tools etc. Recent (since VMS V5) DEC documentation
comes with grey binders; under VMS V4 the binders were orange
("big orange wall"), under V3 they were blue. See <VMS>.
<big iron> n. Large, expensive, ultra-fast computers. Used generally
of number crunching supercomputers such as Crays, but can include
more conventional big commercial IBMish mainframes. Term of
approval; compare <heavy metal>, oppose <dinosaur>.
<big red switch> [IBM] n. The power switch on a computer, esp. on an
IBM-PC where it really is large and red. "This !@%$% <bitty box>
is hung again, time to hit the big red switch." Sources at IBM
report that, in tune with the company's passion for <TLA>s
this is often acronymized as "BRS".
<bignum> /big'num/ [orig. from MIT MACLISP; the name is said to derive
from a pun on the FORTRAN REAL type] n. 1. A multiple-precision
computer representation for very large integers. More generally,
any very large number. "Have you ever looked at the United States
Budget? There's bignums for you!"
Most computer languages provide a kind of data called "integer",
but such computer integers are usually very limited in size;
usually they must be smaller than 2 ^ 31 (2147483648) or (on a
losing <bitty box>) 2 ^ 15 (32767). If you want to work with
numbers larger than that, you have to use floating-point numbers,
which are usually only accurate to six or seven decimal places.
Computer languages that provide bignums can perform exact
calculations on very large numbers, such as 1000! (the factorial of
1000, which is 1000 times 999 times 998 times ... times 2 times 1)
exactly. For example, this value for 1000! was computed by the
MACLISP system using bignums:
4023872600770937735437024339230039857193748642107146325437999104
2993851239862902059204420848696940480047998861019719605863166687
2994808558901323829669944590997424504087073759918823627727188732
5197795059509952761208749754624970436014182780946464962910563938
8743788648733711918104582578364784997701247663288983595573543251
3185323958463075557409114262417474349347553428646576611667797396
6688202912073791438537195882498081268678383745597317461360853795
3452422158659320192809087829730843139284440328123155861103697680
1357304216168747609675871348312025478589320767169132448426236131
4125087802080002616831510273418279777047846358681701643650241536
9139828126481021309276124489635992870511496497541990934222156683
2572080821333186116811553615836546984046708975602900950537616475
8477284218896796462449451607653534081989013854424879849599533191
0172335555660213945039973628075013783761530712776192684903435262
5200015888535147331611702103968175921510907788019393178114194545
2572238655414610628921879602238389714760885062768629671466746975
6291123408243920816015378088989396451826324367161676217916890977
9911903754031274622289988005195444414282012187361745992642956581
7466283029555702990243241531816172104658320367869061172601587835
2075151628422554026517048330422614397428693306169089796848259012
5458327168226458066526769958652682272807075781391858178889652208
1643483448259932660433676601769996128318607883861502794659551311
5655203609398818061213855860030143569452722420634463179746059468
2573103790084024432438465657245014402821885252470935190620929023
1364932734975655139587205596542287497740114133469627154228458623
7738753823048386568897646192738381490014076731044664025989949022
2221765904339901886018566526485061799702356193897017860040811889
7299183110211712298459016419210688843871218556461249607987229085
1929681937238864261483965738229112312502418664935314397013742853
1926649875337218940694281434118520158014123344828015051399694290
1534830776445690990731524332782882698646027898643211390835062170
9500259738986355427719674282224875758676575234422020757363056949
8825087968928162753848863396909959826280956121450994871701244516
4612603790293091208890869420285106401821543994571568059418727489
9809425474217358240106367740459574178516082923013535808184009699
6372524230560855903700624271243416909004153690105933983835777939
4109700277534720000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
00000000.
2. BIGNUMS [from Macsyma] n. In backgammon, large numbers on the
dice, especially a roll of double fives or double sixes. See also
<El Camino Bignum>.
<bit> [from the unit of information] n. 1. The unit of information;
the amount of information obtained by asking a yes-or-no question
(this is straight technicalese). 2. A computational quantity that
can take on one of two values, such as true and false, or zero and
one. 3. A mental flag: a reminder that something should be done
eventually. Example: "I have a bit set for you." (I haven't seen
you for a while, and I'm supposed to tell or ask you something.) A
bit is said to be "set" if its value is true or one, and
"reset" or "clear" if its value is false or zero. One speaks
of setting and clearing bits. To "toggle" or "invert" a bit is
to change it, either from zero to one or from one to zero.
<bit bang> n. Transmission of data on a serial line accomplished by
rapidly tweaking a single output bit at the appropriate times
(popular on certain early models of Prime computers, presumably
when UARTs were too expensive; and on archaic Z-80 micros with a
Zilog PIO but no SIO). The technique is a simple loop with eight
OUT, SHIFT, OUT etc. instructions for each byte. Input is more
interesting. And full duplex (doing input and output at the same
time) is one way to separate the real hackers from the wannabees.
<bit bashing> n. (also, "bit diddling" or "bit twiddling") Term
used to describe any of several kinds of low-level programming
characterized by manipulation of <bit>, <flag>, <nybble> and other
smaller-than-character sized pieces of data: these include
low-level device control, encryption algorithms, checksum and
error-correcting codes, hash functions, some flavors of graphics
programming (see <bitblt>), and assembler/compiler code generation.
May connote either tedium or a real technical challenge (more
usually the former)."The command decoding for the new tape driver
looks pretty solid but the bit-bashing for the control registers
still has bugs." See also <bit bang>.
<bit bucket> n. The great data sink in the sky (originally, the
mythical receptacle used to catch bits when they fall off the end
of a register during a shift instruction). Data that is discarded,
lost, or destroyed is said to "go to the bit bucket". On <UNIX>,
often used for </dev/null>. Sometimes amplified as "the Great Bit
Bucket in the Sky". This term is used purely in jest. It's based
on the fanciful notion that bits are objects that are not
destroyed, but only misplaced. See also <null device>.
<bit decay> n. See <software rot>. People with a physics background
tend to prefer this one for the analogy with particle decay.
<bit rot> n. See <software rot>.
<bitblt> /bit'blit/ or /bit'belt/ n. [from <BLT>, q.v.] 1. Any of a
closely related family of algorithms for moving and copying
rectangles of bits between main and display memory on a bit-mapped
device, or between two areas of either main or display memory (the
requirement to do the Right Thing in the case of overlapping source
and destination rectangles is what makes BitBlt tricky). 2.
Synonym for <blit> or <BLT>
<bits> n. 1. Information. Examples: "I need some bits about file
formats." ("I need to know about file formats.") Compare <core
dump>, sense #4. 2. Machine-readable representation of a document,
specifically as contrasted with paper. "I only have a photocopy
of the Jargon File; does anyone know where I can get the bits?".
See <softcopy>. 3. Also in <the source of all good bits> n. A
person from whom (or a place from which) information may be
obtained. If you need to know about a program, a <wizard> might be
the source of all good bits. The title is often applied to a
particularly competent secretary.
<bitty box> /bit'ee boks/ n. 1. A computer sufficiently small,
primitive or incapable as to cause a hacker acute claustrophobia at
the thought of developing for it. Especially used of small,
obsolescent, single-tasking-only personal machines like the Atari
800, Osborne, Sinclair, VIC-20, or TRS-80. 2. More generally, the
opposite of `real computer' (see <Get a real computer!>).
Pejorative. See also <mess-dos>, <toaster>, and <toy>.
<bixie> /biks'ee/ n. Synonym for <emoticon> used on BIX (the Byte
Information Exchange); BIXers believe (probably incorrectly) the
emoticon was invented there.
<black art> n. A collection of arcane, unpublished, and (by
implication) mostly ad-hoc techniques developed for a particular
application or systems area. VLSI design and compiler code
optimization were (in their beginnings) considered classic examples
of black art; as theory developed they became <deep magic>, and
once standard textbooks had been written became merely <heavy
wizardry>. The huge proliferation of formal and informal channels
for spreading around new computer-related technologies during the
last twenty years has made both the term "black art" and what it
describes less common than formerly. See also <voodoo
programming>.
<black hole> n. When a piece of email or netnews disappears
mysteriously between its origin and destination sites (that is,
without returning a <bounce message>) it is commonly said to have
"fallen into a black hole". Similarly, one might say "I think
there's a black hole at foovax!" to convey suspicion that site
foovax has been dropping a lot of stuff on the floor lately (see
<drop on the floor>). The implied metaphor of email as
interstellar travel is interesting in itself.
<blast> vt.,n. Synonym for <BLT>, used esp. for large data sends over
a network or comm line. Opposite of <snarf>. Usage: uncommon.
The variant `blat' has been reported. 2. v. [HP/Apollo] Synonymous
with <nuke> (sense #3). Sometimes the message "Unable to kill all
processes. Blast them (y/n)?" would appear in the command window
upon logout.
<blazer> n. Nickname for the Telebit Trailblazer, an expensive but
extremely reliable and effective high-speed modem, popular at UNIX
sites that pass large volumes of <email> and <USENET> news.
<bletch> /blech/ [from Yiddish/German "brechen", to vomit] 1.
interj. Term of disgust.
<bletcherous> /blech'@-rus/ adj. Disgusting in design or function;
aesthetically unappealing. This word is seldom used of people.
"This keyboard is bletcherous!" (Perhaps the keys don't work very
well, or are misplaced). See <losing>, <cretinous>, <bagbiter>,
<bogus>, and <random>. <bletcherous> applies to the aesthetics of
the thing so described; similarly for <cretinous>. By contrast,
something that is <losing> or <cretinous> may be failing to meet
objective criteria. See <bogus> and <random>, which have richer
and wider shades of meaning than any of the above.
<blinkenlights> /blink'@n-lietz/ n. Front-panel diagnostic lights on
a mainframe CPU. Derives from the last word of the famous
blackletter-Gothic "ACHTUNG! ALLES LOOKENSPEEPERS!" notice in
mangled pseudo-German that once graced about half the computer
rooms in the English-speaking world. The sign in its entiretu ran:
ACHTUNG! ALLES LOOKENSPEEPERS
Das computermachine ist nicht fur gefingerpoken und mittengrabben.
Ist easy schnappen der springenwerk, blowenfusen und poppencorken
mit spitzensparken. Ist nicht fur gewerken bei das dumpkopfen.
Das rubbernecken sichtseeren keepen hans in das pockets muss;
relaxen und watch das blinkenlichten.
This silliness dates back at least as far as 1959 at Stanford
University and had already gone international by the early '60s,
when it was reported at London University's ATLAS computing site.
There are several variants of it in circulation, some of which
actually do end with the word `blinkenlights';. It is reported, by
the way, that an analogous travesty in mangled English is posted in
German computer laboratories.
<blit> /blit/ vt. 1. To copy a large array of bits from one part of a
computer's memory to another part, particularly when the memory is
being used to determine what is shown on a display screen. "The
storage allocator picks through the table and copies the good parts
up into high memory, and at the end BLITs it all back down again."
See <bitblt>, <BLT>, <DD>, <cat>, <blast>, <snarf>. More
generally, to perform some operation (such as toggling) on a large
array of bits while moving them. 2. An early experimental
bit-mapped terminal designed by Rob Pike at Bell Labs, later
commercialized as the AT&T 5620.
<block> [From computer science usage] 1. vi. To delay while waiting
for something. "We're blocking until everyone gets here." 2. in
<block on> vt. To block, waiting for (something). "Lunch is
blocked on Phil's arrival."
<block transfer computations> n. From the Dr. Who television series:
in the show, it referred to computations so fiendishly subtle and
complex that they could not be performed by machines. Used to
refer to any task that should be expressible as an algorithm in
theory, but isn't.
<blow away> vt. To remove files and directories from permanent storage
with extreme prejudice, generally by accident. Oppose <nuke>.
<blow out> vi. Of software, to fail spectacularly; almost as serious
as <crash and burn>. See <blow past>.
<blow past> vi. To <blow out> despite a safeguard. "The server blew
past the 5K reserve buffer."
<blow up> vi. [scientific computation] To become unstable. Suggests
that the computation is diverging so rapidly that it will soon
either overflow or at least go <nonlinear>.
<blt> /bee ell tee/ or (rarely) /belt/ n.,v. 1. Synonym for <blit>.
This is the original form of <blit> and the ancestor of <bitblt>.
In these versions the usage has outlasted the <PDP-10> BLock
Transfer instruction for which <BLT> derives; nowadays, the
assembler mnemonic <BLT> almost always means `Branch if Less Than
Zero'.
<Blue Book> n. 1. Informal name for one of the three standard
references on the page-layout and graphics-control language
PostScript (`PostScript Language Tutorial and Cookbook', Adobe
Systems, Addison-Wesley 1985, QA76.73.P67P68, ISBN 0-201-10179-3);
the other two official guides are known as the <Green Book> and
<Red Book>. 2. `Smalltalk-80: The Language and its
Implementation'. David Robson, Addison-Wesley 1983, QA76.8.S635G64,
ISBN 0-201-11371-63 (this is also associated with green and red
books). 3. Any of the 1988 standards issues by the CCIT 9th
plenary assembly. Until now, they have changed color each review
cycle (1984 was <Red Book>, 1992 would be <Green Book>); however,
it is rumored that this convention is going to be dropped befor
1992. These include, among other things, the X.400 email spec and
the Group 1 through 4 fax standards. See also <Red Book>, <Green
Book>, <Silver Book>, <Purple Book>, <Orange Book>, <White Book>,
<Pink-Shirt Book>, <Dragon Book>, <Aluminum Book>.
<Blue Glue> [IBM] n. IBM's SNA (Systems Network Architecture) an
incredibly losing and bletcherous protocol suite widely favored at
commercial shops that don't know any better. See <fear and
loathing>. It may not be irrelevant that <Blue Glue> is the trade
name of a 3M product that is commonly used to hold down the carpet
squares to the removable panel floors so common in computer
installations. A correspondent at U.Minn. reports that the CS dept
there has about 80 bottles of Blue Glue hanging about, so they
often refer to any messy work to be done `using the blue glue".
<blue goo> n. Term for "police" <nanobot>s intended to prevent <gray
goo>, denature hazardous waste, destroy pollution, put ozone back
into the stratosphere, prevent halitosis, and to promote truth,
justice, and the American way, etc., etc. See <nanotechnology>.
<BNF> /bee-en-ef/ n. 1. Acronym for `Backus-Naur Form', a
metasyntactic notation used to specify the syntax of programming
languages, command sets and the like. Widely used for language
descriptions but seldom documented anywhere, so that it must
usually be learned by osmosis from other hackers. Consider this
BNF for a postal address:
<postal-address> ::= <name-part> <street-address> <zip-part>
<name-part> ::= <first-name> [<middle-part>] <last-name>
<middle-part> ::= <middle-name> | <middle-initial> "."
<street-address> ::= [<apt>] <street-number> <street-name>
<zip-part> ::= <town-name> "," <state-code> <zip-code>
This translates into English as: A postal-address consists of a
name-part, followed by a street-address part, followed by a
zip-code part. A name-part consists of a first-name followed by an
optional middle-part followed by a last-name. A middle-part
consists of either a middle name or a middle initial followed by a
dot. A street address consists of an optional apartment specifier
followed by a street number, followed by a street name. A zip-part
consts of a town-name, followed by a state code, followed by a zip
code. Note that many things such as the format of a first-name,
apartment specifier or zip-code are left unspecified. These are
presumed to be obvious from context or detailed in another part of
the specification the BNF is part of. See also <PARSE>.
A major reason BNF is listed here is that the term is also used
loosely for any similar notation, possibly containing some or all
of the <GLOB> wildcards.
2. In <SCIENCE-FICTION FANDOM> BNF expands to `Big Name Fan'
(someone famous or notorious). Years ago a fan started handing out
black-on-green BNF buttons at SF conventions. This confused the
hacker contingent terribly.
<boa> [IBM] n. Any one of the fat cables that lurk under the floor in
a <dinosaur pen>. It is rumored within IBM that 370 channel cables
are limited to 200 feet because beyond that length the boas get
dangerous...
<boat anchor> n. Like <doorstop> but more severe, implies that the
offending hardware is irreversibly dead or useless.
<bogometer> n. See <bogosity>.
<bogon> /boh'gon/ [by analogy with proton/electron/neutron, but
doubtless reinforced after 1980 by the similarity to Douglas
Adams's "Vogons", see Appendix C] n. 1. The elementary particle
of bogosity (see <quantum bogodynamics>). For instance, "the
ethernet is emitting bogons again", meaning that it is broken or
acting in an erratic or bogus fashion. 2. A query packet sent from
a TCP/IP domain resolver to a root server, having the reply bit set
instead of the query bit. 3. Any bogus or incorrectly formed
packet sent on a network. 4. By extension, used to refer
metasyntactically to any bogus thing, as in "I'd like to go to
lunch with you but I've got to go to the weekly staff bogon." 5. A
person who is bogus or who says bogus things. This was
historically the original usage, but has been overtaken by its
derivatives in 1-4.
<bogon filter> /boh'gon fil'tr/ n. Any device, software or hardware,
which limits or suppresses the flow and/or emission of bogons.
Example: "Engineering hacked a bogon filter between the Cray and
the VAXen and now we're getting fewer dropped packets."
<bogosity> /boh-go's@-tee/ n. 1. The degree to which something is
<bogus>. 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". 2.
The potential field generated by a bogon flux; see <quantum
bogodynamics>.
<bogotify> /boh-go't@-fie/ vt. To make or become bogus. A program
that has been changed so many times as to become completely
disorganized has become bogotified. If you tighten a nut too hard
and strip the threads on the bolt, the bolt has become bogotified
and you'd better not use it any more. This coinage led to the
notional <autobogotiphobia> (aw'to-boh-got'@-foh`bee-uh) n.,
defined as the fear of becoming bogotified; but is not clear that
the latter has ever been `live' slang rather than a self-conscious
joke in jargon about jargon.
<bogue out> /bohg owt/ vi. to becomes bogus, suddenly and
unexpectedly. "His talk was relatively sane until somebody asked
him a trick question, then he bogued out and did nothing but
<flame> afterwards."
<bogus> [WPI, Yale, Stanford] adj. 1. Non-functional. "Your patches
are bogus." 2. Useless. "OPCON is a bogus program." 3.
False. "Your arguments are bogus." 4. Incorrect. "That
algorithm is bogus." 5. Unbelievable. "You claim to have solved
the halting problem for Turing Machines? That's totally bogus."
6. Silly. "Stop writing those bogus sagas." Astrology is bogus.
So is a bolt that is obviously about to break. So is someone who
makes blatantly false claims to have solved a scientific problem.
(This word seems to have some, but not all, of the connotations of
<random>.)
[Etymological note: "Bogus" was originally used in the hackish
sense at Princeton, in the late 60s. 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 (see <autobogotiphobia>
under <bogotify>). By the mid-1980s it was also current in
something like the hackish sense in West Coast teen slang]
Further note: A correspondent at Cambridge claims these uses of
bogus grate on British nerves; in Britain the word means rather
specifically `counterfeit' as in "a bogus pound note".
<Bohr bug> /bohr buhg/ [from quantum physics] n. A repeatable <bug>;
one which manifests reliably under a possibly unknown but
well-defined set of conditions. Antonym of <heisenbug>.
<boink> /boynk/ [USENET] 1. To have sex with; compare <bounce>, sense
#3. In Commonwealth English this the variant "bonk" is more
common. 2. After the original Peter Korn "Boinkon" <USENET>
parties, used for almost any net social gathering, e.g. Miniboink,
a small boink held by Nancy Gillett in 1988; Minniboink, a Boinkcon
in Minnesota in 1989; Humpdayboinks, Wednesday get-togethers held
in the San Francisco Bay Area. Compare <@-party>.
<bomb> vi. 1. General synonym for <crash>, esp. used of software or OS
failures. "Don't run Empire with less than 32K stack, it'll bomb
out" 2. Atari ST and Macintosh equivalents of <panic> or <guru>
(sense 2), where icons of little black-powder bombs or mushroom
clouds are displayed indicating the system has died. On the Mac
this may be accompanied by a hexadecimal number indicating what
went wrong, similar to the Amiga GURU MEDITION number. <Mess-dos>
machines tend to get <locked up> in this situation.
<bondage-and-discipline language> A language such as Pascal, APL, or
Prolog that, though ostensibly general-purpose, is designed so as
to enforce an author's theory of "right programming" even though
said theory is demonstrably inadequate for systems or even vanilla
general-purpose programming. Often abbreviated "B&D"; thus, one
may speak of things "having the B&D nature" etc. See <Languages
of Choice>.
<bonk/oif> interj. On some <MUD> versions, a `:bonk' command allows
one to express pique or censure; you give it a target name, and the
message everyone sees is of the form `Foo bonks bar'. There is a
convention that one should acknowledge a bonk by saying `oif!' and
a myth to the effect that failing to do so upsets the cosmic
bonk/oif balance, causing much trouble in the universe. See also
<talk mode>.
<boot> [from "by one's bootstraps"] vi.,n. To load and initialize
the operating system on a machine. This usage is no longer slang
(having become jargon in the strict sense), but it is sometimes
used of human thought processes, as in the following exchange:
"You've lost me." "O.K., reboot. Here's the theory...". Also
found in the variants "cold boot" (from power-off condition) and
"warm boot" (with the CPU and all devices already powered up, as
after a hardware reset or software crash).
<bottleneck> adj. 1. Used by hackers specifically to describe hardware
under which performance is usually limited by contention for one
particular resource (such as disk, memory or processor <clocks>);
the opposite condition is called `balanced', which is more jargon
in the strict sense and may be found in technical dictionaries. 2.
Less often, applied to the software analogue of sense #1, a slow
code section or algorithm through which all computation must pass
(see also <hot spot>).
<bounce> v. 1. [UNIX, perhaps from "to bounce a check"] An
electronic mail message which is undeliverable and returns an error
notification to the sender is said to `bounce'. See also <bounce
message>. 2. [Stanford] To play volleyball. At one time there was
a volleyball court next to the computer laboratory. From 5:00 PM
to 7:00 PM was the scheduled maintenance time for the computer, so
every afternoon at 5:00 the computer would become unavailable, and
over the intercom a voice would cry , "Bounce, bounce!" 3. To
engage in sexual intercourse; prob. fr. the expression "bouncing
the mattress", but influenced by Piglet's psychosexually-loaded
"Bounce on me too, Tigger!" from the Winnie the Pooh books. 4.
To casually reboot a system in order to clear up a transient
problem. Reported primarily among <VMS> users.
<bounce message> [UNIX] n. Notification message returned to sender by
a site unable to relay <email> to the intended <Internet address>
recipient or the next link in a <bang path> (see <bounce>).
Reasons might include a nonexistent or misspelled username or a
down relay site. Bounce messages can themselves fail, with
occasionally ugly results; see <sorcerer's apprentice mode>.
<box> [within IBM] n. Without qualification but within an SNA-using
site, this refers specifically to an IBM front-end processor or
FEP. An FEP is a small computer necessary to enable an IBM
mainframe to communicate beyond the limits of the <dinosaur pen>.
Typically used in expressions like the cry that goes up when an SNA
network goes down, "Looks like the <box> has <fallen over>." See
also <IBM>, <fear and loathing>, <Blue Glue>.
<boxen> /bok'sn/ pl n. [by analogy with <VAXen>] Fanciful plural of
`box' often encountered in the phrase `UNIX boxen', used to
describe commodity <UNIX> hardware. The implication is that any
two UNIX boxen are interchangeable.
<brain-damaged> [generalization of "Honeywell Brain Damage" (HBD), a
theoretical disease invented to explain certain utter cretinisms in
Honeywell <Multics>] adj. Obviously wrong; <cretinous>;
<demented>. There is an implication that the person 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, and that its failure to work is due to poor
design rather than some accident.
<brain-dead> adj. Brain-damaged in the extreme. Not quite like
mainstream use, as it tends to imply terminal design failure rather
than malfunction or simple stupidity.
<brain dump> [Sun] n. Comprehensive exchange of knowledge between
people. "Let's get together for a brain dump before you take
off." At Sun, this is also known as `TOI' (transfer of
information).
<braino> /bray'no/ n. Syn. for <thinko>.
<branch to Fishkill> [IBM, from the location of one of their
facilities] n. Any unexpected jump in a program that produces
catastrophic or just plain weird results. See <hyperspace>.
<break> v. 1. To cause to be broken (in any sense). "Your latest
patch to the editor broke the paragraph commands." 2. (of a
program) To stop temporarily, so that it may be examined for
debugging purposes. The place where it stops is a "breakpoint".
3. To send an RS-232 "break" (125 msec. of line high) over a
serial comm line. 4. [UNIX] To strike whatever key currently causes
the tty driver to send SIGINT to the current process. Normally
"break" (sense 3) or delete does this.
<breakage> [IBM] n. The extra people that must be added to an
organization because its master plan has changed; used esp. of
software and hardware development teams.
<brittle> adj. Said of software that's functional but easily broken by
changes in operating environment or configuration. Often describes
the results of a research effort that were never intended to be
robust, but can be applied to commercially developed software.
Oppose <robust>.
<broadcast storm> n. An incorrect packet broadcast on a network that
causes most hosts to respond all at once, typically with wrong
answers that start the process over again. Also called <network
meltdown>. See also <Chernobyl packet>.
<broken> adj. 1. Not working properly (of programs). 2. Behaving
strangely; especially (of people), exhibiting extreme depression.
<broket> /broh'k@t/ or /broh'ket/ [by analogy with "bracket": a
"broken bracket"] n. Either of the characters "<" and ">".
This word originated as a contraction of the phrase "broken
bracket", that is, a bracket that is bent in the middle. (At MIT,
and apparently in <Real World> as well, these are usually called
<angle brackets>.)
<brute force> adj. Describes a certain kind of primitive programming
style; broadly speaking, one which ignores scaling problems and
applies naive methods suited to small problems directly to large
ones. An example of a brute-force program is one that sorts a
thousand numbers by examining them all, picking the smallest one,
and saving it in another table; then examining all the numbers
again, and picking the smallest one except for the one it already
picked; and in general choosing the next number by examining all
one thousand numbers and choosing the smallest one that hasn't yet
been picked (as determined by examining all the ones already
picked). Yes, the program will produce the right answer, but it
will be much slower than a program that uses even a modicum of
cleverness to avoid most of the work.
<brute force and ignorance> n. A popular design technique at many
software houses --- <brute force> coding unrelieved by any
knowledge of how problems have been previously solved in elegant
ways. Dogmatic adherence to design methodologies tends to
encourage it. Characteristic of early <larval stage> programming;
unfortunately, many never outgrow it. Often abbreviated BFI, as
in: "Gak, they used a bubble sort! That's strictly from BFI."
(this comment might be used by a hacker to describe the example
given under <brute force> above). Compare <bogosity>.
<BSD> /bee-ess-dee/ n. [acronym for Berkeley System Distribution] a
family of <UNIX> versions for the DEC <VAX> developed by Bill Joy
and others at University of California at Berkeley starting around
1980, incorporating TCP/IP networking enhancements and many other
features. The BSD versions (4.1, 4.2, and 4.3) and commercial
versions derived from them (SunOS and Mt. Xinu) held the technical
lead in the UNIX world until AT&T's successful standardization
efforts after about 1986, and are still widely popular. See
<UNIX>, <USG UNIX>.
<bucky bits> /buh'kee bits/ [primarily Stanford] n. The bits produced
by the CTRL and META shift keys, esp. on a Stanford (or Knight)
keyboard (see <space-cadet keyboard>). It is rumored that these
were in fact named for Buckminster Fuller during a period when he
was consulting at Stanford. Unfortunately, legend also has it that
"Bucky" was Niklaus Wirth's nickname when *he* was
consulting at Stanford and that he first suggested the idea of the
meta key, so its bit was named after him. See <double bucky>,
<quadruple bucky>.
<buffer overflow> n. What typically happens when an <OS> or
application is fed data faster than it can handle. Used
metaphorically of human mental processes. "Sorry, I got four phone
calls in three minutes last night and lost your message to a buffer
overflow."
<bug> n. An unwanted and unintended property of a program or hardware,
esp. one which causes it to malfunction. Antonym of <feature>.
Examples: "There's a bug in the editor: it writes things out
backwards." "The system crashed because of a hardware bug."
"Fred is a winner, but he has a few bugs." (e.g. Fred is a good
guy, but he has a few personality problems.)
Some have said this term came from telephone company usage: "bugs
in a telephone cable" were blamed for noisy lines, but this
appears to be an incorrect `folk etymology'. Admiral Grace Hopper
(an early computing pioneer better known for inventing COBOL) liked
to tell a story in which a technician solved a persistent glitch in
the Harvard Mark II machine by pulling an actual physical bug out
from between the contacts of one of its relays, and she
subsequently promulgated <bug> in its hackish sense as a joke about
the incident (though, as she was careful to admit, she was not
there when it happened). For many years the logbook associated
with the incident and the actual bug in question (a moth) sat in a
display case at the Naval Surface Warfare Center, and now resides
in the Smithsonian. The entire story, with a picture of the
logbook and the moth taped into it, is recorded in the Annals of
the History of Computing (Volume 3, Number 3 (July 1981) on pages
285 and 286.
Interestingly, the text of the log entry, which is said to read
"First example of an actual computer `bug'." establishes that the
term was already in use at the time; and a similar incident is
alleged to have occurred on the original ENIAC machine. Indeed,
the use of "bug" to mean an industrial defect was already
established in Thomas Edison's time, and "bug" in the sense of an
annoyance goes back to Shakespeare!
In any case, in hacker's slang the word almost never refers to
insects. Here is a plausible conversation that never actually
happened:
"This ant-farm has a bug."
"What do you mean? There aren't even any ants in it."
"That's the bug."
<bug compatible> n. Said of a design or revision the design of which
has been badly compromised by a requirement to be compatible with
<fossil>s or <misfeature>s in other programs or (esp.) previous
releases of itself.
<bulletproof> adj. Used of an algorithm or implementation considered
extremely <robust>; lossage-resistant; capable of correctly
recovering from any imaginable exception condition. This is a rare
and valued quality. Syn. "armor-plated".
<bum> 1. vt. To make highly efficient, either in time or space, often
at the expense of clarity. "I managed to bum three more
instructions out of that code." 2. n. A small change to an
algorithm, program, or hardware device to make it more efficient.
"This hardware bum makes the jump instruction faster." Usage:
now uncommon, largely superseded by <tune>. Note that both these
uses are rare in Commonwealth English, where "bum" is interpreted
as a rude synonym for "buttocks".
<bump> vt. Synonym for increment. Has the same meaning as C's ++
operator. Used esp. of counter variables, pointers and index
dummies in for, while, and do-until loops.
<burble> vi. Like <flame>, but connotes that the source is truly
clueless and ineffectual (mere flamers can be competent). A term
of deep contempt.
<busy-wait> vi. To wait on an event by <spin>ning through a tight or
timed-delay loop that polls for the event on each pass, as opposed
to setting up an interrupt handler and continuing execution on
another part of the task. A wasteful technique, best avoided on
time-sharing systems where a busy-waiting program may hog the
processor. Syn. <spin-lock>
<buzz> vi. 1. Of a program, to run with no indication of progress and
perhaps without guarantee of ever finishing; esp. said of programs
thought to be executing tight loops of code. The state of a
buzzing program resembles <catatonia>, but you never get out of
catatonia, while a buzzing loop may eventually end of its own
accord. Example: "The program buzzes for about ten seconds trying
to sort all the names into order." See <spin>. 2. [ETA Systems]
To test a wire or PCB trace for continuity by applying an AC signal
as opposed to applying a DC signal. Some wire faults will pass DC
tests but fail a buzz test.
<BWQ> /bee duhb'l-yoo kyoo/ [IBM] n. Buzz Word Quotient. Usually
roughly proportional to <bogosity>. See <TLA>.
<bytesexual> /biet-seks'u-@l/ adj. Said of hardware, denotes
willingness to compute or pass data in either <big-endian> or
<little-endian> format (depending, presumably, on a mode bit
somewhere). See also <NUXI problem>
{= C =}
<C> n. 1. The third letter of the Latin alphabet. 2. The name of a
programming language designed by Dennis Ritchie during the early
1970s and first used to implement <UNIX>. So called because many
features derived from an earlier interpreter named `B' in
commemoration of *its* parent, BCPL; before Bjarne Stroustrup
settled the question by designing C++, there was a humorous debate
over whether C's successor should be named `D' or `P'. C became
immensely popular outside Bell Labs after about 1980 and is now the
dominant language in systems and microcomputer applications
programming. See <languages of choice>.
<can> vt. To abort a job on a time-sharing system. Used esp. when the
person doing the deed is an operator, as in "canned from the
console". Frequently used in an imperative sense, as in "Can
that print job, the LPT just popped a sprocket!". Synonymous with
<gun>. It is said that the ASCII character with mnemonic CAN
(0011000) was used as a kill-job character on some early OSs.
<calculator> [Cambridge] n. Syn. for <bitty box>.
<canonical> adj. The usual or standard state or manner of something.
This word has a somewhat more technical meaning in mathematics.
For example, one sometimes speaks of a formula as being in
canonical form. Two formulas such as "9 + x" and "x + 9" are
said to be equivalent because they mean the same thing, but the
second one is in canonical form because it is written in the usual
way, with the highest power of x first. Usually there are fixed
rules you can use to decide whether something is in canonical form.
The slang meaning is a relaxation of the technical meaning (this
generalization is actually not confined to hackers, and may be
found throughout academia).
A true story: One Bob Sjoberg, new at the MIT AI Lab, expressed
some annoyance at the use of jargon. Over his loud objections, we
made a point of using jargon as much as possible in his presence,
and eventually 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: "Bob just used
`canonical' in the canonical way."
<card walloper> n. An EDP programmer who works on batch programs that
do stupid things like print people's paychecks. Compare <code
grinder>.
<casters-up mode> /cas'trz uhp mohd/ [IBM] n. Yet another synonym for
`broken' or `down'.
<casting the runes> n. The act of getting a <guru> to run a particular
program and type at it because it never works for anyone else; esp.
used when nobody can ever see what the guru is doing different from
J. Random Luser does. Compare <incantation>, <runes>, <examining
the entrails>.
<case and paste> [from "cut and paste"] n. 1. The addition of a new
<feature> to an existing system by selecting the code from an
existing feature and pasting it in with minor changes. Common in
telephony circles because most operations in a telephone switch are
selected using case statements. Leads to <software bloat>.
<cat> [from "concatenate" via <UNIX> `cat(1)'] vt. To spew an entire
(notionally, large) file to the screen or some other output sink
without pause; by extension, to dump large amounts of data at an
unprepared target or with no intention of browsing it carefully.
Usage: considered silly. Rare outside UNIX sites. See also <DD>,
<BLT>.
<catatonia> n. A condition of suspended animation in which something
is so <wedged> that it makes no response. For example, if you are
typing on a terminal and suddenly the computer doesn't even echo
the letters back to the screen as you type, let alone do what
you're asking it to do, then the computer is suffering from
catatonia (possibly because it has crashed).
<cdr> /ku'dr/ [from LISP] vt. To remove the first item from a list of
things. In the form "cdr down", to trace down a list of
elements. "Shall we cdr down the agenda?" Usage: silly. See
also <loop through>.
<chad> /chad/ n. 1. The perforated edge strips on printer paper, after
they have been separated from the printed portion. Also called
<selvage> and <perf>. 2. obs. the confetti-like paper bits punched
out of cards or paper tape; this was also called `chaff', `computer
confetti', and `keypunch droppings'.
Historical note: one correspondent believes `chad' (sense #1)
derives from the Chadless keypunch (named for its inventor), which
cut little u-shaped tabs in the card to make a hole when the tab
folded back, rather than punching out a circle/rectangle; it was
clear that if the `Chadless' keypunch didn't make them, then the
stuff that other keypunches made had to be `chad'.
<chain> [orig. from BASIC's CHAIN statement] vi. When used of
programming languages, refers to a statement that allows a parent
executable to hand off execution to a child without going through
the <OS> command interpreter. The state of the parent program is
lost and there is no returning to it. Though this facility used to
be common on memory-limited micros and is still widely supported
for backward compatibility, the jargon usage is semi-obsolescent;
in particular most UNIX programmers will think of this as an
<exec>. Oppose the more modern <subshell>.
<char> /keir/ or /char/; rarely, /kar/ n. Shorthand for `character'.
Esp. used by C programmers, as `char' is C's typename for
character data.
<chase pointers> 1. vi. To go through multiple levels of indirection,
as in traversing a linked list or graph structure. Used esp. by
programmers in C, where explicit pointers are a very common data
type. This is almost jargon in the strict sense, but remains slang
when used of human networks. "I'm chasing pointers. Bob said you
could tell me who to talk to about..." 2. [Cambridge] <pointer
chase> or <pointer hunt>: the process of going through a dump
(interactively or on a large piece of paper printed with hex
<runes>) following dynamic data-structures. Only used in a
debugging context.
<chemist> [Cambridge University] n. Someone who wastes CPU time on
number-crunching when you'd far rather the CPU was doing something
more productive, such as working out anagrams of your name or
printing Snoopy calendars or running <life> patterns. May or may
not refer to someone who actually studies chemistry.
<Chernobyl packet> /cher-no'b@l pa'k@t/ n. An IP Ethergram with both
source and destination Ether and IP address set as the respective
broadcast address. So called because it induces <network
meltdown>.
<choke> vt. To reject input, often ungracefully. "I tried building
<x>, but cpp choked on all those #define's." See <barf>, <gag>,
<vi>.
<chomp> vt. 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 accompanies 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 (much like what the PacMan does in the classic video
game, though this pantomime seems to predate that). The gesture
alone means "chomp chomp" (see Verb Doubling). The hand may be
pointed at the object of complaint, and for real emphasis you can
use both hands at once. For example, to do this to a person is
equivalent to saying "You chomper!" If you point the gesture at
yourself, it is a humble but humorous admission of some failure.
You might do this if someone told you that a program you had
written had failed in some surprising way and you felt dumb for not
having anticipated it.
<chomper> n. Someone or something that is chomping; a loser. See
<loser>, <bagbiter>, <chomp>.
<Christmas tree> n. A kind of RS-232 line tester or breakout box
featuring rows of blinking red and green LEDs like Christmas
lights.
<Christmas tree packet> n. A packet with every single option set for
whatever protocol is in use.
<chrome> [from automotive slang via wargaming] n. Showy features added
to attract users, but which contribute little or nothing to the
power of a system. "The 3D icons in Motif are just chrome!"
Distinguished from <bells and whistles> by the fact that the latter
are usually added to gratify developers' own desires for
featurefulness.
<Church of the Sub-Genius> n. A mutant offshoot of <Discordianism>
launched in 1981 as a spoof of fundamentalist Christianity by the
"Rev." Ivan Stang, a brilliant satirist with a gift for
promotion. Popular among hackers as a rich source of bizarre
imagery and references such as: "Bob" the divine
drilling-equipment salesman, the Benevolent Space Xists and the
Stark Fist of Removal. Much Sub-Genius theory is concerned with
the acquisition of the mystical substance or quality of "slack".
See also <ha ha only serious>.
<Classic C> /klas'ik see/ [a play on `Coke Classic'] n. The C
programming language as defined in the first edition of <K&R>,
with some small additions. It is also known as "K & R C."
The name came into use during the standardisation process for C by
the ANSI X3J11 committee. Also <C Classic>. This is sometimes
generalized to "X Classic" where X = Star Trek (referring to the
original TV series), or X = PC (referring to IBM's ISA-bus machines
as opposed to the PS/2 series); this generalization is especially
used of product series in which the newer versions are considered
serious losers relative to the older ones.
<clean> adj. Used of hardware or software designs, implies "elegance
in the small", that is a design or implementation which may not
hold any surprises but does things in a way that is reasonably
intuitive and relatively easy to comprehend from the outside. The
antonym is <grungy> or <crufty>.
<CLM> [Sun, "Career Limiting Move"] 1. n. Endangering one's future
prospects of getting plum projects and raises, also possibly one's
job. "He used a bubblesort! What a CLM!" 2. adj. denoting
extreme severity of a bug, discovered by a customer and obviously
due to poor testing: "That's a CLM bug!"
<clobber> v. Mistakenly overwrite. As in "I walked off the end of
the array and clobbered the stack." Compare <mung>, <scribble>,
<trash>, and <smash the stack>.
<clocks> n. Processor logic cycles, so called because each generally
corresponds to one clock pulse in the processor's timing. The
relative execution times of instructions on a machine are usually
discussed in `clocks' rather than absolute fractions of a second.
Compare <cycle>.
<clone> n. 1. An exact duplicate, as in "our product is a clone of
their product." Implies a legal re-implementation from
documentation or by reverse-engineering, as opposed to the
illegalities under sense #3. Also connotes lower price. 2. A
shoddy, spurious copy, as in "their product is a clone of our
product." 3. A blatant ripoff, most likely violating copyright,
patent, or trade secret protections, as in "your product is a
clone of my product." This usage implies legal action is pending.
4. A "PC clone"; a PC-BUS/ISA or EISA-compatible 80x86 based
microcomputer (this use is sometimes spelled "klone"). 5. In the
construction <UNIX clone>: An OS designed to deliver a
UNIX-lookalike environment sans UNIX license fees, or with
additional "mission-critical" features such as support for
real-time programming.
<close> /klohz/ [from the verb "to close", thus the `z' sound] 1. n.
Abbreviation for "close (or right) parenthesis", used when
necessary to eliminate oral ambiguity. See <open>. 2. adj. Of a
delimiting character, used at the right-hand end of a grouping.
Used in such terms as "close parenthesis", "close bracket",
etc. 3. vt. To release a file or communication channel after
access.
<clustergeeking> /kluh'ster-gee`king/ [CMU] n. An activity defined by
spending more time at a computer cluster doing CS homework than
most people spend breathing.
<COBOL> n. Synonomous with <evil>. Hackers believe all COBOL
programmers are <suit>s or <code grinder>s, and no self-respecting
hacker will ever admit to having learned the language. Its very
name is seldom uttered without ritual expressions of disgust or
horror.
<COBOL fingers> /koh'bol fing'grs/ n. Reported from Sweden, a
(hypothetical) disease one might get from programming in COBOL.
The language requires extremely voluminous code. Programming too
much in COBOL causes the fingers to wear down (by endless typing),
until short stubs remain. This malformity is called "COBOL
fingers". "I refuse to type in all that source code again, it
will give me cobol fingers!"
<code grinder> n. 1. A <suit>-wearing minion of the sort hired in
legion strength by banks and insurance companies to implement
payroll packages in RPG and other such unspeakable horrors. This
is about as far from hackerdom as you can get and still touch a
computer. Connotes pity. See <Real World>. 2. Used of or to a
hacker, a really serious slur on the person's creative ability;
connotes a design style characterized by primitive technique,
rule-boundedness, and utter lack of imagination. Compare <card
walloper>.
<code police> [by analogy with "thought police"] n. A mythical team
of Gestapo-like storm troopers that might burst into one's office
and arrest one for violating style rules. May be used either
seriously, to underline a claim that a particular style violation
is dangerous, or ironically, to suggest that the practice under
discussion is condemned mainly by anal-retentive weenies. The
ironic usage is perhaps more common.
<codewalker> n. A program component that traverses other programs for
a living. Compilers have codewalkers in their front ends; so do
cross-reference generators and some database front-ends. Other
utility programs which try to do too much with source code may turn
into codewalkers. As in "This new vgrind feature would require a
codewalker to implement."
<cokebottle> /kohk'bot-l/ n. Any very unusual character, particularly
one that isn't on your keyboard so you can't type it. MIT people
used to complain about the "control-meta-cokebottle" commands at
SAIL, and SAIL people complained right back about the
"altmode-altmode-cokebottle" commands at MIT. Since the demise
of the <space-cadet keyboard> this is no longer a serious usage,
but may be invoked humorously to describe an (unspecified) weird or
non-intuitive keystroke command.
<COME FROM> n. A semi-mythical language construct dual to the `go to';
COME FROM <label> would cause the referenced label to act as a sort
of trapdoor, so that if the program ever reached it control would
quietly fall through to the statement following the COME FROM.
COME FROM was first proposed in a Datamation article in 1973 that
parodied the then-raging `structured programming' wars (see
<considered harmful>). Mythically, some variants are the "assigned
come from", and the "computed come from" (parodying some nasty
control constructs in BASIC and FORTRAN). Notionally,
multi-tasking can be implemented by having more than one COME FROM
statement coming from the same label.
COME FROM was actually implemented under a different name in
Univac's Fortran, c.1975. The statement "AT 100" would perform a
"COME FROM 100". It was intended strictly as a debugging aid,
with dire consequences promised to anyone so deranged as to use it
in production code. It was supported under its own name for the
first time fifteen years later, in C-INTERCAL (see <INTERCAL>,
<retrocomputing>); knowledgeable observers are still reeling from
shock.
<comment out> vt. To surround a section of code with comment
delimiters in order to prevent it from being compiled. This may be
done for a variety of reasons, most commonly when the code is
redundant or obsolete but you want to leave it in the source to
make the intent of the active code clearer.
<com[m] mode> /kom mohd/ [from the ITS supporting on-line chat,
spelled with one or two Ms] Syn. for <talk mode>.
<COMMONWEALTH HACKISH> n. Hacker slang as spoken outside the U.S.,
esp. in the British Commonwealth. It is reported that
Commonwealth speakers are more likely to pronounce "char",
"soc" etc. as spelled (/char/, /sok/) as opposed to American
/keir/ or /sohsh/. Dots in names tend to be pronounced more often
(/sok dot wi'bble/ rather than /sohsh wib'ble/). Preferred
metasyntactic variables include EEK, OOK, FRODO and BILBO; WIBBLE,
WOBBLE and in emergencies WUBBLE; BANANA, WOMBAT, FROG, <fish> and
so on and on.
Alternatives to verb doubling include suffixes "-o-rama",
"frenzy" (as in feeding frenzy) and "city" (as in "barf
city!" "hack-o-rama!" "core dump frenzy!"). Finally, note
that the American usages `parens' `brackets' and `braces' for (),
[], and {} are uncommon; Commonwealth hackish prefers
"bracket", "square bracket" and "curly bracket". Also, the
use of "pling" for <bang> is common outside the U.S..
See also <calculator>, <chemist>, <console jockey>, <fish>,
<grunge>, <hakspek>, <heavy metal>, <leaky heap>, <lord high
fixer>, <noddy>, <psychedelicware>, <plingnet>, <raster blaster>,
<seggie>, <spin-lock>, <terminal junkie>, <tick-list features>,
<weeble>, <weasel>, <YABA> and notes or definitions under <Bad
Thing>, <barf>, <bogus>, <bum>, <chase pointers>, <cosmic rays>,
<crippleware>, <crunch>, <dodgy>, <gonk>, <nybble>, <root>, and
<tweak>.
<compress> [UNIX] vt. When used without a qualifier, generally refers
to <crunch>ing of a file using a particular C implementation of
Lempel-Ziv compression by James A. Woods et al. and widely
circulated via <USENET>. Use of <crunch> itself in this sense is
rare among UNIX hackers.
<computer geek> n. One who eats [computer] bugs for a living. One
who fulfills all of the dreariest negative stereotypes about
hackers: an asocial, malodorous, pasty-faced monomaniac with all
the personality of a cheese grater. Cannot be used by outsiders
without implied insult to all hackers; compare black-on-black usage
of "nigger". A computer geek may be either a fundamentally
clueless individual or a true-hacker in <larval stage>. Also
called "turbo nerd", "turbo geek". See also <clustergeeking>.
<computron> /kom-pyoo-tron/ n. 1. A notional unit of computing power
combining instruction speed and storage capacity, dimensioned
roughly in instructions-per-sec times megabytes-of-main-store times
megabytes-of-mass-storage. "That machine can't run GNU Emacs, it
doesn't have enough computrons!" This usage is usually found in
metaphors that treat computing power as a fungible commodity good
like a crop yield or diesel horsepower. See <bitty box>, <get a
real computer>, <toy>, <crank>. 2. A mythical subatomic particle
that bears the unit quantity of computation or information, in much
the same way that an electron bears one unit of electric charge
(see <bogon>). An elaborate pseudo-scientific theory of computrons
has been worked out based on the physical fact that the molecules
in a solid object move more rapidly as it is heated. It is argued
that an object melts because the molecules have lost their
information about where they are supposed to be (that is, they have
emitted computrons). This explains why computers get so hot and
require air conditioning; they use up computrons. Conversely, you
should be able to cool down an object by placing it in the path of
a computron beam. It is believed that this may also explain why
machines that work at the factory fail in the computer room ---
because the computrons there have been all used up by your other
hardware.
<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.
<cons> /kons/ [from LISP] 1. v. To add a new element to a list, esp.
at the top. 2. <cons up>: vt. To synthesize from smaller pieces:
"to cons up an example".
<considered harmful> adj. Edsger Dijkstra's infamous March 1968 CACM
note, "Goto Statement Considered Harmful", fired the first salvo
in the "structured programming" wars. Amusingly, ACM considered
the resulting acromony sufficiently harmful that they will (by
policy) no longer print an article which takes up that assertive a
position against a coding practice. In the ensuing decades a large
number of both serious papers and parodies have borne titles of the
form "X considered Y". The "structured programming" wars
eventually blew over with the realization that both sides were
wrong, but use of such titles has remained as a persistent minor
in-joke (the "considered silly" found at various places in this
jargon file is related).
<console jockey> n. See <terminal junkie>.
<content-free> adj. Ironic analogy with "context-free", used of a
message which adds nothing to the recipient's knowledge. Though
this adjective is sometimes applied to <flamage>, it more usually
connotes derision for communication styles which exalt form over
substance, or are centered on concerns irrelevant to the subject
ostensibly at hand. Perhaps most used with reference to speeches
by company presidents and like animals. "Content-free?
Uh...that's anything printed on glossy paper".
<Conway's Law> n. The rule that the organization of the software and
the organization of the software team will be congruent; originally
stated as "If you have four groups working on a compiler, you'll
get a four-pass compiler."
This was originally promulgated by Melvin Conway, an early
proto-hacker who wrote an assembler for the Burroughs 220 called
SAVE. "SAVE" didn't stand for anything, it was just that you
lost fewer decks and listings because they all had SAVE written on
top of them.
<cookie> n. A handle, transaction ID or other form of agreement
between cooperating programs. "I give him a packet, he gives me
back a cookie." See <magic cookie>.
<cookie monster> [from `Sesame Street'] n. Any of a family of
early (1970s) hacks reported on <TOPS-10>, <ITS> and elsewhere that
would lock up either the victim's terminal (on a time-sharing
machine) or the operator's console (on a batch mainframe),
repeatedly demanding "I WANT A COOKIE". The required responses
ranged in complexity from "COOKIE" through "HAVE A COOKIE" and
upward. See also <wabbit>.
<copyleft> /kop'ee-left/ n. 1. The copyright notice ("General Public
License") carried by <GNU EMACS> and other Free Software
Foundation software, granting re-use and reproduction rights to all
comers (but see also <General Public Virus>). 2. By extension, any
copyright notice intended to achieve similar aims.
<core> n. Main storage or DRAM. Dates from the days of ferrite-core
memory; now archaic, but still used in the UNIX community and by
old-time hackers or those who would sound like same. See <core
dump>.
<core dump> n. [UNIX] 1. A symptom of catastrophic program failure due
to internal error. 2. By extension, used for humans passing out,
vomiting, or registering extreme shock. "He dumped core. All over
the floor. What a mess." "He heard about ... and dumped core."
3. Occasionally used for a human rambling on pointlessly at great
length; esp. in apology: "Sorry I dumped core on you". 4. A
recapitulation of knowledge (compare <bits>, sense 1). Hence,
spewing all one knows about a topic, esp. in a lecture or answer to
an exam question. "Short, concise answers are better than core
dumps" [From the instructions to a qual exam at Columbia]. See
<core>.
<core leak> n. Syn. with <memory leak>.
<Core Wars> n. A game between "assembler" programs in a simulated
machine, where the objective is to kill your opponent's program by
overwriting it. This was popularized by A.K. Dewdney's column in
`Scientific American' magazine, but is said to have been first
devised by Victor Vyssotsky as a PDP-1 hack, during the early '60s
at Bell Labs. It is rumored that the game is a civilized version
of an amusement called DARWIN common on pre-MMU multitasking
machines. See <core>.
<corge> /korj/ [originally, the name of a cat] n. Yet another
meta-syntactic variable, invented by Mike Gallaher and propagated
by the Gosmacs documentation. See <grault>.
<cosmic rays> n. Notionally, the cause of <bit rot>. However, this is
a semi-independent usage which may be invoked as a humorous way to
<handwave> away any minor <randomness> that doesn't seem worth the
bother of investigating. "Hey, Eric --- I just got a burst of
garbage on my <tube>, where did that come from?" "Cosmic rays, I
guess". Compare <sunspots>, <phase of the moon>. The British seem
to prefer the usage `cosmic showers'; `alpha particles' is also
heard, because stray alpha particles passing through a memory chip
can cause single bit errors (this becomes increasingly more likely
as memory sizes and densities increase).
<cowboy> [Sun, from William Gibson's cyberpunk SF] n. Synonym for
<hacker>. It is reported that at Sun, this is often said with
reverence.
<CP/M> (see-pee-em) [Control Program for Microcomputers] An early
microcomputer <OS> written by hacker Gary Kildall for 8080 and Z-80
based machines, very popular in the late 1970s until virtually
wiped out by MS-DOS after the release of the IBM PC in 1981 (legend
has it that Kildall's company blew their chance to write the PC's
OS because Kildall decided to spend the day IBM's reps wanted to
meet with him enjoying the perfect flying weather in his private
plane). Many of its features and conventions strongly resemble
those of early DEC operating systems such as OS-8, RSTS and RSX-11.
See <MS-DOS>, <operating system>.
<CPU Wars> n. A 1979 large-format comic by Chas Andres chronicling the
attempts of the brainwashed androids of "IPM" (Impossible to
Program Machines) to conquer and destroy the peaceful denizens of
HEC (Human Engineered Computers). This rather transparent allegory
featured many references to <ADVENT> and the immortal line "Eat
flaming death, minicomputer mongrels!" (uttered, of course, by an
IPM stormtrooper). It is alleged that the author subsequently
received a letter of appreciation on IBM company stationery from
the then-head of IBM's Thomas J. Watson research laboratories (then
as now one of the few islands of true hackerdom in the IBM
archipelago). The lower loop of the `B' in the IBM logo, it is
said, had been carefully whited out. See <eat flaming death>.
<cracker> n. One who breaks security on a system. Coined c.1985 by
hackers in defense against journalistic misuse of <hacker> (q.v.,
sense #7). There had been an earlier attempt to establish "worm"
in this sense around 1981-1982 on USENET; this largely failed.
<crank> [from automotive slang] vt. Verb used to describe the
performance of a machine, especially sustained performance. "This
box cranks about 6 MegaFLOPS, with a burst mode of twice that on
vectorized operations."
<crash> 1. n. A sudden, usually drastic failure. Most often said of
the system (q.v., sense #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", whereas the term "system crash"
usually, though not always, implies that the operating system or
other software was at fault. 2. vi. 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 system." 3.
Sometimes said of people hitting the sack after a long <hacking
run>; see <gronk> (sense #4).
<crash and burn> vi.,n. A spectacular crash, in the mode of the
conclusion of the car chase scene from Steve McQueen's "Bullitt".
Sun-3 monitors losing the flyback transformer and lightning strikes
on VAX-11/780 backplanes are notable crash and burn generators.
<crawling horror> n. Ancient crufty hardware or software that forces
beyond the control of the hackers at a site refuse to let die.
Like <dusty deck> or <gonkulator>, but connotes that the thing
described is not just an irritation but an active menace to health
and sanity. "Mostly we code new stuff in C, but they pay us to
maintain one big Fortran II application from nineteen-sixty-X
that's a real crawling horror...". Compare <WOMBAT>.
<cray> /kray/ n. 1. One of the line of supercomputers designed by Cray
Research. The term is actually the lowercased last name of Seymour
Cray, a noted computer architect and co-founder of the company.
Numerous vivid legends surround him, some true and some admittedly
invented by Cray Research brass to shape their corporate culture.
2. Any supercomputer at all.
<cray instability> n. A shortcoming of a program or algorithm which
only manifests itself when running a large problem on a powerful
machine. Generally more subtle than bugs which can be detected in
smaller problems running on a workstation or mini.
<crayola> n. A super-mini or -micro computer that provides some
reasonable percentage of supercomputer performance for an
unreasonably low price. Might also be a <killer micro>.
<crayon> n. Someone who works on Cray supercomputers. More
specifically implies a programmer, probably of the CDC ilk,
probably male, and almost certainly wearing a tie (irrespective of
gender). Unicos systems types who have a Unix background tend not
to be described as crayons.
<creeping featuritis> /kree'ping fee-ch@r-ie't@s/ n. 1. Describes a
systematic tendency to load more <chrome> onto systems at the
expense of whatever elegance they may have posessed when originally
designed. See also <feeping creaturitis>. "You know, the main
problem with <BSD UNIX> has always been creeping featuritis". At
MIT, this tends to be called "creeping featur*ism*" (and
likewise, "feeping creaturism"). (After all, -ism means
"condition" whereas -itis usually means "inflammation of"...)
2. More generally, the tendency for anything complicated to become
even more complicated because people keep saying, "Gee, it would
be even better if it had this feature too." (See <feature>.) The
result is usually a patchwork because it grew one ad-hoc step at a
time, rather than being planned. Planning is a lot of work, but
it's easy to add just one extra little feature to help someone...
and then another... and another.... When creeping featurism gets
out of hand it's like a cancer. Usually this term is used to
describe computer programs, but it could also be said of the
federal government, the IRS 1040 form, and new cars.
<cretin> /kre'tn/ or /kree'tn/ n. Congenital <loser>; an obnoxious
person; someone who can't do anything right. It has been observed
that American hackers tend to favor the British pronunciation
/kret'n/ over standard American /kreet'n/; it is thought this may
be due to the insidious phonetic influence of Monty Python's Flying
Circus.
<cretinous> /kre't@n-us/ or /kree't@n-us/ adj. Wrong;
non-functional; very poorly designed (Also used pejoratively of
people). Synonyms: <bletcherous>, <bagbiter>, <losing>,
<brain-damaged>.
<crippleware> n. 1. <shareware> which has some important functionality
deliberately removed, so as to entice potential users to pay for a
working version. See also <guiltware>. 2. [Cambridge] <guiltware>
which exhorts you to donate to some charity.
<crlf> /ker'l@f/, sometimes /kru'l@f/ n. A carriage return (CR)
followed by a line feed (LF). More loosely, whatever it takes to
get you from the end of one line of text to the beginning of the
next line. See <newline>, <terpri>. Under <UNIX> influence this
usage has become less common (UNIX uses a bare line feed as its
`CRLF').
<crock> [from the obvious mainstream scatologism] n. 1. 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 (as in, for example, UNIX
`make(1)') is a crock. 2. 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 having particular bit
patterns so that you can use instructions as data words too; a
tightly woven, almost completely unmodifiable structure. See
<kluge>. Also in the adjectives "crockish", "crocky" and the
noun "crockitude".
<cross-post> [USENET] v. To post a single article directed to several
newsgroups. Distinguished from posting the article repeatedly,
once to each newsgroup, which causes people to see it multiple
times. Cross-posting is frowned upon, as it tends to cause
followup articles to go to inappropriate newsgroups, as people
respond to only one part of the original posting (unless the
originator is careful to specify a newsgroup for followups.)
<crudware> n. Pejorative term for the hundreds of megabytes of
low-quality <freeware> circulated by user's groups and BBS systems
in the micro-hobbyist world. "Yet *another* set of disk
catalog utilities for <MS-DOS>? What crudware!" The related usage
"fuckware" is reported for software so bad it mutilates your
disk, broadcasts to the Internet, or some similar fiasco.
<cruft> /kruhft/ 1. [back-formation from <crufty>] n. 1. An unpleasant
substance. The dust that gathers under your bed is cruft. 2. n.
The results of shoddy construction. 3. v. [from hand cruft, pun on
hand craft] to write assembler code for something normally (and
better) done by a compiler (see <hand-hacking>). 4. Excess;
superfluous junk. Esp. used of redundant or superseded code.
<cruft together> /kruhft too-ge'thr/ vt. (also <cruft up /kruhft
uhp/>) To throw together something ugly but temporarily workable.
Like v. <kluge>, but more pejorative. "There isn't any program
now to reverse all the lines of a file, but I can probably cruft
one together in about ten minutes." See <crufty>.
<cruftsmanship> n. [from <cruft>] The antithesis of craftsmanship.
<crufty> /kruhf'tee/ [origin unknown; poss. from "crusty" or
"cruddy"] adj. 1. Poorly built, possibly overly complex. The
<canonical> example is "This is standard old crufty DEC
software". In fact, one theory of the origin of "crufty" holds
that was originally a mutation of "crusty" applied to DEC
software so old that the Ss were tall and skinny, looking more like
Fs. Hence <cruft>, n. shoddy construction. 2. Unpleasant,
especially to the touch, often with encrusted junk. Like spilled
coffee smeared with peanut butter and catsup. 3. Generally
unpleasant. 4. <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)."
<crumb> n. Two binary digits; a quad. Larger than a <bit>, smaller
than a <nybble>. Syn. <taste> (sense #2).
<crunch> 1. vi. To process, usually in a time-consuming or complicated
way. Connotes an essentially trivial operation which is
nonetheless painful to perform. The pain may be due to the
triviality being imbedded in a loop from 1 to 1000000000.
"FORTRAN programs do mostly number crunching." 2. vt. To reduce
the size of a file by a complicated 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)".) See <compress>. 3. n. The character "#".
Usage: used at Xerox and CMU, among other places. See <ASCII>. 4.
[Cambridge] To squeeze program source into a minimum-size
representation that will still compile. The term came into being
specifically for a famous program on the BBC micro which crunched
Basic source in order to make it run more quickly (it was a
wholly-interpretive basic).
<cruncha cruncha cruncha> /kruhn'chah kruhn'chah kruhn'chah/ interj.
An encouragement sometimes muttered to a machine bogged down in a
serious <grovel>. Also describes a notional sound made by
grovelling hardware. See <wugga wugga>, <grind> (sense #3).
<cryppie> /krip'ee/ n. A cryptographer. One who hacks or implements
cryptographic software or hardware.
<CTSS> /see-tee-ess-ess/ n. Compatible Time-Sharing System. An early
(1963) experiment in the design of interactive time-sharing
operating systems. Cited here because it was ancestral to
<Multics>, <UNIX>, and <ITS>. The name <ITS> ("Incompatible
Time-sharing System") was a hack on CTSS.
<CTY> /sit'ee/ or /see tee wie/ n. [MIT] The terminal physically
associated with a computer's operating console. The term is a
contraction of "Console TTY", that is, "Console TeleTYpe".
This <ITS> and <TOPS-10>-associated term has become less common
than formerly, as most UNIX hackers simply refer to the CTY as `the
console'.
<cubing> [parallel with "tubing"] vi. 1. Hacking on an IPSC (Intel
Personal SuperComputer) hypercube. "Louella's gone cubing
*again*!!" 2. An indescribable form of self-torture (see
sense #1).
<cuspy> /kuhs'pee/ [coined at WPI from the DEC acronym CUSP, for
Commonly Used System Program, i.e., a utility program used by many
people] adj. 1. (of a program) Well-written. 2. Functionally
excellent. A program which performs well and interfaces well to
users is cuspy. See <rude>. 2. [NYU] An attractive woman,
especially one regarded as available.
<cybercrud> [coined by Ted Nelson] n. Obfuscatory tech-talk. Verbiage
with a high <MEGO> factor. The computer equivalent of
bureaucratese.
<cyberpunk> /sie'ber-puhnk/ [orig. by SF critic Gardner Dozois]
n.,adj. A subgenre of SF launched in 1982 by William Gibson's
epoch-making novel `Neuromancer' (though its roots go back
through Vernor Vinge's `True Names' (See Appendix C) to John
Brunner's 1975 Hugo winner, `The Shockwave Rider'). Gibson's
near-total ignorance of computers and the present-day hacker
culture enabled him to speculate about the role of computers and
hackers in futures in ways hackers have since found both
irritatingly naive and tremendously stimulating. Gibson's work was
widely imitated, in particular by the short-lived but innovative
`Max Headroom' TV series. See <cyberspace>, <ice>, <go
flatline>.
<cyberspace> /sie'ber-spays/ n. Notional "information-space" loaded
with visual cues and navigable with brain-computer interfaces
called "cyberspace decks"; a characteristic prop of <cyberpunk>
SF. At time of writing (1990) serious efforts to construct
<virtual reality> interfaces modelled explicitly on <cyberspace>
are already under way, using more conventional devices such as
glove sensors and binocular TV headsets. Few hackers are prepared
to outright deny the possibility of a cyberspace someday evolving
out of the network (see <network, the>).
<cycle> n. The basic unit of computation. What every hacker wants
more of. One might think that single machine instructions would be
the measure of computation, and indeed computers are often compared
by how many instructions they can process per second, but some
instructions take longer than others. Nearly all computers have an
internal clock, though, and you can describe an instruction as
taking so many "clock cycles". Frequently the computer can
access its memory once on every clock cycle, and so one speaks also
of "memory cycles". These are technical meanings of "cycle".
The slang meaning comes from the observation that there are only so
many cycles per second, and when you are sharing a computer, the
cycles get divided up among the users. The more cycles the
computer spends working on your program rather than someone else's,
the faster your program will run. That's why every hacker wants
more cycles: so he can spend less time waiting for the computer to
respond.
<cycle crunch> n. The situation where the number of people trying to
use the computer simultaneously has reached the point where no one
can get enough cycles because they are spread too thin. Usually
the only solution is to buy more computer. Happily, this has
rapidly become easier in recent years, so much so that the very
term <cycle crunch> now has a faintly archaic flavor (most hackers
now use workstations or personal computers as opposed to
traditional timesharing systems).
<cycle drought> n. A scarcity of cycles. It may be due to a <cycle
crunch>, but could also occur because part of the computer is
temporarily not working, leaving fewer cycles to go around.
Example: "The <high moby> is <down>, so we're running with only
half the usual amount of memory. There will be a cycle drought
until it's fixed."
<cycle server> n. A powerful machine which exists primarily for
running large batch jobs. Interactive tasks such as editing should
be done on other machines on the network, such as workstations.
{= D =}
<daemon> /day'mun/ or /dee'mun/ [Disk And Execution MONitor] 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,
under <ITS> writing a file on the LPT spooler's directory would
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> are often used interchangeably, but seem to
have distinct connotations. The term <daemon> was introduced to
computing by <CTSS> people (who pronounced it dee'mon) and used it to
refer to what ITS called a <dragon>. The meaning and pronunciation
have drifted, and we think this glossary reflects current usage.
See also <demon>.
<DATAMATION> n. A magazine that many hackers assume all <suits> read.
Used to question an unbelieved quote, as in "Did you read that in
DATAMATION?".
<day mode> n. See <phase> (of people).
<dd> /dee-dee/ [from IBM <JCL> via] vt. Equivalent to <cat> or <BLT>.
A specialized UNIX copy command for block-oriented devices. Often
used in heavy-handed system abuse, as in "Let's dd the root
partition onto a tape, then use the boot prom to load it back on to
a new disk". The UNIX `dd(1)' was originally written with a weird,
distinctly non-UNIXy keyword option syntax reminiscent of IBM
System/360 JCL (which had a similar DD command); though the command
filled a need, the design choice looks to have been somebody's
joke. The slang usage is now very rare outside UNIX sites and now
nearly obsolescent even there, as `dd(1)' has been <deprecated> for a
long time (though it has no replacement). Replaced by <BLT> or
simple English `copy'.
<DDT> /dee'dee'tee'/ n. 1. Generic term for a program that helps you
to debug other programs by showing individual machine instructions
in a readable symbolic form and letting the user change them. In
this sense the term DDT is now slightly archaic, having been widely
displaced by `debugger' 2. [ITS] Under MIT's fabled <ITS> operating
system, its DDT was also used as the SHELL or top level command
language used to execute other programs. 3. Any one of several
specific DDTs (sense 1) supported on early DEC hardware. The DEC
PDP-10 Reference Handbook (1969) contained a footnote on the first
page of the documentation for DDT which illuminates the origin of
the term:
Historical footnote: DDT was developed at MIT for the PDP-1
computer in 1961. At that time DDT stood for "DEC Debugging
Tape". Since then, the idea of an on-line debugging program
has propagated throughout the computer industry. DDT programs
are now available for all DEC computers. Since media other
than tape are now frequently used, the more descriptive name
"Dynamic Debugging technique" has been adopted, retaining
the DDT acronym. Confusion between DDT-10 and another well
known pesticide, dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane
(C14-H9-Cl5) should be minimal since each attacks a different,
and apparently mutually exclusive, class of bugs.
Sadly, this quotation was removed from later editions of the
handbook as the <suit>s took over and DEC became much more
"businesslike".
<dead code> n. Code which was once `live' but can never be accessed
due to changes in other parts of the program. Syn. <grunge>.
<deadlock> n. 1. 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 communicating to a server, which may
find itself waiting for output from the server before sending
anything more to it, while the server is similarly waiting for more
input from the controlling program before outputting anything. (It
is reported that this particular flavor of deadlock is sometimes
called a "starvation" deadlock, though that term is more properly
used for situations where a program can never run simply because it
never gets high enough priority. 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
anything.) See <deadly embrace>. 2. Also used of deadlock-like
interactions between humans, as when two people meet in a narrow
corridor, and each tries to be polite by moving aside to let the
other pass, but they end up swaying from side to side without
making any progress because they always both move the same way at
the same time.
<deadly embrace> n. Same as <deadlock>, though usually used only when
exactly two processes are involved. This term more popular term in
Europe; <deadlock> in the United States. Also "deadly embrace"
is often restricted to the case where exactly two processes are
involved, while <deadlock> can involve any number.
<death star> [from the movie `Star Wars'] The AT&T corporate logo,
which appears on computers sold by AT&T and bears an uncanny
resemblance to the "Death Star" in the movie. This usage is
particularly common among partisans of <BSD> UNIX, who tend to
regard the AT&T versions as inferior and AT&T as a bad guy.
<DEC Wars> n. A 1983 <USENET> posting by Alan Hastings and Steve Tarr,
spoofing the `Star Wars' movies in hackish terms. Some years
later, ESR (disappointed by Hastings/Tarr's failure to exploit a
great premise more thoroughly) posted a three-times-longer complete
rewrite called `UNIX WARS'; the two are often confused.
<deckle> /dek'l/ n. Two <nickle>s; 10 bits. Reported among developers
for Mattel's GI 1600 (the Intellivision games processor), a chip
with 16-bit-wide RAM but 10-bit-wide ROM.
<defenestration> [from the traditional Czechoslovak method of
assassinating prime ministers, via SF fandom] n. 1. Proper karmic
retribution for an incorrigible punster. "Oh, ghod, that was
*awful*!" "Quick! Defenestrate him!" See also <h infix>.
2. [proposed] The requirement to support a command-line interface.
As: "It has to run on a VT100." "Curses! I've been
defenestrated".
<defined as> adj. Currently in the role of, usually in an
off-the-organization-chart sense. "Pete is currently defined as
bug prioritizer".
<dehose> vt. To clear a <hosed> condition.
<delint> vt. To modify code to remove problems detected when linting.
See <lint>.
<demo mode> [Sun] n. State of being <heads down> in order to finish
code in time for a demo, usually due RSN.
<deep magic> n. An awesomely arcane technique central to a program or
system, esp. one not generally published and available to hackers
at large (compare <black art>). one which could only have been
uttered by a true <wizard>. Compiler optimization techniques and
many aspects of <OS> design used to be <deep magic>; many
techniques in cryptography, signal processing, graphics and AI
still are. Compare <heavy wizardry>. Esp. found in comments of
the form "Deep magic begins here...". Compare <voodoo
programming>.
<deep space> adj. 1. Describes the "location" of any program which
has gone <off the trolley>. Esp. used of programs which just sit
there silently grinding long after either failure or some output is
expected. Compare <buzz>, <catatonia>. 2. The metaphorical
"location" of a human so dazed and/or confused or caught up in
some esoteric form of <bogosity> that he/she no longer responds
coherently to normal communication. Compare <page out>.
<delta> n. 1. A change, especially a small or incremental change.
Example: "I just doubled the speed of my program!" "What was
the delta on program size?" "About thirty percent." (He
doubled the speed of his program, but increased its size by only
thirty percent.) 2. [UNIX] A <DIFF>, especially a <DIFF> stored
under the set of version-control tools called SCCS (Source Code
Control System). 3. n. A small quantity, but not as small as
<epsilon>. The slang usage of <delta> and <epsilon> stems from the
traditional use of these letters in mathematics for very small
numerical quantities, particularly in so-called "epsilon-delta"
proofs in the differential calculus. <delta> is often used once
<epsilon> has been mentioned to mean a quantity that is slightly
bigger than <epsilon> but still very small. For example, "The
cost isn't epsilon, but it's delta" means that the cost isn't
totally negligible, but it is nevertheless very small. Compare
<within delta of>, <within epsilon of>: that is, close to and even
closer to.
<demented> adj. Yet another term of disgust used to describe a
program. The connotation in this case is that the program works as
designed, but the design is bad. For example, a program that
generates large numbers of meaningless error messages implying it
is on the point of imminent collapse.
<demigod> n. Hacker with years of experience, a national reputation,
and a major role in the development of at least one design, tool or
game used by or known to more than 50% of the hacker community. To
qualify as a genuine demigod, the person must recognizably identify
with the hacker community and have helped shape it. Major demigods
include Ken Thompson and Dennis Ritchie (co-inventors of <UNIX> and
C) and Richard M. Stallman (inventor of <EMACS>). In their hearts
of hearts most hackers dream of someday becoming demigods
themselves, and more than one major software project has been
driven to completion by the author's veiled hopes of apotheosis.
See also <net.god>, <true-hacker>.
<demon> n. 1. [MIT] A portion of a program which is not invoked
explicitly, but which lies dormant waiting for some condition(s) to
occur. See <daemon>. The distinction is that demons are usually
processes within a program, 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 original piece. These new pieces could in
turn activate more demons as the inferences filtered down through
chains of logic. Meanwhile the main program could continue with
whatever its primary task was. 2. [outside MIT] Often used
equivalently to <daemon>, especially in the <UNIX> world where the
latter spelling and pronunciation is considered mildly archaic.
<deprecated> n. Said of a program or feature that is considered
obsolescent and in the process of being phased out, usually in
favor of a specified replacement. Deprecated features can,
unfortunately, linger on for many years.
<de-rezz, derez> /dee rez/ [from the movie TRON] 1. vi. To disappear
or dissolve; the image that goes with it is of an object breaking
up into raster lines and static and then dissolving. Occasionally
used of a person who seems to have suddenly "fuzzed out" mentally
rather than physically. Usage: extremely silly, also rare. This
verb was actually invented as *fictional* hacker slang, and
adopted in a spirit of irony by real hackers years after the fact.
2. vt. On a Macintosh, the data is compiled separately from the
program, in small segments of the program file known as
"resources". The standard resource compiler is Rez. The standard
resource decompiler is DeRez. Usage: very common.
<devo> /dee'vo/ [orig. in-house slang at Symbolics] n. A person in a
development group. See also <doco> and <mango>.
<dickless workstation> n. Extremely pejorative hackerism for
"diskless workstation", a class of botches including the Sun 3/50
and other machines designed exclusively to network with an
expensive central disk server. These combine all the disadvantages
of time-sharing with all the disadvantages of distributed personal
computers.
<diddle> 1. vt. To work with in a not particularly serious manner.
"I diddled 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 <twiddle>. 2. n. The action or result
of diddling. See also <tweak>, <twiddle>, <frob>.
<diffs> n. 1. Differences, especially difference in source code or
documents. Includes additions. "Send me your diffs for the jargon
file!" 2. (often in the singular <diff>) the output from the
`diff(1)' utility, esp. when used as specification input to the
`patch(1)' utility (which can actually perform the mods). This is a
common method of distributing patches and source updates in the
UNIX/C world.
<digit> /dij'it/ n. An employee of Digital Equipment Corporation. See
also <VAX>, <VMS>, <PDP-10>, <TOPS-10>, <field circus>.
<dike> vt. To remove or disable a portion of something, as a wire from
a computer or a subroutine from a program. A standard slogan runs:
"When in doubt, dike it out." (The implication is that it is
usually more effective to attack software problems by reducing
complexity rather than increasing it). The word "dikes" is
widely used among mechanics and engineers to mean "diagonal
cutters", a heavy-duty metal-cutting device; to "dike something
out" means to use such cutters to remove something. Among hackers
this term has been metaphorically extended to non-physical objects
such as sections of code.
<ding> /ding/ n.,vi. 1. Synonym for <feep>. Usage: rare among
hackers, but commoner in the <Real World>. 2. <dinged>: What
happens when someone in authority gives you a minor bitching about
something, esp. something you consider trivial. "I was dinged for
having a messy desk".
<dink> adj. Said of a machine which has the <bitty box> nature; a
machine too small to be worth bothering with, sometimes the current
system you're forced to work on. First heard from an MIT hacker
(BADOB) working on a CP/M system with 64K in reference to any 6502
system, then from people writing 32 bit software about 16 bit
machines. "GNUmacs will never work on that dink machine."
Probably derived from mainstream "dinky", which isn't
sufficiently perjorative
<dinosaur> n. Any hardware requiring raised flooring and special
power. Used especially of old minis and mainframes when contrasted
with newer microprocessor-based machines. In a famous quote from
the '88 UNIX EXPO, Bill Joy compared the mainframe in the massive
IBM display with a grazing dinosaur, "with a truck outside pumping
its bodily fluids through it". IBM was not amused. Compare <big
iron>.
<dinosaur pen> n. A traditional mainframe computer room complete with
raised flooring, special power, its own ultra-heavy-duty air
conditioning, and a side order of Halon fire extinguishers. See
<boa>.
<Discordianism> /dis-kor'di-uhn-ism/ n. The veneration of <Eris>, aka
Discordia; widely popular among hackers. Popularized by Robert
Anton Wilson's _Illuminatus!_ trilogy as a sort of self-subverting
dada-Zen for Westerners --- it should on no account be taken
seriously but is far more serious than most jokes. Usually
connected with an elaborate conspiracy theory/joke involving
millenia-long warfare between the anarcho-surrealist partisans of
Eris and a malevolent, authoritarian secret society called the
Illuminati. See Appendix B, <Church of the Sub-Genius>, and <ha ha
only serious>.
<display hack> n. A program with the same approximate purpose as a
kaleidoscope: to make pretty pictures. Famous display hacks
include <munching squares>, <smoking clover>, the BSD UNIX `rain(6)'
program, `worms(6)' on miscellaneous UNIXes, and the <X> kaleid
program. Display hacks can also be implemented without programming
by creating text files containing numerous escape sequences for
interpretation by a video terminal; one notable example displayed,
on any VT100, a Christmas tree with twinkling lights and a toy
train circling its base.
<doco> /do'ko/ [orig. in-house slang at Symbolics] n. A documentation
writer. See also <devo> and <mango>.
<do protocol> [from network protocol programming] vt. To perform an
interaction with somebody or something that follows 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.
<dodgy> adj. Syn. with <flaky>. Preferred outside the U.S.
<dogwash> [From a quip in the "urgency" field of a very optional
software change request, about 1982. It was something like,
"Urgency: Wash your dog first."] n. A project of minimal
priority, undertaken as an escape from more serious work. Also, to
engage in such a project. Many games and much <freeware> gets
written this way.
<Don't do that, then!> [from an old doctor's office joke about a
patient with a trivial complaint] interj. Stock response to a user
complaint. "When I type control-S, the whole system comes to a
halt for thirty seconds." "Don't do that, then." Compare
<RTFM>.
<dongle> /don-gl/ n. 1. A security device for commercial microcomputer
programs consisting of a serialized EPROM and some drivers in an
RS-232 connector shell. Programs that use a dongle query the port
at startup and programmed intervals thereafter, and terminate if it
does not respond with the dongle's programmed validation code.
Thus, users could make as many copies of the program as they want
but must pay for each dongle. The idea was clever but initially a
failure, as users disliked tying up a serial port this way. Most
dongles on the market today (1990) will pass data through the port,
and monitor for "magic codes" (and combinations of status lines)
with minimal if any interference with devices further down the line
(this innovation was necessary to allow daisy-chained dongles for
multiple pieces of software). The devices are still not widely
used, as the industry has trended away from copy-protection schemes
in general. 2. By extension, any physical electronic key or
transferrable ID required for a program to function. See
<dongle-disk>.
<dongle-disk> /don'gl disk/ n. See <dongle>; a "dongle-disk" is a
floppy disk with some coding which allows an application to
identify it uniquely. It can therefore be used as a <dongle>.
Also called a "key disk".
<donuts> n. Collective noun for any set of memory bits. This is
really archaic and may no longer be live slang; it dates from the
days of ferrite-core memories in which each bit was represented by
a doughnut-shaped magnetic flip-flop. Compare <core>.
<doorstop> n. Used to describe equipment that is non-functional and
halfway expected to remain so, especially obsolescent equipment
kept around for political reasons or ostensibly as a backup.
"When we get another Wyse-50 in here that ADM3 will turn into a
doorstop." Compare <boat anchor>.
<dot file> [UNIX] n. A file that is not visible to normal
directory-browsing tools (on UNIX, files named beginning with a dot
are normally invisible to the directory lister).
<double bucky> adj. Using both the CTRL and META keys. "The command
to burn all LEDs is double bucky F." See also <meta bit>,
<cokebottle>, <quadruple bucky>, <space-cadet keyboard>. The
following lyrics were written on May 27, 1978, in celebration of
the Stanford keyboard. A typical MIT comment was that the Stanford
<bucky bits> (control and meta shifting keys) were nice, but there
weren't enough of them; you could only type 512 different
characters on a Stanford keyword. An obvious thing was simply to
add more shifting keys, and this was eventually done; one problem,
is that a keyboard with that many shifting keys is hard on
touch-typists, who don't like to move their hands away from the
home position on the keyboard. It was half-seriously suggested
that the extra shifting keys be pedals; typing on such a keyboard
would be very much like playing a full pipe organ. This idea is
mentioned below, in a parody of a very fine song by Jeffrey Moss
called "Rubber Duckie", which was published in "The Sesame
Street Songbook".
Double Bucky
Double bucky, you're the one!
You make my keyboard lots of fun.
Double bucky, an additional bit or two:
(Vo-vo-de-o!)
Control and meta, side by side,
Augmented ASCII, nine bits wide!
Double bucky! Half a thousand glyphs, plus a few!
Oh,
I sure wish that I
Had a couple of
Bits more!
Perhaps a
Set of pedals to
Make the number of
Bits four:
Double double bucky!
Double bucky, left and right
OR'd together, outta sight!
Double bucky, I'd like a whole word of
Double bucky, I'm happy I heard of
Double bucky, I'd like a whole word of you!
--- The Great Quux (with apologies to Jeffrey Moss)
[This is, by the way, an excellent example of computer <filk> --- ESR]
<doubled sig> /duh'b@ld sig/ [USENET] n. A <sig block> that has been
included twice in a <USENET> article or, less frequently, in an
electronic mail message. An article or message with a doubled sig
can be caused by improperly configured software. More often,
however, it reveals the author's lack of experience in electronic
communication. See <biff>, <pseudo>.
<down> 1. adj. Not operating. "The up escalator is down." That is
considered a humorous thing to say, but "The elevator is down"
always means "The elevator isn't working" and never refers to
what floor the elevator is on. With repect to computers, this
usage has passed into the mainstream; the extension to other kinds
of machine is still hackish. 2. <go down> vi. To stop functioning;
usually said of the <system>. The message every hacker hates to
hear from the operator is, "The system will go down in five
minutes." 3. <take down>, <bring down> vt. To deactivate
purposely, usually for repair work. "I'm taking the system down to
work on that bug in the tape drive."
<download> vt. To transfer data or (esp.) code from a larger `host'
system (esp. a mainframe) over a digital comm link to a smaller
`client' system, esp. a microcomputer or specialized peripheral
device. Oppose <upload>.
<DP> n. Data Processing. Listed here because according to hackers,
use of it marks one immediately as a <suit>. See <DPer>.
<DPB> /duh-pib'/ [from the PDP-10 instruction set] v., obs. To plop
something down in the middle. Usage: silly. Example: "Dpb
yourself into that couch, there." The connotation would be that
the couch is full except for one slot just big enough for you to
sit in. DPB means "DePosit Byte", and was the name of a PDP-10
instruction that inserts some bits into the middle of some other
bits. This usage has been kept alive by the Common Lisp function
of the same name.
<DPer> n. Data Processor. Hackers are absolutely amazed that <suits>
use this term self-referentially. "*Computers* process data,
not people!" See <DP>.
<dragon> n. [MIT] A program similar to a <daemon>, 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. Under ITS, many
terminals displayed 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 was generated by the
"name dragon". Usage: rare outside MIT --- under UNIX and most
other OSs this would be called a `background <demon>' or <daemon>.
The best-known UNIX example of a dragon is `cron(1)'. At SAIL they
called this sort of thing a "phantom".
<Dragon Book> n. Aho, Sethi and Ullman's classic compilers text
`Principles Of Compiler Design', so called because of the cover
design depicting a knight slaying a dragon labelled "compiler
complexity". This actually describes the "Red Dragon Book"; an
earlier edition (sans Sethi) was the "Green Dragon Book". See
also <Blue Book>, <Red Book>, <Green Book>, <Silver Book>, <Purple
Book>, <Orange Book>, <White Book>, <Pink-Shirt Book>, <Aluminum
Book>.
<drain> [IBM] v. Syn. for <flush> (sense 4).
<dread high bit disease> n. A condition endemic to PRIME (formerly
PR1ME) minicomputers which results in all the characters having
their high (0x80) bit ON rather than OFF. This of course makes
transporting files to other systems much more difficult, not to
mention talking to true eightbit devices. It is reported that
PRIME adopted the reversed eight bit convention in order to save 25
cents/serial line/machine. This probably qualifies as one of the
most <cretinous> design tradeoffs ever made. See <meta bit>.
<DRECNET> /drek'net/ [fr. Yiddish `dreck'] n. Deliberate distortion of
DECNET, a networking protocol used in the VMS community. So-called
because DEC helped write the Ethernet specification, and then
(either stupidly or as a malignant customer-control tactic)
violated that spec in the design of DRECNET (among other things,
they implemented the wrong <heartbeat> speed). See also <connector
conspiracy>.
<drool-proof paper> n. Documentation which has been obsessively dumbed
down, to the point where only a <cretin> could bear to read it, is
said to have succumbed to the "drool-proof paper syndrome" or to
have been "written on drool-proof paper". For example, this is
an actual quote from Apple's LaserWriter manual: "Do not expose
your LaserWriter to open fire or flame."
<drop on the floor> vt. To react to an error condition by silently
discarding messages or other valuable data. Example: "The gateway
ran out of memory, so it just started dropping packets on the
floor." Also frequently used of faulty mail and netnews relay
sites that lose messages. See also <black hole>.
<drugged> adj., also "on drugs". 1. Conspicuously stupid, heading
towards <brain-damaged>. Often accompanied by a pantomime of
toking a joint. 2. Of hardware, very slow relative to normal
preformance.
<drunk mouse syndrome> n. A malady exhibited by the mouse pointing
device of some workstations. The typical symptom is for the mouse
cursor on the screen to move to random directions and not in sync
with the moving of the actual mouse. Can usually be corrected by
unplugging the mouse and plugging it back again. Another
recommended fix is to rotate your optical mouse pad 90 degrees.
<dumbass attack> /duhm'ass @-tak'/ [Purdue] n. A novice's mistake
made by the experienced, especially one made by running as root
under UNIX, e.g. typing "rm *" or mkfs on a mounted file system.
Compare <adger>.
<dusty deck> n. Old software (especially applications) with which one
is obliged to remain compatible. The term implies that the
software in question is a holdover from card-punch days. Used esp.
when referring to old scientific and number-crunching software,
much of which was written in FORTRAN and very poorly documented but
would be too expensive to replace. See <fossil>.
<DWIM> /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;
also occasionally described as the single instruction the ideal
computer would have (back when proof of program correctness were in
vogue, there were also jokes about <DWIMC>: Do What I Mean,
Correctly). A related term, more often seen as a verb, is DTRT (Do
The Right Thing), see <Right Thing, The>. 2. n.,obs. The INTERLISP
function that attempted to accomplish this feat by correcting many
of the more common errors. See <hairy>.
<dynner> /din'r/ 32 bits, by analogy with <nybble> and byte. Usage:
rare and extremely silly. See also <playte>, <taste>, <crumb>.
{= E =}
<earthquake> [IBM] n. The ultimate real-world shock test for computer
hardware. Hacker sources at IBM deny the rumor that the Bay Area
quake of 1989 was initiated by the company to test QA at its
California plants.
<Easter egg> n. 1. A message hidden in the object code of a program as
a joke, intended to be found by persons disassembling or browsing
the code. 2. A message, graphic, or sound-effect emitted by a
program (or, on a PC, the BIOS ROM) in response to some
undocumented set of commands or keystrokes, intended as a joke or
to display program credits. One well-known early Easter egg found
in a couple of OSs caused them to respond to the command `make
love' with `not war?'. Many personal computers (other than the IBM
PC) have much more elaborate eggs hidden in ROM, including lists of
the developers' names, political exhortations, snatches of music,
and (in one case) graphics images of the entire development team.
<Easter egging> [IBM] n. The act of replacing unrelated parts more or
less at random in hopes that a malfunction will go away. Hackers
consider this the normal operating mode of <field circus> techs and
do not love them for it.
<eat flaming death> imp. A construction popularized among hackers by
the infamous <DEC WARS> comic; supposed to derive from a famously
turgid line in a WWII-era anti-Nazi propaganda comic in which X was
"non-Aryan mongrels" or something of the sort. Used in
humorously overblown expressions of hostility. "Eat flaming death,
EBCDIC users!"
<eighty-column mind> [IBM] n. The sort said to be employed by persons
for whom the transition from card to tape was traumatic (nobody has
dared tell them about disks yet). It is said that these people,
like (according to an old joke) the founder of IBM, will be buried
`9-EDGE-FORWARD-FACE-DOWN'. These people are thought by most
hackers to dominate IBM's customer base, and its thinking.
<El Camino Bignum> /el' k@-mee'noh big'num/ n. El Camino Real. El
Camino Real is the name of a street through the San Francisco
peninsula that originally extended (and still appears in places)
all the way down to Mexico City. Navigation on the San Francisco
peninsula is usually done relative to El Camino Real, which is
assumed to run north and south even though it doesn't really in
many places (see <logical>). El Camino Real runs right past
Stanford University, and so is familiar to hackers. The Spanish
word "real" (which has two syllables (ray-ahl')) means "royal";
El Camino Real is "the royal road". Now the English word
"real" is used in mathematics to describe numbers (and by analogy
is misused in computer jargon to mean floating-point numbers). In
the FORTRAN language, for example, a "real" quantity is a number
typically precise to seven decimal places, and a "double
precision" quantity is a larger floating-point number, precise to
perhaps fourteen decimal places. When a hacker from MIT visited
Stanford in 1976 or so, he remarked what a long road El Camino Real
was. Making a pun on "real", he started calling it "El Camino
Double Precision" --- but when the hacker was told that the road
was hundreds of miles long, he renamed it "El Camino Bignum", and
that name has stuck. (See <bignum>.)
<elegant> [from mathematical usage] adj. Combining simplicity, power,
and a certain ineffable grace of design. Higher praise than
`clever', `winning' or even <cuspy>.
<elephantine> adj. Used of programs or systems which are both
conspicuous <hog>s (due perhaps to poor design founded on <brute
force and ignorance>) and exceedingly <hairy> in source form. An
elephantine program may be functional and even friendly, but (like
the old joke about being in bed with an elephant) it's tough to
have around all the same, esp. a bitch to maintain. In extreme
cases, hackers have been known to make trumpeting sounds or perform
expressive zoomorphic mime at the mention of the offending program.
Usage: semi-humorous. Compare "has the elephant nature" and the
somewhat more pejorative <monstrosity>. See also <second-system
effect> and <baroque>.
<EMACS> /ee'maks/ [from Editing MACroS] n. The ne plus ultra of hacker
editors, a program editor with an entire LISP interpreter inside
it. Originally written by Richard Stallman in <TECO> at the MIT-AI
lab, but the most widely used versions now run under UNIX. It
includes facilities to run compilation subprocesses and send and
receive mail; many hackers spend up to 80% of their tube time
inside it. Some versions running under window managers iconify as
a kitchen sink, perhaps to suggest the one feature the editor
doesn't include. Indeed, some hackers find EMACS too heavyweight
and baroque for their taste, and expand the name as "Escape Meta
Alt Control Shift" to spoof its heavy reliance on complex
bucky-bitted keystrokes. Other spoof expansions include Eight
Megabytes And Constantly Swapping, Eventually malloc()s All
Computer Storage, and EMACS Makes A Computer Slow (see <RECURSIVE
ACRONYMS>). See also <vi>.
<email> /ee-mayl/ vt.,n. Electronic mail automatically passed through
computer networks and/or via modems common-carrier lines. Contrast
<snail-mail>. See <network address>.
<emoticon> /ee-moh'ti-cahn/ n. An ASCII glyph used to indicate an
emotional state in email or news. Hundreds have been proposed, but
only a few are in common use. These include:
:-) Smiley face (indicates laughter)
:-( Frowney face (indicates sadness, anger or upset)
;-) Half-smiley (ha ha only serious)
Also known as "semi-smiley" or "winkey face".
:-/ Wry face
Of these, the first two are by far the most frequently encountered.
Hyphenless forms of them are common on CompuServe, GEnie and BIX;
see also <bixie>. On <USENET>, "smiley" is often used as a
generic (synonym for emoticon) as well as specifically for the
happy-face emoticon.
Note for the <newbie>: overuse of the smiley is a mark of
loserhood! More than one per paragraph is a fairly sure sign that
you've gone over the line.
<empire> n. Any of a family of military simulations derived from a
game written by Peter Langston many years ago. There are 5 or 6
multi-player variants of varying degrees of sophistication, and one
single-player version implemented for both UNIX and VMS which is
even available as MS-DOS freeware. All are notoriously addictive.
<English> /ing'lish/ n.,obs. The source code for a program, which may
be in any language, as opposed to <binary>. The idea behind the
term is that to a real hacker, a program written in his favorite
programming language is as readable as English. Usage: obsolete,
used mostly by old-time hackers, though recognizable in context.
<ENQ> /enkw/ [from the ASCII mnemonic for 0000101] 1. An on-line
convention for querying someone's availability. After opening a
<talk mode> connection to someone apparently in heavy hack mode,
one might type "SYN SYN ENQ?" (the SYNs representing notional
synchronization bytes) expecting a return of <ACK> or NAK depending
on whether or not the person felt interruptible. See <ACK>;
compare <ping>, <finger>, and the usage of `FOO?' listed under
<talk mode>.
<EOF> /ee-oh-ef/ [UNIX/C] n. End Of File. 1. Refers esp. to whatever
pseudo-character value is returned by C's sequential input
functions (and their equivalents in other environments) when the
logical end of file has been reached (this was 0 under V6 UNIX, is
-1 under V7 and all subsequent versions and all non-UNIX C library
implementations). 2. Used by extension in non-computer contexts
when a human is doing something that can be modelled as a
sequential read and can't go further. "Yeah, I looked for a list
of 360 mnemonics to post as a joke, but I hit <EOF> pretty fast,
all the library had was a JCL manual."
<EOU> /ee oh yoo/ The mnemonic of a mythical ASCII control character
(End Of User) that could make a Model 33 Teletype explode on
receipt. This parodied the numerous obscure record-delimiter
control characters left in ASCII from the days when it was more
associated with wire-service teletypes than computers (e.g. FS, GS,
RS, US, EM, SUB, ETX and esp. EOT). It is worth remembering that
ASR-33s were big, noisy mechanical beasts with a lot of clattering
parts; the notion that one might explode was nowhere near as
ridiculous as it might seem to someone sitting in front of a <tube>
or flatscreen today.
<epoch, the> [UNIX] n. The time and date corresponding to zero in an
operating system's clock and timestamp values. Under most UNIX
versions, 00:00 of January 1st 1970 GMT. System time is measured
in seconds or <tick>s past the epoch. See <tick>s, <wall time>.
Note that weird problems may ensue when the clock wraps around (see
<wrap around>), and that this is not a necessarily a rare event; on
systems counting 10 <tick>s per second, a 32 bit count of ticks is
only good for 6.8 years. The 1-per-second clock of UNIX is good
until January 18, 2038, assuming word lengths don't increase by
then.
<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. "We can get
this feature for epsilon cost." 3. <within epsilon of>: close
enough to be indistinguishable for all practical purposes. this is
even closer than being <within delta of>. Example: "That's not
what I asked for, but it's within epsilon of what I wanted."
Alternatively, it may mean not close enough, but very little is
required to get it there: "My program is within epsilon of
working." See <asymptotic>.
<epsilon squared> n. A quantity even smaller than <epsilon>, as small
in comparison to it as it is to something normal. If you buy a
supercomputer for a million dollars, the cost of the
thousand-dollar terminal to go with it is <epsilon>, and the cost
of the ten-dollar cable to connect the two is <epsilon squared>.
<era, the> Syn. <epoch>. The Webster's Unabridged makes these words
almost synonymous, but "era" usually connotes a span of time
rather than a point in time. The <epoch> usage is recommended.
<Eric Conspiracy> n. Notional group of mustachioed hackers named Eric
first pinpointed as a sinister conspiracy by an infamous
talk.bizarre posting c. 1986; this was doubtless influenced by the
numerous `Eric' jokes in the Monty Python oeuvre. There do indeed
seem to be considerably more mustachioed Erics in hackerdom than
the frequency of these three traits can account for unless they are
correlated in some arcane way. Well known examples include Eric
Allman of <BSD> fame, Erik Fair (coauthor of NNTP); your editor has
heard from about fourteen others by email, and the organization
line `Eric Conspiracy Secret Laboratories' now emanates regularly
from more than one site.
<Eris> /e'r@s/ pn. The Greco-Roman goddess of Chaos, Discord,
Confusion and Things You Know Not Of; aka Discordia. Not a very
friendly deity in the Classical original, she was re-invented as a
more benign personification of creative anarchy starting in 1959 by
the adherents of <Discordianism> and has since been a semi-serious
subject of veneration in several `fringe' cultures including
hackerdom. See <Discordianism>, <Church of the Sub-Genius>.
<erotics> /ee-ro'tiks/ n. Reported from Scandinavia as
English-language university slang for electronics. Often used by
hackers, maybe because of its exciting aspects.
<essentials> n. Things necessary to maintain a productive and secure
hacking environment. "A jug of wine, a loaf of bread, a
20-megahertz 80386 box with 8 meg of core and a 300-megabyte disk
supporting full UNIX with source and X windows and EMACS and UUCP
to a friendly Internet site, and thou."
<evil> adj. As used by hackers, implies that some system, program,
person or institution is sufficiently mal-designed as to be not
worth the bother of dealing with. Unlike the adjectives in the
<cretinous>/<losing>/<brain-damaged> series, "evil" does not
imply incompetence or bad design, but rather a set of goals or
design criteria fatally incompatible with the speaker's. This is
more an esthetic and engineering judgement than a moral one in the
mainstream sense. "We thought about adding a <Blue Glue> interface
but decided it was too evil to deal with." "<TECO> is neat, but
it can be pretty evil if you're prone to typos." Often pronounced
with the first syllable lengthened, as /eeeevil/.
<exa-> /ex'ga/ pref. See <kilo>.
<examining the entrails> n. The process of rooting through a core dump
or hex image in the attempt to discover the bug that brought your
program or system down. Compare <runes>, <incantation>, <black
art>.
<EXCH> /eks'ch@, ekstch/ vt. To exchange two things, each for the
other; to swap places. If you point to two people sitting down and
say "Exch!", you are asking them to trade places. <EXCH>,
meaning EXCHange, was originally the name of a PDP-10 instruction
that exchanged the contents of a register and a memory location.
Many newer hackers tend to be thinking instead of of the Postscript
exchange operator.
<excl> /eks'kl/ n. Abbreviation for "exclamation point". See
<bang>, <shriek>, <wow>.
<EXE> /ex'ee/ An executable binary file. Some operating systems
(notably MS-DOS and VMS) use the extension .EXE to mark such files.
This usage is also occasionally found among UNIX programmers even
though UNIX executables don't have any required extension (in fact,
the term "extension" in this sense is not part of UNIX jargon).
<exec> /eg'zek/ [shortened from "executive" or "execute"] vt.,n.
1. [UNIX] Synonym for <chain>, derives from the `exec(2)' call. 2.
(obs) The command interpreter for an <OS> (see <shell>); term esp.
used on mainframes, and prob. derived from UNIVAC's archaic EXEC 2
and EXEC 8 operating systems.
<exercise, left as an> [Technical reference books] Used to complete a
proof when one doesn't mind a <handwave>, or to avoid one entirely.
The complete phrase is: "The proof (or rest) is left as an
exercise for the reader."
{= F =}
<fall over> [IBM] vi. Yet another synonym for <crash> or <lose>.
`Fall over hard' equates to <crash and burn>.
<fall through> vt. 1. To exit a loop by exhaustion, i.e. by having
fulfilled its exit condition rather than via a break or exception
condition that exits from the middle of it. This usage appears to
be *really* old, as in dating from the '40s and '50s. It may
no longer be live slang. 2. To fail a test that would have passed
control to a subroutine or other distant portion of code. 2. In C,
`fall-through' is said to occur when the flow of execution in a
switch statement reaches a `case' label other than by jumping there
from the switch header, passing a point where one would normally
expect to find a `break'. A trivial example:
switch (color)
{
case GREEN:
do_green();
break;
case PINK:
do_pink();
case RED:
do_red();
break;
default:
do_blue();
break;
}
The effect of this code is to do_green() when color is GREEN,
do_red() when color is RED, do_blue() on any other color than PINK,
and (this is the important part) do_pink() and *then* do_red()
when color is PINK. Fall-through is <considered harmful> by some;
among those who use it, it is considered good practice to include a
comment highlighting the fall through, at the point one would
normally expect a break.
<fandango on core> [UNIX/C hackers, from the Mexican dance] n. In C, a
wild pointer that runs out of bounds causing a <core dump>, or
corrupts the `malloc(3)' <arena> in such a way as to cause mysterious
failures later on, is sometimes said to have `done a fandango on
core'. On low-end personal machines without an MMU this can
corrupt the OS itself, causing massive lossage. Other third-world
dances such as the rhumba, cha-cha or watusi may be substituted.
See <aliasing bug>, <precedence lossage>, <smash the stack>,
<memory leak>, <overrun screw>, <core>.
<FAQ list> /ef-ay-kyoo list/ [Usenix] n. Compendium of accumulated
lore, posted periodically to high-volume newsgroups in an attempt
to forestall Frequently Asked Questions. The jargon file itself
serves as a good example of a collection of one kind of lore,
although it is far too big for a regular posting. Several extant
FAQ lists do (or should) make reference to the jargon file. "How
do you pronounce `char'?" and "What's that funny name for the `#'
character?" are, for example, both Frequently Asked Questions.
<farming> [Adelaide University, Australia] n. What the heads of a
Winchester are said to do when the plow little furrows in the
magnetic media. Associated with a <crash>. Typically used as
follows: "Oh no, the machine has just crashed, I hope the hard
drive hasn't gone <farming> again."
<fascist> adj. Said of a computer system with excessive or annoying
security barriers, usage limits or access policies. The
implication is that said policies are preventing hackers from
getting interesting work done. The variant "fascistic" seems to
have been preferred at MIT, poss. by analogy with "touristic"
(see <tourist>).
<faulty> adj. Non-functional; buggy. Same denotation as
"bagbiting", "bletcherous", "losing", q.v., but the
connotation is much milder.
<fd leak> /ef dee leek/ n. A kind of programming bug analogous to a
<core leak>, in which a program fails to close file descriptors
("fd"s) after file operations are completed, and thus eventually
runs out. See <leak>.
<fear and loathing> [from Hunter Thompson] n. State inspired by the
prospect of dealing with certain real-world systems and standards
which are totally <brain-damaged> but ubiquitous --- Intel 8086s,
or COBOL, or any IBM machine except the Rios (aka the RS/6000).
"Ack. They want PCs to be able to talk to the AI machine. Fear
and loathing time!" See also IBM.
<feature> n. 1. An intended property or behavior (as of a program).
Whether it is good or not is immaterial. 2. A good property or
behavior (as of a program). Whether it was intended or not is
immaterial. 3. A surprising property or behavior; in particular,
one that is purposely inconsistent because it works better that
way. For example, in some versions of the <EMACS> text editor, the
"transpose characters" command exchanges the two characters on
either side of the cursor on the screen, *except* when the
cursor is at the end of a line, in which case the two characters
before the cursor are exchanged. While this behavior is perhaps
surprising, and certainly inconsistent, it has been found through
extensive experimentation to be what most users want; the
inconsistency is therefore a <feature> and not a <bug>. 4. A
property or behavior that is gratuitous or unnecessary, though
perhaps also impressive or cute. For example, one feature of the
MACLISP language is the ability to print numbers as Roman numerals.
See <bells and whistles>. 5. A property or behavior that was put
in to help someone else but that happens to be in your way. 6. A
<bug> that has been documented. To call something a feature
sometimes means the author of the program did not consider the
particular case, and the program responded in a way that was
unexpected, but not strictly incorrect. A standard joke is that a
<bug> can be turned into a <feature> simply by documenting it (then
theoretically no one can complain about it because it's in the
manual), or even by simply declaring it to be good. "That's not a
bug, that's a feature!" See also <feetch feetch>.
<feature creature> n. One who loves to add features to designs or
programs, perhaps at the expense of coherence, concision, or
<taste>. See also <creeping featurism>.
<featurectomy> /fee`ch@r-ek'to-mee/ n. The act of removing a feature
from a program. Featurectomies generally come in two varieties,
the "righteous" and the "reluctant". Righteous featurectomies
are performed because the remover believes the program would be
more elegant without the feature, or there is already an equivalent
and "better" way to achieve the same end. (This is not quite the
same thing as removing a <misfeature>.) Reluctant featurectomies
are performed to satisfy some external constraint such as code size
or execution speed.
<feep> /feep/ 1. n. The soft bell of a display terminal (except for a
VT-52!); a beep (in fact, the microcomputer world seems to prefer
<beep>). 2. vi. To cause the display to make a feep sound. TTY's
do not have feeps; they have mechanical bells that ring. Alternate
forms: <beep>, <bleep>, or just about anything suitably
onomatopoeic. (Jeff Macnelly, in his comic strip `Shoe', uses
the word `eep' for sounds made by computer terminals and video
games; this is perhaps the closest written approximation yet.) The
term <beedle> was sometimes heard at SAIL, where the terminal
bleepers are not particularly "soft" (they sound more like the
musical equivalent of a raspberry or Bronx cheer; for a close
approximation, imagine the sound of a Star Trek communicator's beep
lasting for five seconds.). The "feeper" on a VT-52 has been
compared to the sound of a '52 Chevy stripping its gears. See also
<ding>.
<feeper> /fee'pr/ n. The device in a terminal or workstation (usually
a loudspeaker of some kind) that makes the <feep> sound.
<feeping creaturitis> /fee'ping kree`ch@r-ie'tis/ n. Deliberate
spoonerization of <creeping featuritis>, meant to imply that the
system or program in question has become a misshapen creature of
hacks.This term isn't really well-defined, but it sounds so neat
that most hackers have said or heard it. It is probably reinforced
by an image of terminals prowling about in the dark making their
customary noises.
<feetch feetch> interj. If someone tells you about some new
improvement to a program, you might respond, "Feetch, feetch!"
The meaning of this depends critically on vocal inflection. With
enthusiasm, it means something like, "Boy, that's great! What a
great hack!" Grudgingly or with obvious doubt, it means "I don't
know; it sounds like just one more unnecessary and complicated
thing." With a tone of resignation, it means, "Well, I'd rather
keep it simple, but I suppose it has to be done."
<fencepost error> n. 1. 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.) For example, suppose
you have a long list or array of items, and want to process items m
through n; how many items are there? The obvious answer is n - m,
but that is off by one; the right answer is n - m + 1. A program
that used the "obvious" formula would have a fencepost error in
it. See also <off-by-one error>, and note that not all off-by-one
errors are fencepost errors. The game of Musical Chairs involves
an off-by-one problem where N people try to sit in N-1 chairs, but
it's not a fencepost error. Fencepost errors come from counting
things rather than the spaces between them, or vice versa, or by
neglecting to consider whether one should count one or both ends of
a row. 2. Occasionally, an error induced by unexpectedly regular
spacing of inputs, which can (for instance) screw up your hash
table.
<field circus> [a derogatory pun on "field service"] n. The field
service organization of any hardware manufacturer, but especially
DEC. There is an entire genre of jokes about DEC field circus
engineers:
Q: How can you recognize a DEC field circus engineer with a flat tire?
A: He's changing each tires to see which one is flat.
Q: How can you recognize a DEC field circus engineer who is out of
gas?
A: He's changing each tires to see which one is flat.
<field servoid> /fee'@ld ser'void/ n. Representative of a Field Service
organisation (see <field circus>).
<filk> /filk/ [from SF fandom, where a typo for "folk" was adopted
as a new word] n.,v. A "filk" is a popular or folk song with
lyrics revised or completely new lyrics, intended for humorous
effect when read and/or to be sung late at night at SF conventions.
There is a flourishing subgenre of these called "computer filks",
written by hackers and often containing technical humor of quite
sophisticated nature. See <double bucky> for an example.
<film at 11> [MIT, in parody of TV newscasters], interj. Used in
conversation to announce ordinary events, with a sarcastic
implication that these events are earth-shattering. "<ITS>
crashes; film at 11." "Bug found in scheduler; film at 11."
<filter> [orig. UNIX, now also in <MS-DOS>] n. A program which
processes an input text stream into an output text stream in some
well-defined way, and does no I/O to anywhere else except possibly
on error conditions; one designed to be used as a stage in a
<pipeline>.
<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>.
<finger> [SAIL's mutant TOPS-10, via BSD UNIX] 1. n. A program that
displays a particular user or all users logged on the system or a
remote system. Typically shows full name, last login time, idle
time, terminal line and terminal location. May also display a
"plan file" left by the user. 2. vt. To apply finger to a
username. 3. vt. By extension, to check a human's current state by
any means. "Foodp?" "T!" "OK, finger Lisa and see if she's
idle". 4. Any picture (composed of ASCII characters) depicting
"the finger". Originally a humorous component of one's "plan
file" to deter the curious fingerer (sense #2), it has entered the
arsenal of some <flamer>s.
<firebottle> n. A large, primitive, power-hungry active electrical
device, similar to an FET constructed out of glass, metal, and
vacuum. Characterized by high cost, low density, low reliability,
high-temperature operation, and high power dissipation. Sometimes
mistakenly called a "tube" in the U.S. or a "valve" in England.
<firefighting> n. The act of throwing lots of manpower and late nights
at a project to get it out before deadline. See also <gang bang>;
however, <firefighting> connotes that the effort is going into
chasing bugs rather than adding features.
<firewall machine> n. A dedicated gateway machine with special
security precautions on it, used to service outside
network/mail/news connections and/or accept remote logins for (read
only) shared-file-system access via FTP. The idea is to protect a
cluster of more loosely administered machines `hidden' behind it
from crackers. The typical `firewall' is an inexpensive
micro-based UNIX box kept clean of critical data, with a bunch of
modems and public network ports on it but just one carefully
watched connection back to the rest of the cluster. The special
precautions may include threat monitoring, callback, and even a
complete <iron box> keyable to particular incoming IDs or activity
patterns. Syn. <flytrap>, <venus flytrap>.
<fireworks mode> n. The mode a machine is sometimes said to be in when
it is performing a <crash and burn> operation.
<firmware> n. Software installed into a computer-based piece of
equipment on ROM. So-called because it's harder to change than
software but easier than hardware.
<fish> [Adelaide University, Australia] n. Another metasyntactic
variable. See <foo>. Derived originally from the Monty-Python
skit in the middle of "The Meaning of Life", entitled "Find the
fish".
<flag> n. A variable or quantity that can take on one of two values; a
bit, particularly one that is used to indicate one of two outcomes
or is used to control which of two things is to be done. Examples:
"This flag controls whether to clear the screen before printing
the message." "The program status word contains several flag
bits." See also <bit>, <hidden flag>.
<flag day> 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?"
This term has nothing to do with the use of the word <flag> to mean
a variable that has two values. It came into use when a massive
change was made to the <Multics> timesharing system to convert from
the old ASCII code to the new one; this was scheduled for Flag Day,
June 14, 1966.
<flaky> adj. (var sp. `flakey') Subject to frequent lossages. See
<lossage>. This use is of course related to the common slang use
of the word, to describe a person as eccentric or crazy. A system
that is flaky is working, sort of, enough that you are tempted to
try to use it, but it fails frequently enough that the odds in
favor of finishing what you start are low. Commonwealth hackish
prefers <dodgy>.
<flamage> /flay'm@j/ n. High-noise, low-signal postings to <USENET>
or other electronic fora. Often in the phrase "the usual
flamage".
<flame> 1. vi. To speak incessantly and/or rabidly on some relatively
uninteresting subject or with a patently ridiculous attitude. When
a discussion degenerates into useless controversy, one might tell
the participants, "Now you're just flaming" or "Stop all that
flamage!" to try to get them to cool down (so to speak). 2. To
post an email message intended to insult and provoke. <FLAME ON>:
vi. To continue to flame. See <rave>, <burble>. The punning
reference to Marvel comics's Human Torch has been lost as recent
usage completes the circle: "Flame on" now usually means
"beginning of flame".
A USENETter who was at WPI from 1972 to 1976 adds: I am 99% certain
that the use of "flame" originated at WPI. Those who made a
nuisance of themselves insisting that they needed to use a TTY for
"real work" came to be known as "flaming asshole lusers".
Other, particularly annoying people became "flaming asshole
ravers", which shortened to "flaming ravers", and ultimately
"flamers". I remember someone picking up on the Human Torch pun,
but I don't think "flame on/off" was ever much used at WPI. See
also <asbestos cork award>.
<flame bait> n. A posting intended to trigger a <flame war>, or one
which invites flames in reply.
<flame war> n. Acrimonious dispute, especially when conducted on a
public electronic forum such as <USENET>. Often merged to one
word, <flamewar>.
<flamer> n. One who habitually flames others. Said esp. of obnoxious
<USENET> personalities.
<flap> vt. 1. 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! 2.
By extension, to unload any magnetic tape. See <microtape>,
<macrotape>. Modern cartridge tapes no longer actually flap, but
the usage has remained.
<flat-ASCII> adj. Said of a text file wich contains only 7-bit ASCII
characters and uses only ASCII-standard control characters (that
is, has no embedded codes specific to a particular text formatter
or markup language, and no <META>-characters. Syn. <plain-ASCII>.
<flatten> v. To remove structural information, esp. to filter
something with an implicit tree structure into a simple sequence of
leaves. "This code flattens an expression with parentheses into
an equivalent <canonical> form."
<flavor> n. 1. Variety, type, kind. "DDT commands come in two
flavors." "These lights come in two flavors, big red ones and
small green ones." See <vanilla>. 2. The attribute that causes
something to be <flavorful>. Usually used in the phrase "yields
additional flavor." "This convention yields additional flavor by
allowing one to print text either right-side-up or upside-down."
See <vanilla>. This usage is almost certainly influenced by
accepted terminology in particle physics, in which quarks (the
constituents of e.g. protons) come in six flavors (up, down,
strange, charm, top, bottom) and three colors (red, blue, green)
--- however, its use at MIT almost certainly predated quark theory.
<flavorful> adj. Aesthetically pleasing. See <random> and <losing>
for antonyms. See also the entries for <taste> and <elegant>.
<flippy> /flip'ee/ n. A single-side floppy disk altered for
double-sided use by addition of a second write-notch, so called
because it must be flipped over for the second side to be
accessible. No longer common.
<flush> v. 1. To delete something, usually superfluous. "All that
nonsense has been flushed." Standard ITS terminology for aborting
an output operation (but note sense 4 below!); one speaks of the
text that would have been printed, but was not, as having been
flushed. Under ITS, if you asked to have a file printed on your
terminal, it was printed a page at a time; at the end of each page,
it asked whether you want to see more, and if you said no, it
replied "FLUSHED". (It is speculated that this term arose from a
vivid image of flushing unwanted characters by hosing down the
internal output buffer, washing the characters away before they can
be printed.) 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, or to ignore a
person. 4. [UNIX/C] To force buffered I/O to disk, as with an
`fflush(3)' call. This is *not* an abort as in sense 1 but a
demand for early completion! UNIX hackers find the ITS usage
confusing and vice versa.
<flytrap> n. See <firewall machine>.
<FOAF> [USENET] n. Written-only acronym for Friend Of A Friend. The
source of an unverified, possibly untrue story. This was not
originated by hackers (it is used in Jan Brundvent's books on urban
folklore) but is much better recognized on USENET and elsewhere
than in the mainstream.
<foo> /foo/ 1. interj. Term of disgust. 2. Name used for temporary
programs, or samples of three-letter names. Other similar words
are <bar>, <baz> (Stanford corruption of <bar>), and rarely RAG.
3. Used very generally as a sample name for absolutely anything.
4. First on the standard list of metasyntactic variables used in
syntax examples. See also: <bar>, <baz>, <qux>, <quux>, <QUUUX>,
<corge>, <grault>, <garply>, <waldo>, <fred>, <plugh>, <xyzzy>.
<moby foo>: See <moby>.
<foo> is the <canonical> example of a `metasyntactic variable'; a
name used in examples and understood to stand for whatever thing is
under discussion, or any random member of a class of things under
discussion. To avoid confusion, hackers never use `foo' or other
words like it as permanent names for anything.
The etymology of hackish "foo" is obscure. When used in
connection with "bar" it is generally traced to the WWII-era army
slang acronym FUBAR (Fucked Up Beyond All Recognition), later
expurgated to <foobar> and then truncated.
However, the use of the word "foo" itself has more complicated
antecedents, including a long history in comic strips and cartoons.
The old `Smokey Stover' comic strips by Bill Holman often
included the word "FOO", in particular on license plates of cars;
allegedly, "FOO" and "BAR" also occurred in Walt Kelly's
`Pogo' strips. In a 1938 cartoon Daffy Duck holds up a sign
saying "SILENCE IS FOO!". It is even possible that hacker usage
actually springs from the title `FOO, Lampoons and Parody' of
a comic book first issued 20 years later, in September 1958; the
byline read "C. Crumb" but this may well have been a sort-of
pseudonym for noted weird-comix artist Robert Crumb. The title FOO
was featured in large letters on the front cover.
Very probably hackish "foo" had no single origin and derives
through all these channels from Yiddish "feh", or English
"fooey!".
<foobar> n. Another common metasyntactic variable; see <foo>.
<fool> n. As used by hackers, specifically describes a person who
habitually reasons from obviously or demonstrably incorrect
premises and cannot be persuaded to do otherwise by evidence; it is
not generally used in its other senses, i.e. to describe a person
with a native incapacity to reason correctly, or a clown. Indeed,
in hackish experience many fools are capable of reasoning all too
effectively in executing their errors. See also <cretin>, <loser>.
<footprint> n. 1. The floor or desk area taken up by a piece of
hardware. 2. [IBM] The audit trail (if any) left by a crashed
program (often in plural, `footprints').
<for the rest of us> [Mac slogan] adj. Used to describe a <spiffy>
product whose affordability shames other comparable products, or
(more often) used sarcastically to describe <spiffy>, but very
overpriced products.
<foreground> [UNIX] adj.,vt. On a time-sharing system, a task
executing in foreground is one able to accept input from and return
output to the user; oppose <background>. Normally, there is only
one foreground task per terminal (or terminal window); having
multiple processes simultaneously reading the keyboard is a good
way to <lose>. By extension, "to foreground" a task is to bring
it to the top of one's <stack> for immediate processing, and in
this sense hackers often use it for non-computer tasks.
<forked> [UNIX] adj. Terminally slow, or dead. Originated when the
system slowed to incredibly bad speeds due to a process recursively
spawning copies of itself (using the Unix system call `fork(2)')
and taking up all the process table entries.
<fortune cookie> [UNIX] n. A random quote, item of trivia, joke or
maxim printed to the user's tty at login time or (less commonly) at
logout time. Items from this jargon file have often been used as
fortune cookies.
<fossil> n. 1. In software, a misfeature that becomes understandable
only in historical context, as a remnant of times past retained so
as not to break compatibility. Example: the retention of octal as
default base for string escapes in C in spite of the better match
of hexadecimal to modern byte-addressable architectures. See
<dusty deck>. 2. More restrictively, a feature with past but no
present utility. Example: the force-all-caps (LCASE) bits in the
V7 and <BSD UNIX> tty driver, designed for use with monocase
terminals. In a perversion of the usual backwards compatibility
goal, this functionality has actually been expanded and renamed in
some later <USG UNIX> releases as the IUCLC and OLCUC bits.
<fred> n. The personal name most frequently used as a metasyntactic
variable (see <foo>). Allegedly popular because it's easy to type
on a standard QWERTY keyboard. It is alternatively alleged to be
an acronym for "Flipping Ridiculous Electronic Device" (other
f-verbs may be substituted for "flipping")
<freeware> n. Free software, often written by enthusiasts and usually
distributed by electronic mail, local bulletin boards, <USENET>, or
other electronic media. See <shareware>.
<fried> adj. 1. Non-working due to hardware failure; burnt out.
Especially used of hardware brought down by a power glitch, short,
or other electrical event. (Sometimes this literally happens to
electronic circuits! In particular, resistors can burn out and
transformers can melt down, emitting terribly-smelling smoke.
However, this term is also used metaphorically.) 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> /frob/ 1. n. [MIT] The official Tech Model Railroad Club
definition was "FROB = protruding arm or trunnion", and by
metaphoric extension any somewhat small thing; an object that you
can comfortably hold in one hand; something you can frob. See
<frobnitz>. 2. v. Abbreviated form of <frobnicate>. 3. [from the
<MUD> world] To request <wizard> privileges on the `professional
courtesy' grounds that one one is a wizard elsewhere.
<frobnicate> /frob'ni-kayt/ vt. To manipulate or adjust, to tweak.
Thus: "Please frob the light switch." (That is, flip the light
switch.), but also "Stop frobbing that clasp; you'll break it."
Poss. derived from <frobnitz>. Usually abbreviated to <frob>, but
<frobnicate> is recognized as the official full form. Thus one has
the saying "to frob a frob". See <tweak> and <twiddle>. Usage:
<frob>, <twiddle>, and <tweak> sometimes connote 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 oscilloscope, then if he's carefully adjusting it he is
probably 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 frobbing it. The variant
"frobnosticate" has been recently reported.
<frobnitz> /frob'nits/, pl. <frobnitzem> (frob'nitsm) n. An unspecified
physical 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" and "frobule". Starting
perhaps in 1979, "frobozz" (fruh-bahz'), plural "frobbotzim"
(fruh-bot'z@m) has also become very popular, largely due to its
exposure as a name via <Zork>. These can also be applied to
nonphysical objects, such as data structures.
<frog> alt. `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 people, somewhere inbetween a
turkey and a toad. 4. <froggy>: adj. Similar to <bagbiting>, but
milder. "This froggy program is taking forever to run!"
<front end> n. 1. A subsidiary computer that doesn't do much. 2. What
you're talking to when you have a conversation with someone who is
making replies without paying attention. "Look at the dancing
elephants!" "Uh-huh" "Do you know what I just said?"
"Sorry, you were talking to the front end".
<frotz> /frotz/ 1. n. See <frobnitz>. 2. <mumble frotz>: An
interjection of very mild disgust.
<frotzed> /frotzt/ adj. <down> due to hardware problems.
<fry> 1. vi. To fail. Said especially of smoke-producing hardware
failures. More generally, to become non-working. Usage: never
said of software, only of hardware and humans. See <fried>, <magic
smoke>. 2. vt. To cause to fail; to <roach>, <toast> or <hose> a
piece of hardware (never used of software or humans).
<FTP> /ef-tee-pee/, *not* /fit'ip/ 1. n. The File Transfer
Protocol for transmitting files between systems on the Internet.
2. vt. To transfer a file using the File Transfer Protocol. 3.
Sometimes used as a generic even for file transfers not using
<FTP>. "Lemme get this copy of Wuthering Heights FTP'd from
uunet."
<fuck me harder> excl. Sometimes uttered in response to egregious
misbehavior, esp. in software, and esp. of those which seem
unfairly persistent (as though designed in by the imp of the
perverse). Often theatrically elaborated: "Aiighhh! Fuck me with
a piledriver and sixteen feet of curare-tipped wrought-iron fence
*and no lubricants!*" The phrase is sometimes heard
abbreviated FMH in polite company.
<FUD wars> /fud worz/ n. [from `Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt']
Political posturing engaged in by hardware and software vendors
ostensibly committed to standardization but actually willing to
fragment the market to protect their own share. The OSF vs. UNIX
International conflict, for example.
<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 hoc way
to produce the desired result. The terms "tolerance" and
"slop" are also used, though these usually 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. A good example is the <fuzz>
typically needed in floating-point calculations: two numbers being
compared for equality must be allowed to differ by a small amount;
if that amount is too small, a computation may never terminate,
while if it is too large, results will be needlessly inaccurate.
Fudge factors are frequently adjusted incorrectly by programmers
who don't fully understand their import.
<fuel up> vi. To eat or drink hurriedly in order to get back to
hacking. "Food-p?" "Yeah, let's fuel up." "Time for a
<great-wall>!". See also <ORIENTAL FOOD>.
<fuggly> /fuhg'lee/ adj. Emphatic form of <funky>; funky + ugly (or
possibly a contraction of "fuckin' ugly"). Unusually for hacker
slang, this may actually derive from black street-jive. To say it
properly, the first syllable should be growled rather than spoken.
Usage: humorous. "Man, the ASCII-to-EBCDIC code in that printer
driver is *fuggly*." See also <wonky>.
<funky> adj. Said of something which functions, but in a slightly
strange, klugey way. It does the job and would be difficult to
change, so its obvious non-optimality is left alone. Often used to
describe interfaces. The more bugs something has that nobody has
bothered to fix because workarounds are easier, the funkier it is.
<TECO> and UUCP are funky. The Intel i860's exception handling is
extraordinarily funky. Most standards acquire funkiness as they
age. "The new mailer is installed, but is still somewhat funky;
if it bounces your mail for no reason, try resubmitting it."
"This UART is pretty funky. The data ready line is active-high in
interrupt mode, and active-low in DMA mode." See <fuggly>.
<funny money> n. (also `play money') 1. Notional `dollar' units of
computing time and/or storage handed to students at the beginning
of a computer course by professors; also called "purple money"
(in implicit opposition to real or "green" money). When your
funny money ran out, your account froze and you needed to go to a
professor to get more. Formerly a common practice, this has now
been made sufficiently rare by the plunging cost of timesharing
cycles that it has become folklore. The amounts allocated were
almost invariably too small, even for the non-hackers who wanted to
slide by with minimum work. In extreme cases the practice led to
small-scale black markets in bootlegged computer accounts. 2. By
extension, phantom money or quantity tickets of any kind used as a
resource-allocation hack within a system.
<fuzz> n. In floating-point arithmetic, the maximum difference allowed
between two quantities for them to compare equal. Has to be set
properly relative to the FPU's precision limits. See <fudge
factor>.
<fuzzball> [TCP/IP hackers] n. A DEC LSI-11 running a particular suite
of homebrewed software by Dave Mills and assorted co-conspirators,
used in the early 80's for Internet protocol testbedding and
experimentation. These were used as NSFnet backbone sites in its
early 56KB-line days; a few of these are still active on the
Internet as of early 1990, doing odd jobs such as network time
service.
{= G =}
<gabriel> /gay'bree-@l/ [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 perpetrator of such tactics.
Also, "pulling a Gabriel", "Gabriel mode".
<gag> vi. Equivalent to <choke>, but connotes more disgust. "Hey,
this is Fortran code. No wonder the C compiler gagged." See also
<barf>.
<gang bang> n. The use of large numbers of loosely-coupled programmers
in an attempt to wedge a great many features into a product in a
short time. While there have been memorable gang bangs (ref: that
over-the-weekend assembler port mentioned in Steven Levy's
"Hackers"), most are perpetrated by large companies trying to
meet deadlines and produce enormous buggy masses of code entirely
lacking in orthogonality (see <orthogonal>). When market-driven
managers make a list of all the features the competition have and
assign one programmer to implement each, they often miss the
importance of maintaining strong invariants, like relational
integrity.
<garbage collect> vi., (also "garbage collection", n.) See <GC>.
<garply> /gar'plee/ n. [Stanford] Another meta-syntactic variable (see
<foo>) popular among SAIL hackers.
<gas> [as in "gas chamber"] interj. 1. A term of disgust and hatred,
implying that gas should be dispensed in generous 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. vt. <flush>.
"You should gas that old crufty software." 4. GASEOUS adj.
Deserving of being gassed. Usage: primarily used by Geoff
Goodfellow at SRI, but spreading; became particularly popular after
the Moscone/Milk murders in San Francisco, when it was learned that
Dan White (who supported Proposition 7) would get the gas chamber
under 7 if convicted. He was eventually found not guilty by reason
of insanity.
<GC> /jee-see/ [from LISP terminology; "Garbage Collect"] 1. vt. To
clean up and throw away useless things. "I think I'll <GC> the
top of my desk today." When said of files, this is equivalent to
<GFR>. 2. vt. To recycle, reclaim, or put to another use. 3. n.
An instantiation of the garbage collector process. `Garbage
collection' is computer science jargon for a particular class of
strategies for dynamically reallocating computer memory. One such
strategy involves periodically scanning all the data in memory and
determining what is no longer useful; useless data items are then
discarded so that the memory they occupy can be recycled and used
for another purpose. Implementations of the LISP language usually
use garbage collection. In slang, the full phrase is sometimes
heard but the acronym is more frequently used because it's shorter.
Note that there is an ambiguity in usage that has to be resolved by
context: "I'm going to garbage-collect my desk" usually means to
clean out the drawers, but it could also mean to throw away or
recycle the desk itself.
Warning: in X programming, a "GC" may be a graphics context. This
technical term has nothing to do with the jargon <GC>!
<GCOS> n. A quick and dirty <clone> of System/360 DOS that emerged
from GE about 1970; originally called GECOS (the General Electric
Comprehensive Operating System) and later kluged to support
primitive timesharing and transaction processing. After the buyout
of GE's computer division by Honeywell the name was changed to
General Comprehensive Operating System (GCOS). Other OS groups at
Honeywell began referring to it as `God's Chosen Operating System',
allegedly in reaction to the GCOS crowd's uninformed and snotty
attitude about the superiority of their product. All this might be
of zero interest, except for two facts: 1) the GCOS people won the
political war, resulting in the orphaning and eventual death of
Honeywell <Multics>, and 2) GECOS/GCOS left one permanent mark
on UNIX. Some early UNIX systems at Bell Labs were used as front
ends to GCOS machines; the field added to /etc/passwd to carry GCOS
ID information was called `the GECOS field' and survives today as
the pw_gecos member used for the user's full name and other
human-id information. GCOS itself played a major rule in keeping
Honeywell a dismal also-ran in the mainframe market, and was itself
ditched for UNIX in the late 1980s when Honeywell retired its aging
<big iron> designs.
<GECOS> n. See GCOS
<gedanken> /g@-dahn'kn/ adj. Wild-eyed; impractical; not
well-thought-out; untried; untested. "Gedanken" is a German word
for "thought". A thought experiment is one you carry out in your
head. In physics, the term "gedanken experiment" is used to
refer to an experiment that is impractical to carry out, but useful
to consider because you can reason about it theoretically. (A
classic gedanken experiment of relativity theory involves thinking
about a man flying through space in an elevator.) Gedanken
experiments are very useful in physics, but you have to be careful.
It was a gedanken experiment that led Aristotle to conclude that
heavy things always fall faster than light things (he thought about
a rock and a feather); this was accepted until Galileo proved
otherwise. Among hackers, however, the word has a pejorative
connotation. It is said of a project, especially one in artificial
intelligence research, which is written up in grand detail
(typically as a Ph.D. thesis) without ever being implemented to any
great extent. Such a project is 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 an
algorithm.
<geek out> vi. To temporarily enter techno-nerd mode while in a
non-hackish context, for example at parties held near computer
equipment. Especially used when you need to do something highly
technical and don't have time to explain: "Pardon me while I geek
out for a moment."
<gender mender> n. (also "gender bender" and "sex changer") A
cable connector shell with either two male or two female connectors
on it, used to correct the mismatches that result when some <loser>
didn't understand the RS232C specification and the distinction
between DTE and DCE. Used esp. for RS-232C parts in either the
original D-25 or the IBM PC's bogus D-9 format.
<General Public Virus> n. Pejorative name for some versions of the
<GNU> project <copyleft> or General Public License, which requires
that any tools or <app>s incorporating copylefted code must be
source-distributed on the same counter-commercial terms as GNU
stuff. Thus it is alleged that the copyleft `infects' software
generated with GNU tools, which may in turn infect other software
that reuses any of its code. FSF's official position as of January
1991 is that only "programs textually incorporating significant
amounts of GNU code" fall under the GPL and that the infection is
not passed on to third parties unless actual GNU source is
transmitted (as in, for example, use of the Bison parser skeleton).
Nevertheless, widespread suspicion that the <copyleft> language is
`boobytrapped' has caused many developers to avoid using GNU tools
and the <GPL> license.
<generate> vt. To produce something according to an algorithm or
program or set of rules, or as a (possibly unintended) side effect
of the execution of an algorithm or program. The opposite of
<parse>. This term retains its mechanistic connotations (though
often humorously) when used of human behavior. "The guy is
rational most of the time, but mention nuclear energy around him
and he'll generate <infinite> flamage."
<Get a life!> imp. Hacker-standard way of suggesting that the person
to whom you are speaking has succumbed to terminal geekdom (see
<computer geek>). Often heard on <USENET>. This exhortation was
originally uttered by William Shatner on a Saturday Night Live
episode in a speech which ended "Get a *life*!".
<Get a real computer!> imp. Typical hacker response to news that
somebody is having trouble getting work done on a system that is a)
single-tasking, b) has no Winchester, or c) has an address space
smaller than 4 megabytes. This is as of 1990; note that the
threshold for `real computer' rises with time, and it may well be
(for example) that machines with character-only displays will be
considered `unreal' in a few years. See <bitty box> and <toy>.
<GFR> /jee eff ar/ vt. [acronym, ITS] From "Grim File Reaper", an
ITS utility. To remove a file or files according to some
program-automated or semi-automatic manual procedure, especially
one designed to reclaim mass storage space or reduce namespace
clutter. Often generalized to pieces of data below file level.
"I used to have his phone number but I guess I <GFR>ed it." See
also <prowler>, <reaper>.
<gig> /jig/, rarely /gig/ n. Short for "gigabyte" (1024 megabytes);
esp. used in describing amounts of <core> or mass storage. "My
machine just got upgraded to a quarter-gig". See also <kilo>.
<giga-> /ji'ga/ pref. See <kilo>.
<GIGO> /gie'goh/ [acronym] 1. Garbage In, Garbage out -- Usually said
in response to lusers who complain that a program didn't complain
about faulty data. Also commonly used to describe failures in
human decision making due to faulty, incomplete or imprecise data.
2. Garbage In, Gospel Out -- this more recent expansion is a
sardonic comment on the tendency human beings have to put excessive
trust in "computerized" data.
<gillion> /jill'yun/ n. 10^9. [From giga, following construction of
mega/million and notional tera/trillion] Same as an American
billion or a British `milliard'.
<glark> /glark/ vt. To figure something out from context. "The System
III manuals are pretty poor, but you can generally glark the
meaning from context". Interestingly, the original sentence was
"This gubblick contains many nonsklarkish English flutzpahs, but
the overall pluggandisp can be glorked [sic] from context." by
David Moser, quoted by Douglas Hofstadter in his `Metamagical
Themas' column in the January 1981 Scientific American. It is
conjectured that hackish usage mutated the verb to `glark' because
<glork> was already an established jargon term.
<glass> [IBM] n. Synonym for <silicon>.
<glass tty> /glas tee-tee-wie/ or /glas ti-tee/ n. A terminal which
has a display screen but which, because of hardware or software
limitations, behaves like a teletype or other printing terminal ,
thereby combining the disadvantages of both: like a printing
terminal, it can't do fancy display hacks, and like a display
terminal, it doesn't produce hard copy An example is Lear-Siegler
the ADM-3 (without cursor control). See <tube>, <tty>. See
Appendix A for an interesting true story about glass TTYs.
<glitch> /glich/ [from German "glitchen" to slip, via Yiddish
"glitshen", to slide or skid] 1. n. A sudden interruption in
electric service, sanity,, continuity, or program function.
Sometimes recoverable. An interruption in electric service is
specifically called a "power glitch". This is of grave concern
because it usually crashes all the computers. More common in
slang, though, a hacker who got to the middle of a sentence and
then forgotten how he or she intended to complete it might say,
"Sorry, I just glitched". 2. vi. To commit a glitch. See
<gritch>. 3. vt. [Stanford] To scroll a display screen several
lines at a time. This derives from some oddities in the terminal
behavior under the mutant TOPS-10 formerly used at SAIL. 4. (obs.)
Same as <magic cookie>, sense #2.
<glob> /glob/, *not* /glohb/ [UNIX, from "glob", the name of a
subprogram that translated wildcards in archaic Bourne Shell
versions] v. To expand special characters in a wildcarded name (the
action is "globbing"). The UNIX conventions for filename
wildcarding have become sufficiently pervasive that many hackers
use some of them in written English, especially in email or news on
technical topics. Those commonly encountered include:
* wildcard for any string (see UN*X).
? wildcard for any character (generally only read this way
at the beginning or in the middle of a word).
[] wildcard matching one character from a specified set.
{} alternation of comma-separated alternatives. Thus,
`{foo,bar}baz' would be read as `foobar' or `foobaz'.
Some examples: "He said his name was [KC]arl" (expresses
ambiguity). "That got posted to talk.politics.*" (all the
talk.politics subgroups on <USENET>). Other examples are given
under the entry for `X'. <glob> as a noun refers to the act of
expanding a string using these conventions. It is also used as a
verb.
<glork> /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. vt. Similar to
<glitch>, but usually used reflexively. "My program just glorked
itself."
<gnarly> adj. Both <obscure> and <hairy> in the sense of complex.
"Yeech --- the tuned assembler implementation of BitBlt is really
gnarly!" From a similar but less specific usage in surfer slang.
<GNU> /gnoo/, *not* /noo/ 1. [acronym for "GNU's Not UNIX!"] A
UNIX-workalike development effort of the Free Software Foundation
headed by Richard Stallman (rms@prep.ai.mit.edu). GNU EMACS and
the GNU C compiler, two tools designed for this project, have
become very popular in hackerdom. See <EMACS>, <copyleft>,
<General Public Virus>. 2. Noted UNIX hacker John Gilmore
(gnu@hoptoad.com), ironically enough one of the best-known and
most vocal opponents of the "information should not be property"
philosophy behind GNU (sense #1).
<GNUMACS> /gnoo'maks/ [contraction of "Gnu Emacs"] Often-heard
abbreviated name for the <GNU> project's flagship tool, <EMACS>.
Used esp. in contrast with <GOSMACS>.
<go flatline> [from cyberpunk SF, refers to flattening of EEG traces
upon brain-death] vi., also adjectival <flatlined>. 1. To die,
terminate, or fail, esp. irreversibly. In hacker parlance this is
used of machines only, human death being considered somewhat too
serious a matter to employ jargon-jokes about. 2. To go completely
quiescent; said of machines undergoing controlled shutdown. "You
can suffer file damage if you shut down UNIX but power off before
the system has gone flatline." 3. A particular failure mode of
video tubes in which vertical scan is lost, so all one sees is a
bright horizontal line bisecting the screen.
<gobble> vt. To consume or to obtain. The phrase <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 documentation tomorrow."
See also <snarf>.
<gonk> /gonk/ vt.,n. 1. To prevaricate or to embellish the truth
beyond any reasonable recognition. In German the term is
(fictively) "gonken", in spanish the verb becomes "gonkar".
"You're gonking me. That story you just told me is a bunch of
gonk." In German, "Du Gonkst mir" (You're pulling my leg).
See also <gonkulator>. 2. [British] To grab some sleep at an odd
time.
<gonkulator> /gon'kyoo-lay-tr/ [from the old "Hogan's Heroes" TV
series] n. A pretentious piece of equipment that actually serves no
useful purpose. Usually used to describe one's least favorite
piece of computer hardware. See <gonk>.
<gonzo> /gon'zo/ [from Hunter S. Thompson] adj. Overwhelming;
outrageous; over the top; very large, esp. used of collections of
source code, source files or individual functions. Has some of the
connotations of <moby> and <hairy>, q.v.
<Good Thing> adj. Often capitalized; always pronounced as if
capitalized. 1. Self-evidently wonderful to anyone in a position
to notice: "The Trailblazer's 19.2Kbaud PEP mode with on-the-fly
Lempel-Ziv compression is a Good Thing for sites relaying
netnews." 2. Something which can't possibly have any ill side
effects and may save considerable grief later: "Removing the
self-modifying code from that shared library would be a Good
Thing." 3. When said of software tools or libraries, as in "YACC
is a Good Thing", specifically connotes that the thing has
drastically reduced a programmer's work load. Oppose <Bad Thing>.
<gorilla arm> n. The side-effect that destroyed touch-screens as a
mainstream input technology despite a promising start in the early
eighties. It seems the designers of all those <spiffy> touch-menu
systems failed to notice that humans aren't designed to hold their
arms in front of their faces making small motions. After more than
a very few selects the arm begins to feel sore, cramped, and
oversized, hence "gorilla arm". This is now considered a classic
Horrible Example and cautionary tale to human-factors designers;
"remember the gorilla arm" is shorthand for "how's this gonna
fly in *real* use?"
<gorp> /gorp/ [CMU, perhaps from a brand of dried hiker's food?]
Another metasyntactic variable, like <foo> and <bar>.
<GOSMACS> /goz'maks/ [contraction of "Gosling Emacs"] n. The first
<EMACS>-in-C implementation, predating but now largely eclipsed by
<GNUMACS>. Originally freeware; a commercial version is now
modestly popular as "UniPress Emacs".
<Gosperism> /goss'p@r'iz'm/ A hack, invention, or saying by
arch-hacker R. William (Bill) Gosper. This notion merits its own
term because there are so many of them. Many of the entries in
<HAKMEM> are Gosperisms; see also <life>.
<grault> /grawlt/ n. Yet another meta-syntactic variable, invented by
Mike Gallaher and propagated by the <GOSMACS> documentation. See
<corge>.
<gray goo> n. A hypothetical substance composed of <sagans> of
sub-micron-sized Von Neumann machines (self-replicating robots)
programmed to make copies of themselves out of whatever is
available. The image that goes with the term is one of the entire
biosphere of Earth being eventually converted to robot goo. This
is the simplest of the <nanotechnology> disaster scenarios and is
easily refuted by arguments from energy requirements and elemental
abundances.
<Great Renaming> n. The <flag day> on which all of the groups on the
<USENET> had their names changed from the net.* format to the
current multiple-hierarchies scheme.
<great-wall> [from SF fandom] vi.,n. A mass expedition to an oriental
restaurant, esp. one where food is seved family-style and shared.
There is a common heuristic about the amount of food to order
expressed as "For N people, get N - 1 entrees.". See <ORIENTAL
FOOD>, <ravs>, <stir-fried random>.
<Green Book> n. 1. One of the three standard PostScript references
(`PostScript Language Program Design', Adobe Systems,
Addison-Wesley 1988 QA76.73.P67P66 ISBN 0-201-14396-8); see also
<Red Book>, <Blue Book>). 2. `Smalltalk-80: Bits of History,
Words of Advice', Glenn Krasner, Addison-Wesley 1983,
QA76.8.S635S58, ISBN 0-201-11669-3 (this is also associated with
blue and red books). 3. The `X/Open Compatibility Guide'. Defines
an international standard <UNIX> environment that is a proper
superset of POSIX/SVID; also includes descriptions of a standard
utility toolkit, systems administrations features, and the like.
This grimoire is taken with particular seriousness in Europe. See
<Purple Book>. 4. The IEEE 1003.1 POSIX Operating Systems
Interface standard has been dubbed "The Ugly Green Book". 5. Any
of the 1992 standards which will be issued by the CCIT 10th plenary
assembly. Until now, hese have changed color each review cycle
(1984 was <Red Book>, 1988 <Blue Book>); however, it is rumored
that this convention is going to be dropped befor 1992. These
include, among other things, the X.400 email spec and the Group 1
through 4 fax standards. See also <Blue Book>, <Red Book>, <Green
Book>, <Silver Book>, <Purple Book>, <Orange Book>, <White Book>,
<Dragon Book>, <Pink-Shirt Book>.
<green bytes> n. 1. Meta-information imbedded in a file such as the
length of the file or its name; as opposed to keeping such
information in a separate description file or record. Name comes
from an IBM user's group meeting where these two approaches were
being debated and the diagram of the file on the blackboard had the
"green bytes" drawn in green. 2. By extension, the
non-data bits in any self-describing format. "A GIF file
contains, among other things, green bytes describing the packing
method for the image."
<green lightning> [IBM] n. Apparently random flashing streaks on the
face of 3278-9 terminals while a programmable symbol set is being
loaded. This hardware bug was left deliberately unfixed, as some
bright spark suggested that this would let the user know that
`something is happening'. It certainly does. 2. [proposed] Any bug
perverted into an alleged feature by adroit rationalization or
marketing. E.g. "Motorola calls the CISC cruft in the 8800
architecture `compatibility logic', but I call it green
lightning".
<GREP> /grep/ [from the qed/ed editor idiom g/re/p (Global search for
Regular Expression and Print) via <UNIX> `grep(1)'] vt. To rapidly
scan a file or file set looking for a particular string or pattern.
By extension, to look for something by pattern. "Grep the bulletin
board for the system backup schedule, would you?"
<grind> vt. 1. [MIT and Berkeley] To format code, especially LISP
code, by indenting lines so that it looks pretty. This usage was
associated with the MACLISP community and is now rare;
<prettyprint> was and is the generic term for such operations. 2.
[UNIX] To generate the formatted version of a document from the
nroff, troff, TeX or Scribe source. 3. To run seemingly
interminably, performing some tedious and inherently useless task.
Similar to <crunch>, <grovel>. 3. <grind grind> excl. Roughly,
"Isn't the machine slow today!"
<grind crank> n. A mythical accessory to a terminal. A crank on the
side of a monitor, which when operated makes a zizzing noise and
causes the computer to run faster. Usually one does not refer to a
grind crank out loud, but merely makes the appropriate gesture and
noise. See <grind>, and <wugga wugga>.
Historical note: At least one real machine actually had a grind
crank --- the R1, a research machine built towards the the end of
the days of the great vacuum tube computers in 1959. R1 (also
known as "The Rice Institute Computer" - TRIC, and later as "The
Rice University Computer" - TRUC) had a single step/free run
switch for use when debugging programs. Since single stepping
through a large program was rather tedious, there was also a crank
with a cam and gear arrangement that repeatedly pushed the single
step button. This allowed one to "crank" through a lot of code,
then slow down to single step a bit when you got near the code of
interest, poke at some registers using the "console typewriter",
and then keep on cranking.
<gritch> /grich/ 1. n. A complaint (often caused by a <glitch>). 2.
vi. To complain. Often verb-doubled: "Gritch gritch". 3. A
synonym for <glitch> (as verb or noun).
<grok> /grok/ [from the novel "Stranger in a Strange Land", by
Robert Heinlein, where it is a Martian verb meaning literally "to
drink" and metaphorically "to be one with"] vt. 1. To
understand, usually in a global sense. Connotes intimate and
exhaustive knowledge. Contrast <zen>, similar supernal
understanding as a single brief flash. 2. Used of programs, may
connote merely sufficient understanding, e.g., "Almost all C
compilers grok void these days."
<gronk> /gronk/ [popularized by the cartoon strip "B.C." by Johnny
Hart, but the word apparently predates that] vt. 1. To clear the
state of a wedged device and restart it. More severe than "to
<frob>". 2. To break. "The teletype scanner was gronked,
so we took the system down." 3. <gronked>: adj. Of people, the
condition of feeling very tired or sick. Oppose <broken>, which
means about the same as <gronk> used of hardware but connotes
depression or mental/emotional problems in people. 4. <gronk out>:
vi. To cease functioning. Of people, to go home and go to sleep.
"I guess I'll gronk out now; see you all tomorrow."
<grovel> vi. 1. To work interminably and without apparent progress.
Often used transitively with "over" or "through". "The file
scavenger has been grovelling through the file directories for ten
minutes now." Compare <grind> and <crunch>. Emphatic form:
<grovel obscenely>. 2. To examine minutely or in complete detail.
"The compiler grovels over the entire source program before
beginning to translate it." "I grovelled through all the
documentation, but I still couldn't find the command I wanted."
<grunge> [Cambridge] n. Code which is `dead' (can never be accessed)
due to changes in other parts of the program. The preferred term
in North America is <dead code>,
<grungy> /gruhn'jee/ adj. Incredibly dirty, greasy, or grubby.
Anything which has been washed within the last year is not really
grungy. Also used metaphorically; hence some programs (especially
crocks) can be described as grungy. Now (1990) also common in
mainstream slang.
<gubbish> /guh'bish/ [a portmanteau of "garbage" and "rubbish"?]
n. Garbage; crap; nonsense. "What is all this gubbish?" The
opposite portmanteau "rubbage" is also reported.
<guiltware> n. <freeware> decorated with a message telling one how
long and hard the author worked on this program and intimating that
one is a no-good freeloader if one does not immediately send the
poor suffering martyr gobs of money.
<gumby> /guhm'bee/ [from a class of Monty Python characters, poss.
themselves named after a '60s claymation character] n. An act of
minor but conspicuous stupidity, often in <gumy maneuver> or <pull
a gumby>.
<gun> [from the :GUN command on ITS] vt. 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." Compare <can>.
<gurfle> /ger'fl/ interj. An expression of shocked disbelief. "He
said we have to recode this thing in FORTRAN by next week.
Gurfle!" Compare <weeble>.
<guru> n. 1. [UNIX] An expert. Implies not only <wizard> skill but a
history of being a knowledge resource for others. Less often, used
(with a qualifier) for other experts on other systems, as in "VMS
guru". 2. Amiga equivalent of "panic" in UNIX. When the system
crashes a cryptic message "GURU MEDITATION #XXXXXXXX.YYYYYYYY"
appears, indicating what the problem was. An Amiga guru can figure
things out from the numbers. Generally a <guru> event must be
followed by a <vulcan nerve pinch>.
{= H =}
<h infix> [from SF fandom] A method of "marking" common words in the
linguist's sense, i.e. calling attention to the fact that they are
being used in a nonstandard, ironic or humorous way. Orig. in the
fannish catchphrase "Bheer is the One True Ghod" from decades
ago. H-infix marking of "Ghod" and other words spread into the
Sixties counterculture via underground comix, and into early
hackerdom either from the counterculture or SF fandom (all three
overlapped heavily at the time). More recently, the h infix has
become an expected feature of benchmark names, i.e. Whetstone,
Dhrystone, Rhealstone, etc; this is prob. patterning on the
original Whetstone name but influenced by the
fannish/counterculture H infix.
<ha ha only serious> [from SF fandom, orig. as mutation of HHOK, "Ha
Ha Only Kidding"] A phrase that aptly captures the flavor of much
hacker discourse (often seen abbreviated as HHOS). Applied
especially to parodies, absurdities and ironic jokes that are both
intended and perceived to contain a possibly disquieting amount of
truth, or truths which are constructed on in-joke and self-parody.
The jargon file contains many examples of ha-ha-only-serious in
both form and content. Indeed, the entirety of hacker culture is
often perceived as ha-ha-only-serious by hackers themselves; to
take it either too lightly or too seriously marks a person as an
outsider or one in <larval stage>. For further enlightenment on
this subject, consult any Zen master. See also <HUMOR, HACKER> and
<AI koans>.
<hack> 1. n. Originally a quick job that produces what is needed, but
not well. 2. n. An incredibly good, and perhaps very
time-consuming, piece of work that produces exactly what is needed.
3. The result of a hack (sense 1 or 2); 3. <neat hack>: A clever
technique. Also, a brilliant practical joke, where neatness is
correlated with cleverness, harmlessness, and surprise value.
Example: the Caltech Rose Bowl card display switch circa 1961. 4.
<real hack>: A crock (occasionally affectionate). vt. 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 major interest (or
project)". "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>). "Watcha up to?" "Oh, just hacking."
10. <hack up>, <hack on>: To hack, but generally implies that the
result is meanings 1-2. 11. [UNIX] A dungeon game similar to
<rogue> but more elaborate, distributed in C source over <USENET>
and very popular at UNIX sites and on PC-class machines. Recent
versions are called `nethack'. 12. Short for <hacker>, which see.
Constructions on this term abound. They include: <happy hacking>: A
farewell. <how's hacking?>: A friendly greeting among hackers.
<hack hack>: A somewhat pointless but friendly comment, often used
as a temporary farewell. For more on the meaning of <hack> see
Appendix A.
<hack attack> [poss by analogy with "Big Mac Attack"] n. Nearly
synonymous with <hacking run> though the latter implies an
all-nighter more strongly.
<hack value> n. Often adduced 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
features for reading and printing roman numerals, which was
installed purely for hack value. As a musician once said of jazz,
if you don't understand hack value there is no way it can be
explained.
<hacker> [originally, someone who makes furniture with an axe] n. 1. A
person who enjoys learning the details of programming systems and
how to stretch their capabilities, as opposed to most users who
prefer to learn only the minimum necessary. 2. One who programs
enthusiastically (even obsessively), or who enjoys programming
rather than just theorizing about programming. 3. A person capable
of appreciating <hack value>. 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 UNIX hacker". (Definitions 1
to 5 are correlated, and people who fit them congregate.) 6. An
expert of any kind. One might be an astronomy hacker, for example.
7. (deprecated) A malicious or inquisitive meddler who tries to
discover information by poking around. Hence "password hacker",
"network hacker". See <cracker>.
<hack mode> n. 1. What one is in when hacking, of course. 2. More
specifically, a Zen-like state of total focus on The Problem which
may be achieved when one is hacking. Ability to enter such
concentration at will correlates strongly with wizardliness; it is
one of the most important skills learned during <larval stage>.
Sometimes amplified as "deep hack mode". Being yanked out of hack
mode (see <priority interrupt>) may be experienced as an almost
physical shock, and the sensation of being in it is more than a
little habituating. The intensity of this experience is probably
by itself sufficient explanation for the existence of hackers, and
explains why many resist being promoted out of positions where they
can do code.
<hacking run> [analogy with "bombing run" or "speed run"] n. A
hack session extended long outside normal working times, especially
one longer than 12 hours. May cause you to "change phase the hard
way" (see <phase>).
<hackish> /hak'ish/ adj. (also <hackishness> n.) 1. Being or involving
a hack. 2. Of or pertaining to hackers or the hacker subculture.
See also <true-hacker>. It is better to be described as hackish by
others than to describe oneself that way. Hackers consider
themselves somewhat of an elite, though one to which new members
are gladly welcome. It is a meritocracy based on ability. There
is a certain self-satisfaction in identifying yourself as a hacker
(but if you claim to be one and are not, you'll quickly be labelled
<bogus>).
<hackishness, hackitude> n. The quality of being or involving a hack.
(The word <hackitude> is considered silly; the standard term is
<hackishness>.)
<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.
Also in <hairiferous> (tending to promote hair growth): "GNU elisp
encourages lusers to write complex editing modes." "Yeah, it's
pretty hairiferous all right." (or just: "Hair squared!")
<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> /hak'mem/ n. MIT AI Memo 239 (February 1972). A legendary
collection of neat mathematical and programming hacks contributed
by many people at MIT and elsewhere. (The title of the memo really
is "HAKMEM", which is an acronym of sorts for "hacks memo".)
Some of them are very useful techniques or powerful theorems, but
most fall into the category of mathematical and computer trivia. A
sampling of the entries (with authors), slightly paraphrased:
Item 41 (Gene Salamin) There are exactly 23,000 prime numbers less
than 2 to the 18th power.
Item 46 (Rich Schroeppel) The most *probable* suit
distribution in bridge hands is 4-4-3-2, as compared to 4-3-3-3,
which is the most *evenly* distributed. This is because the
world likes to have unequal numbers: a thermodynamic effect saying
things will not be in the state of lowest energy, but in the state
of lowest disordered energy.
Problem 81 (Rich Schroeppel) Count the magic squares of order 5
(that is, all the 5-by-5 arrangements of the numbers from 1 to 25
such that all rows, columns, and diagonals add up to the same
number). There are about 320 million, not counting those that
differ only by rotation and reflection.
Item 174 (Bill Gosper and Stuart Nelson) 21963283741 is the only
number such that if you represent it on the <PDP-10> as both an
integer and a floating-point number, the bit patterns of the two
representations are identical.
HAKMEM also contains some rather more complicated mathematical and
technical items, but these examples show some of its fun flavor.
<hakspek> /hak'speek/ n. Generally used term to describe a method of
spelling to be found on many British academic bulletin boards and
talker systems. Syllables and whole words in a sentence are
replaced by single ASCII characters which are phonetically similar
or equivalent, whilst multiple letters are usually dropped. Hence
`for' becomes `4', `two', `too' and `to' become `2', `ck' becomes
`k'. "Before I see you tomorrow" becomes "b4 i c u 2moro".
First appeared in London about 1986, and was probably caused by the
slow speed of available talker systems, which operated on archaic
machines with outdated operating systems, and no standard methods
of commuinication. Has become rarer nowadays. See also <talk
mode>.
<hamster> n. A particularly slick little piece of code that does one
thing well; a small, self-contained hack. The image is of a
hamster happily spinning its exercise wheel.
<hand-hacking> n. 1. The practice of translating <hot spot>s from an
<HLL> into custom hand-optimized assembler, as opposed to trying to
coerce the compiler into generating better code. Both the term and
the practice are becoming uncommon. See <tune>, <bum>; syn. with
v. <cruft>. 2. More generally, manual construction or patching of
data sets that would normally be ground out by a translation
utility and interpreted by another program, and aren't really
designed to be read or modified by humans.
<handwave> 1. v. To gloss over a complex point; to distract a
listener; to support a (possibly actually valid) point with
blatantly faulty logic. If someone starts a sentence with
"Clearly..." or "Obviously..." or "It is self-evident
that...", you can be sure he is about to handwave. The theory
behind this term is that if you wave your hands at the right
moment, the listener may be sufficiently distracted to not notice
that what you have said is <bogus>. Alternatively, if a listener
does object, you might try to dismiss the objection with a wave of
your hand. 2. n. The act of handwaving. "Boy, what a handwave!"
The use of this word is often accompanied by gestures: both hands
up, palms forward, 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; if a speaker makes an
outrageous unsupported assumption, you might simply wave your hands
in this way, as an accusation more eloquent than words could
express that his logic is faulty.
<hang> v. 1. To wait for some event to occur; to hang around until
something happens. "The program displays a menu and then hangs
until you type a character." 2. More commonly, to wait for an
event that will never occur. "The system is hanging because it
can't read from the crashed drive". See <wedged>, <hung>.
<Hanlon's Razor> n. A "murphyism" parallel to Occam's Razor that
reads "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately
explained by stupidity". The derivation of the common title
Hanlon's Razor is unknown; a similar epigram has been attributed to
William James. Quoted here because it seems to be a particular
favorite of hackers, often showing up in <fortune cookie> files and
the login banners of BBS systems and commercial networks. This
probably reflects the hacker's daily experience of environments
created by the well-intentioned but shortsighted.
<hardwarily> /hard-weir'i-lee/ adv. In a way pertaining to hardware.
"The system is hardwarily unreliable." The adjective
"hardwary" is *not* used. See <softwarily>.
<hardwired> adj. 1. Insertion of data directly into a program, where
it cannot be easily modified, as opposed to making provision for a
<user> or hacker to modify the values easily. 2. In C, this is
esp. applied to use of a literal instead of a preprocessor #define
(see also <magic number>). 2. By extension, anything that is not
modifiable, especially in the sense of customizable to one's
particular needs or tastes.
<has the x nature> [seems to derive from Zen Buddhist koans of the
form "Does an X have the Buddha-nature?"] adj. Common hacker
construction for `is an X', used for humorous emphasis. "Anyone
who can't even use a program with on-screen help embedded in it
truly has the <loser> nature!"
<hash collision> [from the technical usage] n. When used of people,
signifies a confusion in associative memory or imagination,
especially a persistent one (see <thinko>). True story: one of us
[ESR] was once on the phone with a friend about to move out to
Berkeley. When asked what he expected Berkeley to be like, the
friend replied "Well, I have this mental picture of naked women
throwing Molotov cocktails, but I think that's just a collision in
my hash tables." The variant "hash clash" is also reported.
<HCF> /aych-see-eff/ n. Mnemonic for "Halt and Catch Fire", any of
several undocumented and semi-mythical machine instructions with
destructive side-effects, supposedly included for test purposes on
several well-known architectures going as far back as the IBM 360.
The MC6800 microprocessor was the first for which the HCF opcode
became widely known. This instruction caused the processor to
toggle a subset of the bus lines as rapidly as it can; in some
configurations this can actually cause lines to burn up.
<heads down> [Sun] adj. Concentrating, usually so heavily and for so
long that everything outside the focus area is missed. See also
<larval stage>, although it's not confined to fledgeling hackers.
<heartbeat> n. 1. The master clock signal propagated across an
Ethernet; by extension, the time-baseline synchronization signal at
the physical level of any network. 2. The `natural' oscillation
frequency of a computer's clock crystal, before frequency division
down to the machine's clock rate. 3. A signal emitted at regular
intervals by software to demonstrate that it's still alive. Oppose
<ping>.
<heavy metal> [Cambridge] n. Syn. <big iron>.
<heavy wizardry> n. Code or designs which trade on a particularly
intimate knowledge or experience of a particular operating system
or language or complex application interface. Distinguished from
<deep magic>, which trades more on arcane *theoretical*
knowledge. Writing device drivers is heavy wizardry; so is
interfacing to X (sense #2) without a toolkit. Esp. found in
comments of the form "Heavy wizardry begins here...". Compare
<voodoo programming>.
<heisenbug> /hie'sen-buhg/ [from Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle in
quantum physics] n. A bug which disappears or alters its behavior
when one attempts to probe or isolate it. Antonym of <Bohr bug>.
In C, 9 out of 10 heisenbugs result from either <fandango on core>
phenomena (esp. lossage related to corruption of the malloc
<arena>) or errors which <smash the stack>.
<Helen Keller mode> n. State of a hardware or software system which is
deaf, dumb, and blind, i.e. accepting no input and generating no
output, usually due to an infinite loop or some other excursion
into <deep space>. (Unfair to the real Helen Keller, whose success
at learning speech was triumphant.) See also <go flatline>.
<hello sailor>! interj. Occasional West Coast equivalent of <hello,
world!>; seems to have originated at SAIL, later associated with
the game <Zork> (which also included "hello aviator" and "hello
implementor").
<hello wall!> excl. See <wall>.
<hello world!> interj. 1. The canonical minimal test message in the
C/UNIX universe. In folklore, the first program a C coder is
supposed to write in a new environment is one that just prints
"hello, world!" to standard output. Environments that generate
an unreasonably large executable for this trivial test or which
require a <hairy> compiler-linker invocation to generate it are
considered to <lose>. 2. Greeting uttered by a hacker making an
entrance or requesting information from anyone present. "Hello,
world! Is the <VAX> back up yet?"
<hidden flag> [scientific computation] n. A extra option added to a
routine without changing the calling sequence. For example,
instead of adding an explicit input variable to instruct a routine
to give extra diagnostic output, the programmer might just add a
test for some otherwise meaningless feature of the existing inputs,
such as a negative mass. Liberal use of hidden flags can make a
program very hard to debug and understand.
<high bit> n. 1. See <meta bit>. Also meaning most significant part of
something other than a data byte, e.g. "Spare me the whole saga,
just give me the high bit."
<high moby> /hie mohb'ee/ n. The high half of a stock <PDP-10>'s
address space; the other half was of course the low moby. This
usage has been generalized in a way that has outlasted the
<PDP-10>; for example, at the 1990 Washington D.C Area Science
Fiction Conclave (DISCLAVE) when a miscommunication resulted in two
separate wakes being held in commemoration of the shutdown of MIT's
last <ITS> machines, the one on the upper floor was dubbed the high
moby and the other the low moby. All parties involved grokked this
instantly. See <moby>.
<highly> [scientific computation] adv. The preferred modifier for
overstating an understatement. As in: <highly nonoptimal>, the
worst possible way to do something; <highly nontrivial>, either
impossible or requiring a major research project; <highly
nonlinear>, completely erratic and unpredictable; <highly
nontechnical>, drivel written for <luser>s, oversimplified to the
point of being misleading or incorrect (compare <drool-proof
paper>). In other computing cultures, postfixing of <in the
extreme> might be preferred.
<hirsute> adj. Occasionally used humorously as a synonym for <hairy>.
<HLL> /aych-el-el/ n. [High-Level Language (as opposed to assembler)]
Found primarily in email and news rather than speech. Rarely, the
variants `VHLL' and `MLL' are found. VHLL = `Very-High-Level
Language' and is used to describe a <BONDAGE-AND-DISCIPLINE
LANGUAGE> that the speaker happens to like; Prolog and Backus's FP
are often called VHLLs. `MLL' = `Medium-Level Language' and is
sometimes used half-jokingly to describe C, alluding to its
`structured-assembler' image. See also <languages of choice>.
<hog> n.,vt. Favored term to describe programs or hardware which seem
to eat far more than their share of a system's resources, esp.
those which noticeably degrade general timesharing response.
*Not* used of programs which are simply extremely large or
complex or which are merely painfully slow themselves (see <pig,
run like a>). More often than not encountered in qualified forms,
e.g. "memory hog", "core hog", "hog the processor", "hog the
disk". Example: "A controller that never gives up the I/O bus
gets killed after the bus hog timer expires."
<holy wars> [from <USENET>, but may predate it] n. <flame war>s over
<religious issues>. The 1980 paper by Danny Cohen that popularized
the terms <big-endian> and <little-endian> in connection with the
LSB-first/MSB-first controversy was entitled `On Holy Wars and
a Plea for Peace'. Other perennial Holy Wars have included: <EMACS>
vs. <VI>, my personal computer vs. everyone else's personal
computer, <ITS> vs. <UNIX>, <UNIX> vs. <VMS>, <BSD> UNIX vs. <USG>
UNIX, C vs. Pascal, etc. etc. etc. The characteristic that
distinguishes <holy wars> from normal technical disputes is that
(regardless of the technical merits of the case on either side)
most participants spend their time trying to pass off personal
value choices and cultural attachments as objective technical
evaluations.
<hook> n. An extraneous piece of software or hardware included in
order to simplify later additions or changes by a user. For
instance, a PDP-10 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. As another example, a simple
program that prints numbers might always print them in base ten,
but a more flexible version would let a variable determine what
base to use; setting the variable to 5 would make the program print
numbers in base five. The variable is a simple hook. An even more
flexible program might examine the variable, and treat a value of
16 or less as the base to use, but treat any other number as the
address of a user-supplied routine for printing a number. This is
a very powerful hook; one can then write a routine to print numbers
as roman numerals, say, or as Hebrew characters, and plug it into
the program through the hook. Often the difference between a good
program and a superb one is that the latter has useful hooks in
judiciously chosen places. Both may do the original job about
equally well, but the one with the hooks is much more flexible for
future expansion of capabilities.
<home box> n. A hacker's personal machine, especially one he owns.
"Yeah? Well, *my* home box runs a full 4.2BSD, so there!"
<hose> 1. vt. To make non-functional or greatly degraded in
performance, as in "That big ray-tracing program really hoses the
system." See <hosed>. 2. n. A narrow channel through which data
flows under pressure. Generally denotes data paths in a system
that represent performance bottlenecks. 3. Cabling, especially
thick Ethernet cable. This is sometimes called "bit hose" or
"hosery" (play on "hosiery") or "etherhose". See also
<washing machine>.
<hosed> adj. Same as <down>. Used primarily by UNIX hackers.
Humorous: also implies a condition thought to be relatively easy to
reverse. Probably derived from the Canadian slang `hoser'
popularized by the Bob and Doug skits on SCTV. See <hose>.
There is a story that a Cray which had been experiencing periodic
difficulties once crashed, and it was announced to have been
<hosed>. It was discovered that the crash was due to the
disconnection of some coolant hoses. The problem was corrected, and
users were then assured that everything was OK because the system
had been rehosed. [This is an excellent example of hackish
wordplay --- ESR].
<hot spot> n. 1. [primarily C/UNIX programmers, but spreading] n. In
most programs, less than 10% of the code eats 90% of the execution
time; if one were to graph instruction visits versus code
addresses, one would typically see a few huge spikes amidst a lot
of low-level noise. Such spikes are called "hot spots" and are
good candidates for micro-optimization or <hand-hacking>. The term
is especially used of tight loops and recursions in the code's
central algorithm, as opposed to (say) initial set-up costs or
large but infrequent I/O operations. See <tune>, <bum>,
<hand-hacking>. 2. The active location of a cursor on a bit-map
display. "Put the mouse's hot spot on the `ON' widget and click
the left button."
<house wizard> [prob. from ad-agency lingo, cf. `house freak'] n. A
lone hacker occupying a technical-specialist, R&D or systems
position at a commercial shop. A really effective house wizard can
have influence out of all proportion to his/her ostensible rank and
still not have to wear a suit. Used esp. of UNIX experts. The
term <house guru> is equivalent.
<HP-SUX> /aych pee suhx/ n. Unflattering hackerism for HP-UX,
Hewlett-Packard's UNIX port. Features some truly unique bogosities
in the filesystem internals and elsewhere that occasionally create
portability problems. HP-UX is often referred to as "hockey-pux"
inside HP, and one outside correspondent claims that the proper
pronunciation is /aych-pee ukkkhhhh/ as though one were spitting.
See also <Telerat>, <sun-stools>, <terminak>.
<humma> excl. A filler word used on various "chat" and "talk"
programs when you had nothing to say but felt that it was important
to say something. The word apparently originated (at least with
this definition) on the MECC Timeshare System (MTS) a now-defunct
educational time-sharing system running in Minnesota during the
1970s and early '80s, but was later sighted on early UNIX systems.
<humongous> /hyoo-mohng'gus/ alt. <humingous> (hyoo-muhng'gus) See
<hungus>.
<HUMOR, HACKER> n. A distinctive style of shared intellectual humor
found among hackers, having the following marked characteristics:
1) Fascination with form-vs.-content jokes, paradoxes, and humor
having to do with confusion of metalevels (see <meta>). One way to
make a hacker laugh: hold an index card in front of him/her with
"THIS IS GREEN" written on it in bold red ink, or vice-versa
(note, however, that this is only funny the first time).
2) Elaborate deadpan parodies of large intellectual constructs such
as specifications (see <write-only memory>), standards documents,
language descriptions (see <INTERCAL>) and even entire scientific
theories (see <quantum bogodynamics>, <computron>).
3) Jokes which involve screwily precise reasoning from bizarre,
ludicrous or just grossly counter-intuitive premises.
4) Fascination with puns and wordplay.
5) A fondness for apparently mindless humor with subversive
currents of intelligence in it, for example: old Warner Brothers
and Rocky & Bullwinkle cartoons, Charlie Chaplin movies, the B-52s,
and Monty Python's Flying Circus. Humor which combines this trait
with elements of high camp and slapstick is especially favored.
6) References to the symbol-object antinomies and associated ideas
in Zen Buddhism and (less often) Taoism. See <has the x nature>,
<Discordianism>, <zen>, <ha ha only serious>, <AI koans>.
See also <filk>; <retrocomputing>; and Appendix B. If you have an
itchy feeling that all six of these traits are really aspects of
one thing that is incredibly difficult to talk about exactly, you
are a) correct and b) responding like a hacker. These traits are
also recognizable (though in a less marked form) throughout
<SCIENCE-FICTION FANDOM>.
<hung> [from "hung up"] adj. Equivalent to <wedged>, q.v. but more
common at UNIX/C sites. Not generally used of people. Syn. with
<locked up>, <wedged>; compare <hosed>. See also <hang>.
<hungus> /hung'g@s/ [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."
<hyperspace> (hie'per-spays) n. A memory location within a virtual
memory machine that is many, many megabytes (or gigabytes) away
from where the program counter should be pointing, usually
inaccessible because it is not even mapped in. "Another core
dump... looks like the program jumped off to hyperspace somehow."
This usage is from the SF notion of a spaceship "jumping into
hyperspace", that is, taking a shortcut through higher-dimensional
space --- in other words, leaving this universe.
{= I =}
<IBM> /ie bee em/ Inferior But Marketable; It's Better Manually;
Insidious Black Magic; It's Been Malfunctioning; Incontinent Bowel
Movement; and a near-<infinite> number of even less complimentary
expansions, including "International Business Machines". See
<TLA>. These abbreviations illustrate the considerable antipathy
most hackers have long felt for the "industry leader" (see <fear
and loathing>). What galls hackers about most IBM machines above
the PC level isn't so much that they're underpowered and overpriced
(though that counts against them) but that the designs are
incredibly archaic, crufty and <elephantine> and you can't
*fix* them --- source code is locked up tight and programming
tools are expensive, hard to find, and bletcherous to use once
you've found them. With the release of the UNIX-based RIOS family
this may have begun to change --- but then, we thought that when
the PC-RT came out, too. In the spirit of universal peace and
brotherhood, this lexicon now includes a number of entries marked
`IBM'; these derive from a rampantly unofficial jargon list
circulated among IBM's own beleaguered hacker underground.
<ice> [from William Gibson's cyberpunk SF: notionally, "Intrusion
Countermeasure Electronics"] Security software (in Gibson's
original, software that responds to intrusion by attempting to
literally kill the intruder). Also, <icebreaker>: a program
designed for cracking security on a system. Neither term is in
serious use yet as of 1990, but many hackers find the metaphor
attractive and they may be in the near future.
<ill-behaved> adj. 1. [numerical analysis] Said of an algorithm or
computational method that tends to blow up due to accumulated
roundoff error or poor convergence properties. 2. Software which
bypasses the defined <OS> interfaces to do things (like screen,
keyboard and disk I/O) itself, often in a way that depends on the
hardware of the machine it is running on or which is nonportable or
incompatible with other pieces of software. In the IBM PC/MS-DOS
world, there is a folk theorem (nearly true) to the effect that
(due to gross inadequacies and performance penalties in the OS
interface) all interesting applications are ill-behaved. Oppose
<well-behaved>, compare <PC-ism>. See <mess-dos>.
<IMHO> [from SF fandom via USENET] Written acronym for In My Humble
Opinion. Example: "IMHO, mixed-case C names should be avoided, as
mistyping something in the wrong case can cause hard-to-detect
errors --- and they look too Pascalish anyhow." Also seen in
variant forms such as IMNSHO (In My Not-So-Humble Opinion) and IMAO
(In My Arrogant Opinion).
<in the extreme> adj. A preferred emphasizing suffix for many hackish
terms. See for example <obscure in the extreme> under <obscure>,
and compare <highly>.
<incantation> n. Any particularly arbitrary or obscure command that
must be muttered at a system to attain a desired result. Not used
of passwords or other explicit security features. Especially used
of tricks that are so poorly documented they must be learned from a
<wizard>. E.g. "This compiler normally locates initialized data
in the data segment, but if you mutter the right incantation they
will be forced into text space". See <mutter>.
<include> v. [USENET] 1. To duplicate a portion (or whole) of
another's message (typically with attribution to the source) in a
reply or followup, for clarifying the context of one's response.
2. A directive; to explicitly command the preprocessor to include a
file. 3. Derived from C: #include <disclaimer.h> has appeared in
<sig block>s to denote a `standard' dislaimer file.
<include war> n. Excessive multi-leveled including within a discussion
thread (ie of the same subject), to annoy readers. In a forum such
as USENET, with high traffic newsgroups, this can lead to <flame>s
and the urge to start a <kill file>.
<infinite> adj. Consisting of a large number of objects; extreme.
Used very loosely as in: "This program produces infinite
garbage." "He is an infinite loser." This is an abuse of the
word's mathematical meaning. The term "semi-infinite" denoting
an immoderately large amount of some resource is also heard.
"This compiler is taking a semi-infinite amount of time to
optimize my program". See also <semi->.
<infinity> n. 1. The largest value that can be represented in a
particular type of variable (register, memory location, data type,
whatever). 2. <minus infinity> The smallest such value. Note that
this is different from <time t equals minus infinity>, which is
closer to a mathematician's usage of infinity.
<infant mortality> n. It is common lore among hackers that the chances
of sudden hardware failure drop off exponentially with a machine's
time since power-up (that is until the relatively distant time at
which mechanical wear in I/O devices and thermal-cycling stress in
components has accumulated enough for the machine to start going
senile). Up to half of all chip-and-wire failures happen within a
new system's first few weeks; such failures are often referred to
as "infant mortality" problems (or, occasionally, as "sudden
infant death syndrome").
<insanely great> adj. [Mac Community, from Steve Jobs; also BSD UNIX
people via Bill Joy] Something so incredibly <elegant> that it is
imaginable only to someone possessing the greatest of
<hacker>-natures.
<INTERCAL> /in't@r-kal/ [said by the authors to stand for "Compiler
Language With No Pronounceable Acronym"] n. A computer language
designed by Don Woods and James Lyon in 1972. INTERCAL is purposely
different from all other computer languages in all ways but one; it
is purely a written language, being totally unspeakable. An
excerpt from the INTERCAL Reference Manual will make the style of
the language clear. In most languages, if you wanted the variable
A to have the value 65536, you would write something like
LET A = 65536;
The INTERCAL Reference Manual, however, explains that "It is a
well-known and oft-demonstrated fact that a person whose work is
incomprehensible is held in high esteem. For example, if one were
to state that the simplest way to store a value of 65536 in a
32-bit INTERCAL variable is:
DO :1 <- #0$#256
any sensible programmer would say that that was absurd. Since this
is indeed the simplest method, the programmer would be made to look
foolish in front of his boss, who would of course have happened to
turn up, as bosses are wont to do. The effect would be no less
devastating for the programmer having been correct." INTERCAL has
many other peculiar features designed to make it even more
unspeakable. The Woods/Lyons implementation was actually used by
many (well, at least several) people at Princeton. The language
has been recently re-implemented as C-INTERCAL and is consequently
enjoying an unprecedented level of unpopularity; there is even an
alt.lang.intercal newsgroup devoted to the study and ...
appreciation of the language on USENET.
<interesting> adj. In hacker parlance, this word is not simply
synonymous with "intriguing", but has strong connotations of
"annoying", or "difficult", or both. Hackers relish a
challenge. Oppose <trivial>.
<Internet address> n. An `absolute' network address of the form
foo@bar.baz, where foo is a user name, bar is a <sitename>, and
baz is a `domain' name, possibly including periods itself.
Contrasts with <bang path>, q.v.; see also <network, the> and
<network address>. All Internet machines and most UUCP sites can
now resolve these addresses, thanks to a large amount of
behind-the-scenes magic and PD software written since 1980 or so.
See also <bang path>.
<interrupt> interj. 1. On a computer, an event which interrupts normal
processing and temporarily diverts flow-of-control through an
"interrupt handler" routine. See also <trap>. 2. A request for
attention from a hacker. Often explicitly spoken. "Interrupt ---
have you seen Joe recently?". See <priority interrupt>.
<interrupts locked out> adj. When someone is ignoring you. In a
restaurant, after several fruitless attempts to get the waitress's
attention, a hacker might well observe that "She must have
interrupts locked out." Variations of this abound; "to have one's
interrupt mask bit set" is also heard.
<iron> n. Hardware, especially older/larger hardware of mainframe
class with big metal cabinets housing relatively low-density
electronics (but also used of modern supercomputers). Often in the
phrase <big iron>. Oppose <silicon>. See also <dinosaur>.
<iron box> [UNIX/Internet] n. A special environment set up to trap a
<cracker> logging in over remote or network connections long enough
so he can be traced. May include a specially-gimmicked <shell>
restricting the hacker's movements in unobvious ways, and `bait'
files designed to keep him interested and logged on. See also
<back door>, <firewall machine>, <venus flytrap> and Clifford
Stoll's account of how he made and used one (see Appendix B).
<ironmonger> [IBM] n. A hardware specialist. Derogatory. Compare
<sandbender>, <polygon pusher>.
<ITS> /ie-tee-ess/ n. Incompatible Time-Sharing System, an influential
but highly idiosyncratic operating system written for PDP-10s at
MIT and long used at the MIT AI lab; much AI-hacker slang derives
from ITS folklore. After about 1982 most actual work was shifted
to newer machines, with the remaining ITS boxes run essentially as
a hobby and service to the hacker community. The shutdown of the
lab's last ITS machine in May 1990 marked the end of an era and
sent old-time hackers into mourning nationwide. The Royal
Institute of Technology in Sweden is maintaining one `live' ITS
site at its computer museum (right next to the only TOPS-10 system
still on the Internet), so ITS is still alleged to hold the record
for OS in longest continuous use. See Appendix A.
<IWBNI> [acronym] It Would Be Nice If. No pronunciation, as this is
never spoken, only written. Compare <WIBNI>.
<IYFEG> [USENET] Abbreviation for "Insert Your Favourite Ethnic
Group". Used as a meta-name when telling racist jokes in email to
avoid offending anyone.
{= J =}
<J. Random> /jay rand'm/ n. [generalized from <J. Random Hacker>,
q.v.] Arbitrary; ordinary; any one; "any old". "Would you let
J. Random Loser marry your daughter?". <J. Random> is
often prefixed to a noun to make a name out of it. It means
roughly "some particular" or "any specific one". The most
common uses are "J. Random Hacker, "J. Random Loser" and "J.
Random Nerd" ("Should J. Random Loser be allowed to <gun> down
other people?"), but it can be used just as an elaborate version
of <random> in any sense.
<J. Random Hacker> [MIT] /jay rand'm hak'r/ n. A mythical figure like
the Unknown Soldier; the archetypal hacker nerd. See <random>,
<Suzie COBOL>. This may originally have been inspired or
influenced by `J. Fred Muggs', a show-biz chimpanzee whose name
was a household word back in the days of the MIT Model Railroad
Club.
<jaggies> /jag'eez/ n. The `stairstep' effect observable when an edge
(esp. a linear edge of slope far from a multiple of 45 degrees) is
rendered on a pixel device (as opposed to a vector display).
<JCL> [ex-IBM] 1. IBM's ultimately <rude> "Job Control Language."
JCL was the script language used to control the execution of
programs in IBM's batch systems. JCL had a very <fascist> syntax,
and would, for example, <barf> if two spaces appeared where it
expected one. Most programmers who were confronted with JCL would
simply copy a working file (or card deck), changing the file names.
Someone who actually understood and generated unique JCL was
regarded with the mixed respect which one gives to someone who
memorizes the phone book. 2. Any very <rude> software that a
hacker is expected to use. "That's as bad as JCL." Often used
without having experienced it, as is <COBOL>. See also <IBM>,
<fear and loathing>.
<JFCL> /jif'kl/ or /jaf'kl/ v., obs. To cancel or annul something.
"Why don't you jfcl that out?" The fastest do-nothing instruction
on the PDP-10 happened to be JFCL, which stands for "Jump if Flag
set and then CLear the flag"; this does something useful, but is a
very fast no-operation if no flag is specified. Geoff Goodfellow,
one of the jargon-1 compilers, once had JFCL on the license plate
of his BMW. Usage: rare except among old-time PDP10 hackers.
<jiffy> n. 1. The width of one tick of the system clock on the
computer (see <tick>). Often 1 AC cycle time (1/60 second in the
U.S. and Canada, 1/50 most other places) but more recently 1/100
sec has become common. 2. Confusingly, the term is sometimes also
used for a 1-millisecond <wall time> interval. "The swapper runs
every six jiffies" means that the virtual memory management
routine is executed once for every six ticks of the clock, or about
ten times a second. 3. Indeterminate time from a few seconds to
forever. "I'll do it in a jiffy" means certainly not now and
possibly never. This is a bit contrary to the more widespread use
of the word.
<jock> n. 1. Programmer who is characterized by large and somewhat
brute force programs. See <brute force>. 2. When modified by
another noun, describes a specialist in some particular computing
area. The compounds `compiler jock' and `systems jock' seem to be
the best established examples of this.
<joe code> /joh kohd/ [said to commemmorate a notoriously bad coder
named Joe at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory] n. Badly written,
possibly buggy source code. Correspondents wishing to remain
anonymous have fingered a particular Joe and observed that usage
has drifted slightly; they described his code as "overly <tense>
and unmaintainable". "Perl may be a handy program, but if you
look at the source, it's complete joe code."
<JR[LN]> /jay ahr en/, /jay ahr el/ n. The names JRN and JRL were
sometimes used as example names when discussing a kind of user ID
used under <TOPS-10>; they were understood to be the initials of
(fictitious) programmers named "J. Random Nerd" and "J. Random
Loser" (see <J. Random>). For example, if one said "To log in,
type log one comma jay are en" (that is, "log1,JRN"), the
listener would have understood that he should use his own computer
id in place of "JRN".
{= K =}
<K> [from <kilo->] /kay/ n. Kilobyte. Similarly, at least, meg
(/meg/) and gig (/gig/) for megabyte and gigabyte. Also written
KB, MB, GB respectively. See also <kilo>.
<K&R> [Kernighan and Ritchie] n. Brian Kernighan & Dennis Ritchie's
"The C Programming Language", esp. the classic and influential
first edition (Prentice-Hall 1978, ISBN 0-113-110163-3). Also
called the <White Book>. See also <Red Book>, <Green Book>, <Blue
Book>, <Purple Book>, <Silver Book>, <Orange Book>, <Pink-Shirt
Book>, <Dragon Book>, <Aluminum Book>.
<kahuna> /k@-hoo'nuh/ [IBM, from the Hawaiian title for a shaman] n.
Synonym for <wizard>, <guru>.
<ken> /ken/ n. A flaming user. This noun was in use by the Software
Support group at Symbolics because the two greatest flamers in the
user community were both named Ken.
<kgbvax> /kay-jee-bee-vaks/ n. See <kremvax>.
<kill file> [USENET] n. Per-user file used by some <USENET> reading
programs to discard summarily (without presenting for reading)
articles which match some particularly uninteresting (or unwanted)
patterns of subject, author, or other header lines. Thus to "add
a person (or subject) to one's kill file" is to arrange for that
person to be ignored by your newsreader in future. By extension,
it may be used for a decision to ignore the person or subject in
other media.
<killer micro> [popularized by Eugene Brooks] n. A
microprocessor-based machine that infringes on mini, mainframe or
supercomputer performance turf. Often heard in "No one will
survive the attack of the killer micros!", the battle cry of the
downsizers. Used esp. of RISC architectures.
<killer poke> n. A recipe for inducing hardware damage on a machine
via insertion of invalid values in a memory-mapped control
register; used esp. of various fairly well-known tricks on MMU-less
<bitty boxes> like the IBM PC and Commodore PET that can overload
and trash analog electronics in the monitor. See also <HCF>.
<kilo-> [from metric measure] prefix. Denotes multiplication by 1024,
the power of 2 closest to 1000, rather than by the usual 1000.
Similarly the higher metric prefixes denote multiplication by
powers of 1024 rather than of 1000: mega- meaning 1048576, giga-
meaning 1073741824, tera- meaning 1099511627776, peta- meaning
1125899906842624, and exa- meaning 1152921504606846976. The last
two have not actually been observed, yet. Usage: especially with
"bytes", but also with anything else perceived to naturally come in
units that are powers of 2.
Confusion of 1000 and 1024, for example describing memory in units
of 524K (see K) instead of 512K, is a sure sign of the
<marketroid>.
<kluge> /klooj/ alt. kludge /kluhj/ [from the German "klug", clever]
(`klooj' is the original pronunciation, more common in the US;
`kluhj' is reported more common in England). n. 1. A Rube Goldberg
(or Heath Robinson) device in hardware or software. (A long-ago
Datamation article said: "An ill-assorted collection of poorly
matching parts, forming a distressing whole.") 2. n. A clever
programming trick intended to solve a particular nasty case in an
expedient, if not clear, manner. Often used to repair bugs. Often
involves <ad-hockery> and verges on being a <crock>. 3. Something
that works for the wrong reason. 4. vt. 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"; "I've
kluged up this routine...,etc." . 5. <kluge around>: To avoid by
inserting a kluge. 6. [WPI] A feature which is implemented in a
<rude> manner.
Note that a plurality of hackers pronounce this word /klooj/ but
spell it incorrectly as `kludge'. Some observers consider this
appropriate in view of its meaning.
<Knights of the Lambda Calculus> n. A semi-mythical organization of
wizardly LISP and Scheme hackers (the name refers to a mathematical
formalism invented by Alonzo Church with which LISP is intimately
connected). There is no enrollment list and the criteria for
induction are unclear, but one well-known LISPer has been known to
give out buttons and, in general, the *members* know who they
are...
<Knuth> [Dold Knuth's "The Art of Computer Programming"] n. The
reference that answers all questions about data structures or
algorithms. A safe answer when you do not know, as in "I think
you can find that in Knuth." Contrast <literature, the>. See also
<bible>.
<kremvax> /krem-vaks/ [From the then large number of <USENET> <VAXen>
with names of the form "foovax"] n. A fictitious USENET site at
the Kremlin, announced on April 1, 1984, in a posting ostensibly
from Soviet leader Konstantin Chernenko. The posting was actually
forged by Piet Beertema as an April Fool's joke. Other sites
mentioned in the hoax were moskvax and <kgbvax>, which now seems to
be the one by which it is remembered. This was probably the
funniest of the many April Fool's forgeries perpetrated on USENET
(which has negligible security against them), because the notion
that USENET might ever penetrate the Iron Curtain seemed so totally
absurd at the time. But in fact, the first genuine site in Moscow
(demos.su) joined USENET only 6 years later --- and some readers
needed convincing that it wasn't a hoax.
[Ed. note: Vadim Antonov (avg@hq.demos.su), the major poster from
demos.su up to at least the end of 1990, was well acquainted with
the kremvax hoax and referred to it in his own postings --- even to
the extent of twitting a number of credulous netters on
alt.folklore.computers by blandly "admitting" that *he* was
a hoax! Mr. Antonov, BTW, also contributed the Russian-language
material for this File --- ESR]
{= L =}
<lace card> n. obs. A Hollerith card with all holes punched (also
called a <whoopee card>). Card readers jammed when they got to one
of these, as the resulting card had too little structural strength
to avoid buckling inside the mechanism. When some practical joker
fed a <lace card> through the reader you needed to clear the jam
with a card knife --- which you used on the joker first.
<language lawyer> n. A person, usually an experienced or senior
software engineer, who is intimately familiar with many or most of
the numerous syntactic and semantic restrictions (both useful and
esoteric) applicable to one or more computer programming languages.
Compare <wizard>.
<languages of choice> n. C or LISP. Essentially all hackers know one
of these and most good ones are fluent in both. Smalltalk and
Prolog are popular in small but influential communities. Assembler
used to be a language of choice, but is generally no longer
considered interesting or appropriate for anything but compiler
code generation and a few time-critical uses in systems programs.
There is also a rapidly dwindling category of older hackers with
FORTRAN as their language of choice; they often prefer to be known
as <real programmers>, and other hackers consider them a bit odd.
Most hackers tend to frown at languages like Pascal and Ada which
don't give them the near-total freedom considered necessary for
hacking (see <bondage-and-discipline language>) and to regard
everything that's even remotely connected with COBOL as a total
<loss>.
<larval stage> n. Describes a period of monomaniacal concentration on
coding apparently passed through by all fledgling hackers. Common
symptoms include: the perpetration of more than one 36-hour
<hacking run> in a given week, neglect of all other activities
including usual basics like food and sex, and a chronic case of
advanced bleary-eye. Can last from six months to two years, with
the apparent median being around eighteen months. A few so
afflicted never resume a more `normal' life, but the ordeal seems
to be necessary to produce really wizardly (as opposed to merely
competent) programmers. A less protracted and intense version of
larval stage (typically lasting about a month) may recur when
learning a new <OS> or programming language.
<lase> /layz/ vt. To print a given document via a laser printer. "OK,
let's lase that sucker and see if all those graphics-macro calls
did the right things."
<laser chicken> n. Kung Pao Chicken, a standard Chinese dish
containing chicken, peanuts, and bell peppers in a spicy pepper-oil
sauce. A few hackers call it "laser chiicken" for two reasons;
it can <zap> you just like a laser, and the pepper-oil sauce has a
red color reminiscent of some laser beams.
In a variation on this theme, it is reported that one group of
Australian hackers have redesignated the common dish "lemon
chicken" as "Chernobyl Chicken". The name is derived from the
colour of the dish, which is considered bright enough to glow in
the dark (much like some of the fabled inhabitants of Chernobyl).
<LDB> /l@d'd@b/ [from the PDP-10 instruction set] v. To extract from
the middle. This usage has been kept alive by Common LISP's
function of the same name. See also <DPB>.
<leak> n. With qualifier, one of a class of resource-management bugs
that occur when resources are not freed properly after operations
on them are finished, leading to eventual exhaustion as new
allocation requests come in. <memory leak> and <fd leak> have
their own entries; one might also refer, say, to a "window handle
leak" in a window system.
<leaky heap> [Cambridge] n. Syn. <memory leak>.
<LERP> /lerp/ v.,n. Quasi-acronym for Linear Interpolation, used as a
verb or noun for the operation. Ex. Bresenham's algorithm lerps
incrementally between the two endpoints of the line.
<lexer> /lek'sr/ n. Common hacker shorthand for "lexical analyzer",
the input-tokenizing stage in the parser for a language. "Some C
lexers get confused by the old-style compound ops like =-".
<life> n. 1. A cellular-automata game invented by John Horton Conway,
and first introduced publicly by Martin Gardner (Scientific
American, October 1970). Many hackers pass through a stage of
fascination with it, and hackers at various places contributed
heavily to the mathematical analysis of this game (most notably
Bill Gosper at MIT; see <Gosperism>). When a hacker mentions
"life", he is much more likely to mean this game than the
magazine, the breakfast cereal, or the human state of existence.
2. The opposite of <USENET>. As in "Get a life!".
<like kicking dead whales down the beach> adj. A slow and disgusting
process. First popularized by a famous quote about the difficulty
of getting work done under one of IBM's mainframe OSs. "Well, you
*could* write a C compiler in COBOL, but it would be like
kicking dead whales down the beach."
<line eater, the> [USENET] n. 1. A bug in some now-obsolete versions
of the netnews software used to eat up to 512 bytes of the article
text. The bug was triggered by having the text of the article
start other than as the first character of the line. This bug was
quickly personified as a mythical creature called "the line
eater", and postings often included a dummy line of "line eater
food". Ironically, line eater food that had whitespace before it
was eaten along with the following text the food was supposed to
protect, and line eater food that didn't have whitespace before it
isn't eaten, since the bug is avoided. The practice of
"sacrificing to the line eater" continued for some time after the
bug had been <nailed to the wall>, and is still humorously referred
to. The bug itself is still (in mid-1990) occasionally reported to
be lurking in some mail-to-netnews gateways. 2. The mythical NSA
trawling program sometimes assumed to be reading <USENET> for the
U.S. Government's spooks. Some netters put loaded phrases like
`Uzi' `nuclear materials' `Palestine' `cocaine' and `assassination'
in their <sig block>s in an attempt to confuse and overload the
creature. The <GNU> version of <EMACS> actually has a command that
randomly generates a lot of words like that into your edited text.
<line starve> [MIT] 1. vi. To feed the paper through the terminal the
wrong way by one line (most terminals can't do this!). On a
display terminal, to move the cursor up to the previous line of the
screen. Example: "To print X squared, you just output X, line
starve, 2, line feed." (The line starve causes the 2 to appear on
the line above the X, and the line feed gets back to the original
line.) 2. n. A "character" (or character sequence) that causes a
terminal to perform this action. Unlike "line feed", "line
starve" is *not* standard ASCII terminology. Even among
hackers it is considered a bit silly. 3. [proposed] A sequence
like \c (used in System V echo, as well as nroff/troff) which
suppresses a line feed that would normally implicitly be emitted.
<link-dead> [popularized by MUD] adj. 1. A lost Telnet/MUD connection.
v. 2. A deliberate act, with ulterior motives, to close a
connection.
<link farm> [UNIX] n. A directory tree that contains many links to
files in another, master directory tree of files. Link farms save
space when maintaining several nearly identical copies of the same
source tree, e.g. when the only difference is
architecture-dependent object files. Example use: `Let's freeze
the source and then rebuild the FROBOZZ-3 and FROBOZZ-4 link
farms.' Link farms may also be used to get around restrictions on
the number of -I arguments on older C preprocessors.
<lint> [from UNIX's `lint(1)', named perhaps for the bits of
fluff it picks from programs] 1. v. To examine a program closely
for style, language usage, and portability problems, esp. if in C,
esp. if via use of automated analysis tools, most esp. if the UNIX
utility `lint(1)' is used. This term used to be restricted to
use of `lint(1)' itself but (judging by references on USENET)
has become a shorthand for `desk-check' at some non-UNIX shops,
even in some languages other than C. See also <delint>. 2. Excess
verbiage in a document, as in "this draft has too much lint".
<lion food> [IBM] n. Middle management or HQ staff (by extension,
administrative drones in general). From an old joke about two lions
who, escaping from the zoo, split up to increase their chances but
agreed to meet after two months. When they do meet, one is skinny
and the other overweight. The thin one says "How did you manage?
I ate a human just once and they turned out a small army to chase
me --- guns, nets, it was terrible. Since then I've been reduced
to eating mice, insects, even grass." The fat one replies "Well,
*I* hid near an IBM office and ate a manager a day. And
nobody even noticed!"
<LISP> [from "LISt Processing language", but mythically from "Lots
of Irritating Superfluous Parentheses] n. The name of AI's mother
tongue, a language based on the ideas of 1) variable-length lists
and trees as fundamental data types, and 2) the interpretation of
code as data and vice-versa. Invented by John McCarthy at Stanford
in the late 1950s, it is actually older than any other <HLL> still
in use except FORTRAN. Accordingly, it has undergone considerable
adaptive radiation over the years; modern variants (of which Scheme
is perhaps the most successful) are quite different in detail from
the original LISP 1.5 at Stanford. The hands-down favorite of
hackers until the early 1980s, LISP now shares the throne with <C>.
See <languages of choice>.
<literature, the> n. Used to answer a question that the hearer
believes is <trivial>, as in "It's in the literature." Oppose
<Knuth>, which has no connotation of triviality.
<little-endian> adj. Describes a computer architecture in which,
within a given 16- or 32-bit word, lower byte addresses have lower
significance (the word is stored `little-end-first'). The PDP-11
and VAX families of computers and Intel microprocessors and a lot
of communications and networking hardware are little-endian. See
<big-endian>, <middle-endian>, <NUXI problem>.
<Live Free Or Die!> imp. 1. The state motto of New Hampshire. 2. A
slogan associated with UNIX in the romantic days when UNIX
aficionados saw themselves as a tiny, beleaguered underground
tilting against the windmills of industry. The "free" referred
specifically to freedom from the <fascist> design phiolosophies and
crufty misfeatures common on commercial operating systems. Armando
Stettner, one of the early UNIX developers, used to give out fake
license plates bearing this motto under a large UNIX, all in New
Hampshire colors of green and white. These are now valued
collector's items.
<livelock> n. A situation in which some critical stage of a task is
unable to finish because its clients perpetually create more work
for it to do after they've been serviced but before it can clear.
Differs from <deadlock> in that the process is not blocked or
waiting for anything, but has a virtually infinite amount of work
to do and accomplishes nothing.
<liveware> n. Synonym for <wetware> Less common.
<locked up> adj. Syn. for <hung>, <wedged>.
<logic bomb> n. Code surreptitiously inserted in an application or OS
which causes it to perform some destructive or
security-compromising activity whenever specified conditions are
met. Compare <back door>.
<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". Compare
<virtual>. This use of <logical> is an extension from its
technical use in computer science. A program can be written to do
input or output using a "logical device"; when the program is
run, the user can specify which "physical" (actual) device to use
for that logical device. For example, a program might write all
its error messages to a logical device called ERROR; the user can
then specify whether logical device ERROR should be associated to
the terminal, a disk file, or the <bit bucket> (to throw the error
messages away). Perhaps the word "logical" is used because even
though a thing isn't the actual object in question, you can reason
logically about the thing as if it were the actual object.
At Stanford, "logical" compass directions denoted 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 San Francisco 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.)
In giving directions, one might say, "To get to Rincon Tarasco
restaurant, get onto El Camino Bignum going logical north." Using
the word "logical" helps to prevent the recipient from worrying
about that the fact that the sun is setting almost directly in
front of him. The concept is perpetuated by North American
highways which are almost, but not quite, consistently labelled
with logical rather than physical directions. A similar situation
exists at MIT. Route 128 (famous for the electronics industries
that have grown up along it) is a three-quarters circle surrounding
Boston at a radius of ten miles, terminating at the coastline at
each end. It would be most precise to describe the two directions
along this highway as being "clockwise" and "counterclockwise",
but the road signs all say "north" and "south", respectively.
A hacker would describe these directions as "logical north" and
"logical south", to indicate that they are conventional
directions not corresponding to the usual convention for those
words. (If you went logical south along the entire length of route
128, you would start out going northwest, curve around to the
south, and finish headed due east!)
<loop through> v. To process each element of a list of things. "Hold
on, I've got to loop through my paper mail." Derives from the
computer-language notion of an iterative loop; compare <cdr down>
(which is less common among C and UNIX programmers).
<lord high fixer> [primarily British, prob. fr. Gilbert & Sullivan's
"lord high executioner"] n. The person in an organization who
knows the most about some aspect of a system. See <wizard>.
<lose> [from MIT jargon] vi. 1. To fail. A program loses when it
encounters an exceptional condition or fails to work in the
expected manner. 2. To be exceptionally unaesthetic. 3. Of
people, to be obnoxious or unusually stupid (as opposed to
ignorant). 4. <deserves to lose>: vi. 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
consequences of one's losing actions. "Boy, anyone who tries to
use <mess-dos> deserves to lose!" (ITS fans used to say this of
UNIX; many still do) See also <screw>, <chomp>, <bagbiter>. 5.
<lose> as a noun refers to something which is losing, especially in
the phrases "That's a lose!" or "What a lose!".
<lose lose> interj. A reply or comment on an undesirable situation.
"I accidentally deleted all my files!" "Lose lose."
<loser> n. An unexpectedly bad situation, program, programmer, or
person. Someone who habitually loses (even winners can lose
occasionally). Someone who knows not and knows not that he knows
not. emphatic forms are "real loser", "total loser", and
"complete loser" (but not "moby loser", which would be a
contradiction in terms). See <luser>.
<losing> adj. Said of anything which is or causes a <lose>.
<loss> n. Something (not a person) which loses; a situation in which
something is losing. Emphatic forms include "moby loss" "total
loss", "complete loss". Common interjections are "What a loss!"
and "What a moby loss!" Compare <lossage>.
<lossage> /los'@j/ n. The result of a bug or malfunction. This is a
collective noun. "What a loss!" and "What lossage!" are nearly
synonymous remarks. The former is slightly more particular to the
speaker's present circumstances while the latter implies a
continuing lose of which the speaker is presently victim. Thus
(for example) a temporary hardware failure is a loss, but bugs in
an important tool (like a compiler) are serious lossage.
<LPT> /lip'it/ [ITS] n. Line printer, of course. Rare under UNIX,
commoner in hackers with MS-DOS or CP/M background (the printer
device is called LPT: on those systems, which like ITS were
strongly influenced by early DEC conventions).
<lurker> n. One of the `silent majority' in a <USENET> or BBS
newsgroup; one who posts occasionally or not at all but is known to
read the group regularly. Often in `the lurkers', the hypothetical
audience for the group's <flamage>-emitting regulars.
<lunatic fringe> [IBM] n. Customers who can be relied upon to accept
release 1 versions of software.
<luser> /loo'zr/ n. A <user> who is probably also a <loser>.
(<luser> and <loser> are pronounced identically.) This word was
coined about 1975 at MIT. Under ITS, when you first walked up to a
terminal at MIT and typed Control-Z to get the computer's
attention, it prints out some status information, including how
many people are already using the computer; it might print "14
users", for example. Someone thought it would be a great joke to
patch the system to print "14 losers" instead. There ensued a
great controversy, as some of the users didn't particularly want to
be called losers to their faces every time they used the computer.
For a while several hackers struggled covertly, each changing the
message behind the back of the others; any time you logged into the
computer it was even money whether it would say "users" or
"losers". Finally, someone tried the compromise "lusers", and
it stuck. Later one of the ITS machines supported `luser' as a
request-for-help command. ITS died in early 1990; the usage lives
on, however, and the term `luser' is often seen in program
comments.
{= M =}
<macdink> /mak'dink/ [from the Apple Macintosh, which is said to
encourage such behavior] vt. To make many incremental and
unnecessary cosmetic changes to a program or file. Frequently the
subject of the macdinking would be better off without them. Ex:
"When I left at 11pm last night, he was still macdinking the
slides for his presentation."
<Macintrash> /mak'in-trash/ The Apple Macintosh, as described by a
hacker who doesn't appreciate being kept away from the *real
computer* by the interface. See also <WIMP environment>,
<drool-proof paper>, <user friendly>.
<macro> /mak'ro/ n. A name (possibly followed by a formal <arg> list)
which is equated to a text expression to which it is to be expanded
(possibly with substitution of actual arguments) by a language
translator. This definition can be found in any technical
dictionary; what those won't tell you is how the hackish
connotations of the term have changed over time. The term `macro'
originated in early assemblers, which encouraged use of macros as a
structuring and information-hiding device. During the early 70s
macro assemblers became ubiquitous and sometimes quite as powerful
and expensive as HLLs, only to fall from favor as improving
compiler technology marginalized assembler programming (see
<languages of choice>). Nowadays the term is most often used in
connection with the C preprocessor, LISP, or one of several
special-purpose languages built around a macro-expansion facility
(such as TeX or UNIX's nroff, troff and pic suite). Indeed, the
meaning has drifted enough that the collective `macros' is now
sometimes used for code in any special-purpose application-control
language (whether or not the language is actually translated by
text expansion) as well as other "expansions" such as the
"keyboard macros" supported in some text editors (and PC TSR
keyboard enhancers).
<machoflops> [pun on "megaflops", a coinage for "millions of
floating-point operations per second"] n. Refers to artificially
inflated performance figures often quoted by computer
manufacturers. Real applications are lucky to get half the quoted
speed. Thus, machoflops are similar to EPA gas mileage estimates.
See <benchmark>.
<macrology> /mak-ro'l@-jee/ n. Set of usually complex or crufty
macros, e.g. as part of a large system written in LISP, <TECO> or
(less commonly) assembler. Sometimes studying the macrology of a
system is not unlike archaeology, hence the sound-alike
construction. Prob. influenced by <ecology> and <theology>.
<macrotape> /ma'kro-tayp/ n. An industry standard reel of tape, as
opposed to a <microtape>.
<magic> adj. 1. As yet unexplained, or too complicated to explain
(compare <automagically> and Clarke's Third Law: "Any sufficiently
advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic"). "TTY
echoing is controlled by a large number of magic bits." "This
routine magically computes the parity of an eight-bit byte in three
instructions." 2. Characteristic of something that works but no
one really understands why. 3. [Stanford] A feature not generally
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.
<magic cookie> [UNIX] n. 1. Something passed between routines or
programs that enables the receiver to perform some <obscure>
operation; a capability ticket or opaque identifier. Especially
used of small data objects which contain data encoded in a strange
or intrinsically machine-dependent way. For example, on non-UNIX
OSs with a non-byte-stream model of files, the result of `ftell(3)'
may be a `magic cookie' rather than a byte offset; it can be passed
to `fseek(3)' but not operated on in any meaningful way. 2. An
in-band code for changing graphic rendition (i.e. inverse video or
underlining) or performing other control functions. Some older
terminals would leave a blank on the screen corresponding to
mode-change cookies; this was also called a <glitch>. See also
<cookie>.
<magic number> [UNIX/C] n. 1. Special data located at the beginning of
a binary data file to indicate its type to a utility. Under UNIX
the system and various applications programs (especially the
linker) distinguish between types of executable by looking for a
magic number. 2. In source code, some non-obvious constant whose
value is significant to the operation of a program and is inserted
inconspicuously in line, rather than expanded in by a symbol set by
a commented #define. Magic numbers in this sense are bad style.
<magic smoke> n. A notional substance trapped inside IC packages that
enables them to function (also called "blue smoke"). Its
existence is demonstrated by what happens when a chip burns up ---
the magic smoke gets let out, so it doesn't work any more. See
<smoke test>.
<management> n. 1. Corporate power elites distinguished primarily by
their distance from actual productive work and chronic failure to
manage (see also <suit>). Spoken derisively, as in
"*Management* decided that..." 2. Mythically, a vast
bureaucracy responsible for all the world's minor irritations.
Hackers' satirical public notices are often signed "The Mgmt".
<mangle> vt. Used similarly to <mung> or <scribble>, but more violent
in its connotations; something that is mangled has been
irreversibly and totally trashed.
<mango> [orig. in-house slang at Symbolics] n. A manager. See also
<devo> and <doco>.
<marginal> adj. 1. Extremely small. "A marginal increase in core can
decrease <GC> time drastically." In everyday terms, this means
that it's a lot easier to clean off your desk if you have a spare
place to put some of the junk while you sort through it. 2. Of
extremely small merit. "This proposed new feature seems rather
marginal to me." 3. Of extremely small probability of winning.
"The power supply was rather marginal anyway; no wonder it
fried." 4. <marginally>: adv. Slightly. "The ravs here are
only marginally better than at Small Eating Place." See <epsilon>.
4. <marginal hacks>: n. Margaret Jacks Hall, a building into which
the Stanford AI Lab was moved near the beginning of the '80s.
<marketroid> /mar'k@-troyd/ alt. <marketing slime>, <marketing
droid>, <marketeer> n. Member of a company's marketing department,
esp. one who promises users that the next version of a product
will have features which are unplanned, extremely difficult to
implement, and/or violate the laws of physics; and/or one who
describes existing features (and misfeatures) in ebullient,
buzzword-laden adspeak. Derogatory. Used by techies.
<martian> n. A packet sent on a TCP/IP network with a source address
of the test loopback interface (127.0.0.1). As in "The domain
server is getting lots of packets from Mars. Does that gateway
have a Martian filter?"
<massage> vt. Vague term used to describe `smooth' transformations of
a data set into a more useful form, esp. transformations which do
not lose information. Connotes less pain than <munch> or <crunch>.
"He wrote a program that massages X bitmap files into GIF
format." Compare <slurp>.
<meatware> n. Synonym for <wetware>. Less common.
<meg> /meg/ n. A megabyte; 1024K.
<mega-> /me'ga/ pref. See <kilo>.
<megapenny> /meg'a-pen'ee/ n. $10,000 (1 cent * 10e6). Used
semi-humorously as a unit in comparing computer cost/performance
figures.
<MEGO> /mego/ or /meego/ [My Eyes Glaze Over, often Mine Eyes Glazeth
Over, attributed to the futurologist Herman Kahn] Also "MEGO
factor". 1. Handwaving intended to confuse the listener and
hopefully induce agreement because the listener does not want to
admit to not understanding what is going on. MEGO is usually
directed at senior management by engineers and contains a high
proportion of <TLA>s. 2. excl. An appropriate response to MEGO
tactics.
<meltdown, network> n. A state of complete network overload; the
network equivalent of <thrash>ing. See also <broadcast storm>.
<meme> /meem/ [coined on analogy with `gene' by Richard Dawkins] n. An
idea considered as a <replicator>. Used esp. in the prase `meme
complex' denoting a group of mutually supporting memes which form
an organized belief system, such as a religion. This dictionary is
a vector of the "hacker subculture" meme complex; each entry
might be considered a meme. However, "meme" is often misused to
mean "meme complex". Use of the term connotes acceptance of the
idea that in humans (and presumably other tool-and language-using
sophonts) cultural evolution by selection of adaptive ideas has
superseded biological evolution by selection of hereditary traits.
Hackers find this idea congenial for tolerably obvious reasons.
<meme plague> n. The spread of a successful but pernicious <meme>,
esp. one which `parasitizes' the victims into giving their all to
propagate it. Astrology, BASIC, and the other guy's religion are
often considered to be examples. This usage is given point by the
historical fact that `joiner' ideologies like Naziism or various
forms of millenarian Christianity have exhibited plague-like cycles
of exponential growth followed by collapse to small `reservoir'
populations.
<memetics> /me-me-tiks/ [from <meme>] The study of memes. As of 1990,
this is still an extremely informal and speculative endeavor,
though the first steps towards at least statistical rigor have been
made by H. Keith Henson and others. Memetics is a popular topic
among hackers, who like to see themselves as the architects of the
new information ecologies in which memes live and replicate.
<memory leak> [C/UNIX programmers] n. An error in a program's
dynamic-store allocation logic that causes it to fail to reclaim
discarded memory, leading to attempted hogging of main store and
eventual collapse due to memory exhaustion. Also (esp. at CMU)
called <core leak>. See <aliasing bug>, <fandango on core>, <smash
the stack>, <precedence lossage>, <overrun screw>, <leaky heap>.
<menuitis> /men`yoo-i'tis/ n. Notional disease suffered by software
with an obsessively simple-minded menu interface and no escape.
Hackers find this intensely irritating and much prefer the
flexibility of command-line or language-style interfaces,
especially those customizable via macros or a special-purpose
language in which one can encode useful hacks. See
<user-obsequious>, <drool-proof paper>, <WIMP environment>.
<mess-dos> /mes-dos/ [UNIX hackers] n. Derisory term for MS-DOS. Often
followed by the ritual expurgation "Just Say No!". See MS-DOS.
Most hackers (even many MS-DOS hackers) loathe MS-DOS for its
single-tasking nature, its limits on application size, its nasty
primitive interface, and its ties to IBMness (see <fear and
loathing>). Also "mess-loss", "messy-dos", "mess-dog"
"mess-loss" "mess-dross" and various combinations thereof.
<meta> /meta@/ or /mayt'@/ [from analytic philosophy] adj. One level
of description up. Thus, a meta-syntactic variable is a variable
in notation used to describe syntax and meta-language is language
used to describe language. This is difficult to explain out of
context, but much hacker humor turns on deliberate confusion
between meta-levels. See <HUMOR, HACKER>.
<meta bit> /meta@ bit/ or /mayt'@ bit/ n. Bit 8 of an 8-bit
character, on in values 128-255. Also called <high bit> or <alt
bit>. Some terminals and consoles (especially those designed for
LISP traditions) have a META-shift key. Others (including,
mirabile dictu, keyboards on IBM PC-class machines) have an ALT
key. See also <bucky bits>.
<microfloppies> n. 3-1/2 inch floppies, as opposed to 5-1/4 <vanilla>
or mini-floppies and the now-obsolescent 8-inch variety. This term
may be headed for obsolescence as 5-1/4 inchers pass out of use,
only to be revived if anybody floats a sub-3-inch floppy standard.
See <stiffy>.
<microtape> n. Occasionally used to mean a DECtape, as opposed to a
<macrotape>. A DECtape is a small reel of magnetic tape about four
inches in diameter and an inch deep. Unlike normal drivers for
standard magnetic tapes, microtape drivers allow "random access"
to the data. In their heyday they were used in pretty much the
same ways one would now use a floppy disk: as a small, portable way
to save and transport files and programs. Apparently the term
"microtape" was actually the official term used within DEC for
these tapes until someone consed up the word "DECtape", which of
course sounded sexier to the <marketroid> types.
<middle-endian> adj. Not <big-endian> or <little-endian>. Used of
byte orders like 3-4-1-2 occasionally found in the packed-decimal
formats of minicomputer manufacturers who shall remain nameless.
<millilampson> /mil'i-lamp-sn/ n. How fast people can talk. Most
people run about 200 millilampsons. Butler Lampson (a CS theorist
and systems implementor highly regarded among hackers) goes at
1000. A few people speak faster.
<MIPS> /mips/ [acronym] 1. A measure of computing speed; formally,
"Millions of Instructions Per Second"; often rendered by hackers
as "Meaningless Indication of Processor Speed". This joke
expresses a nearly universal attitude about the value of
<benchmark> claims, said attitude being one of the great cultural
divides between hackers and <marketroid>s. 2. The corporate name
of a RISC-chip maker; among other things, they supplied silicon for
the DEC 3100 workstation series.
<misbug> [mit] n. An unintended property of a program that turns out
to be useful; something that should have been a <bug> but turns out
to be a <feature>. Usage: rare.
<misfeature> /mis-fee'chr/ 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. A misfeature is different from a simple
unforeseen side effect; the term implies that the misfeature was
actually carefully planned to be that way, but future consequences
or circumstances just weren't predicted accurately. This is
different from just not having thought ahead about it at all.
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 the
original implementors wanted to save directory space and we're
stuck with it for now."
<Missed'em-five> n. Pejorative hackerism for AT&T System V UNIX,
generally used by <BSD> partisans in a bigoted mood. See <software
bloat>, <Berzerkely>.
<moby> [seems to have been in use among model railroad fans years ago.
Derived from Melville's "Moby Dick" (some say from "Moby
Pickle").] 1. adj. Large, immense, complex, impressive. "A
Saturn V rocket is a truly moby frob." "Some MIT undergrads
pulled off a moby hack at the Harvard-Yale game." (see Appendix
A). 2. n. obs. The maximum address space of a machine (see
below). For a 68000 or VAX or most modern 32-bit architectures, it
is 4294967296 8-bit bytes. 3. A title of address (never of
third-person reference), usually used to show admiration, respect,
and/or friendliness to a competent hacker. "Greetings, moby Dave.
How's that address-book thing for the Mac going?" 4. adj. In
backgammon, doubles on the dice, as in "moby sixes", "moby
ones", etc. Compare this with <bignum> (sense #2): double sixes
are both bignums and moby sixes, but moby ones are not bignums (the
use of term "moby" to describe double ones is sarcastic). <moby
foo>, <moby win>, <moby loss>: standard emphatic forms. <foby
moo>: a spoonerism due to Greenblatt.
This term entered hackerdom with the Fabritek 256K moby memory of
the MIT-AI machine. Thus, a moby is classically, 256K 36-bit words,
the size of a PDP-10 moby (it has two). Back when address
registers were narrow, the term was more generally useful; because
when a computer had virtual memory mapping it might actually
have more physical memory attached to it than any one program could
access directly. One could then say "This computer has six
mobies" to mean that the ratio of physical memory to address space
is six, without having to say specifically how much memory there
actually is. That in turn implied that the computer could
timeshare six "full-sized" programs without having to swap
programs between memory and disk.
Nowadays the low cost of processor logic means that registers are
typically wider than the most memory you can cram onto a machine,
so most systems have much *less* than 1 theoretical `native'
moby of core. Also, more modern memory-management techniques make
the `moby count' less significant. However, there is one series of
popular chips for which the term could stand to be revived -- the
Intel 8088 and 80286 with their incredibly brain-damaged
segmented-memory design. On these, a `moby' would be the
1-megabyte address span of a paragraph-plus-offset pair.
<mode> n. A general state, usually used with an adjective describing
the state. Use of the word "mode" rather than "state" implies
that the state is extended over time, and probably also that some
activity characteristic of that state is being carried out. "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 programs and inanimate objects. "The E editor normally
uses a display terminal, but if you're on a TTY it will switch to
non-display mode." This term is normally used in a technical sense
to describe the state of a program. Extended usage --- for
example, to describe people --- is definitely slang. In
particular, see <hack mode>, <day mode>, <night mode>, <demo mode>,
<fireworks mode> and <yoyo mode>; also <talk mode>.
One also often hears the verbs "enable" and "disable" used in
connection with slang modes. Thus, for example, a sillier way of
saying "I'm going to crash" is "I'm going to enable crash mode
now." One might also hear a request to "disable flame mode,
please".
<modulo> /mod'yuh-low/ prep. Except for. From mathematical
terminology: one can consider saying that 4=22 "except for the
9's" (4=22 mod 9) (the precise meaning is a bit more complicated,
but that's the idea). "Well, LISP seems to work okay now, modulo
that <GC> bug." "I feel fine today modulo a slight headache."
<monkey up> vt. To hack together hardware for a particular task,
especially a one-shot job. Connotes an extremely <crufty> and
consciously temporary solution.
<monstrosity> 1. n. A ridiculously <elephantine> program or system,
esp. one which is buggy or only marginally functional. 2. The
quality of being monstrous (see `Peculiar nouns' in the discussion
of jargonification). See also <baroque>.
<Moore's Law> /morz law/ n. The observation that the logic density of
silicon integrated circuits has closely followed the curve (bits
per inch ^ 2) = 2 ^ (n - 1962); that is, the amount of
information storable in one square inch of silicon has roughly
doubled yearly every year since the technology was invented.
<moria> /mor'i-ah/ n. Together with <nethack> and <rogue>, one of the
large PD Dungeons-and-Dragons simulation games, available for a
wide range of machines and operationg systems. Extremely addictive
and a major consumer of time better used for hacking.
<MOTAS> /moh-tahs/ [USENET, Member Of The Appropriate Sex] n. A
potential or (less often) actual sex partner. See <MOTOS>,
<MOTSS>, <S.O>.
<MOTOS> /moh-tohs/ [from the 1970 census forms via USENET, Member Of
The Opposite Sex] n. A potential or (less often) actual sex
partner. See <MOTAS>, <MOTSS>, <S.O.> Less common than <MOTSS> or
<MOTAS>, which has largely displaced it.
<MOTSS> /motss/ [from the 1970 census forms via USENET, Member Of The
Same Sex] n. Esp. one considered as a possible sexual partner, e.g.
by a gay or lesbian. The gay-issues newsgroup on USENET is called
soc.motss. See <MOTOS> and <MOTAS>, which derive from it. Also
see <S.O.>.
<mount> vt. 1. To attach a removable physical storage volume to a
machine. In elder days and on mainframes this verb was used almost
exclusively of tapes; nowadays it is more likely to refer to a disk
or disk pack. 2. By extension, to attach any removable device such
as a sensor, robot arm, or <meatware> subsystem (see Appendix A).
3. [UNIX] To make a <logical> volume of some sort available for
use. The volume in question may or may not be removable and may be
just one partition of a physical device.
<mouse ahead> vi. To manipulate a computer's pointing device (almost
always a mouse in this usage, but not necessarily) and its
selection or command buttons before a computer program is ready to
accept such input, in anticipation of the program accepting the
input. Handling this properly is rare, but it can help make a
<user friendly> program usable by real users, assuming they are
familiar with the behavior of the user interface. Point-and-click
analog of "type ahead".
<mouse around> vi. To explore public portions of a large system, esp.
a network such as Internet via <FTP> or <TELNET>, looking for
interesting stuff to <snarf>.
<mouse elbow> n. A tennis-elbow-like fatigue syndrome resulting from
excessive use of a <WIMP environment>.
<mouso> /mow'so/ n. [by analogy with `typo'] An error in mouse usage
resulting in an inappropriate selection or graphic garbage on the
screen. Compare <thinko>.
<MS-DOS> /em-es-dos/ [MicroSoft Disk Operating System] n. A <clone> of
<CP/M> for the 8088 crufted together in six weeks by hacker Tim
Paterson, who is said to have regretted it ever since. Numerous
features including vaguely UNIX-like but rather broken support for
subdirectories, I/O redirection, and pipelines were hacked in in
2.0 and subsequent versions; as a result, there are two
incompatible versions of many system calls, and MS-DOS programmers
can never agree on basic things like what to use as an option
switch or whether to be case-sensitive. Now the
highest-unit-volume OS in history. Often known simply as DOS,
which annoys people familiar with other similarly-abbreviated
operating systems. See <mess-dos>, <ill-behaved>.
<MUD> [acronym for "Multi-user Interactive Dungeons"] n. A class of
<virtual reality> experiments accessible via <Internet>. These are
real-time chat forums with structure; they have multiple
`locations' like an adventure game and may include traps, puzzles,
magic, a simple economic system, and the capability for characters
to build more structure onto the database that represents the
existing world. However, there is no notion that corresponds to
`winning' an adventure game, and interaction is primarily social.
The acronym MUD is often lower-cased and/or verbed; thus, one may
speak of "going mudding", etc.
<multician> /muhl-ti'sh@n/ [coined at Honeywell, c.1970] n.
Competent user of <Multics>.
<Multics> /muhl'tiks/ n. [from "MULTiplexed Information and Computing
Service"] An early (late 1960s) timesharing operating system
co-designed by a consortium including MIT, GE and Bell
Laboratories, very innovative for its time (among other things, it
introduced the idea of treating all devices uniformly as special
files). All the members but GE eventually pulled out after
determining that <second-system effect> had bloated MULTICS to the
point of practical unusability (the `lean' predecessor in question
is said to have been <CTSS>). Honeywell commercialized Multics
after buying out GE's computer group, but it was never very
successful (among other things, one was required to enter a
password to log out). One of the developers left in the lurch by
the project's breakup was Ken Thompson, a circumstance which led
directly to the birth of <UNIX>. For this and other reasons
aspects of the Multics design remain a topic of occasional debate
among hackers. See also <brain-damage>.
<mumblage> /mum'bl@j/ 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. "Don't you think that we could
improve LISP performance by using a hybrid reference-count
transaction garbage collector, if the cache is big enough and there
are some extra cache bits for the microcode to use?" "Well,
mumble... I'll have to think about it." 2. Sometimes used as an
expression of disagreement. "I think we should buy a <VAX>."
"Mumble!" Common variant: <mumble frotz>. 3. Yet another
metasyntactic variable, like <foo>.
<munch> [often confused with `mung', q.v.] vt. To transform
information in a serial fashion, often requiring large amounts of
computation. To trace down a data structure. Related to <crunch>
and nearly synonymous with <grovel>, but connotes less pain.
<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,
(re)discovered recently on the LISP machine, have been christened
<munching triangles>, <munching w's>, and <munching mazes>. More
generally, suppose a graphics program produces an impressive and
ever-changing display of some basic form foo on a display terminal,
and does it using a relatively simple program; then the program (or
the resulting display) is likely to be referred to as "munching
foos" (this is a good example of the use of the word <foo> as a
metasyntactic variable).
<munchkin> /muhnch'kin/ n. A teenage-or-younger micro enthusiast
bashing BASIC or something else equally constricted. A term of
mild derision --- munchkins are annoying but some grow up to be
hackers after passing through a <larval stage>. The term <urchin>
is also used. See also <bitty box>.
<mundane> [from SF fandom] n. 1. A person who is not in science
fiction fandom. 2. A person who is not in the computer industry.
In this sense, most often an adjectival modifier as in "in my
mundane life..."
<mung> /muhng/ alt. `munge' /muhnj/ [in 1960 at MIT, "Mash Until No
Good"; sometime after that the derivation from the recursive
acronym "Mung Until No Good" became standard] vt. 1. To make
changes to a file, often large-scale, usually irrevocable.
Occasionally accidental. See <BLT>. 2. To destroy, usually
accidentally, occasionally maliciously. The system only mungs
things maliciously; this ia a consequence of Murphy's Law. See
<scribble>, <mangle>, <trash>. Reports from <USENET> suggest that
the pronunciation /muhnj/ is now usual in speech, but the spelling
`mung' is still common in program comments. 3. The kind of beans of
which the sprouts are used in Chinese food. (That's their real
name! Mung beans! Really!)
<MUSIC> n. A common extracurricular interest of hackers (compare
<SCIENCE-FICTION FANDOM>, <ORIENTAL FOOD>; see also <filk>). It is
widely believed among hackers that there is a substantial
correlation between whatever mysterious traits underlie hacking
ability (on the one hand) and musical talent and sensitivity (on
the other). It is certainly the case that hackers, as a rule, like
music and often develop musical appreciation in unusual and
interesting directions. Folk music is very big in hacker circles;
so is the sort of elaborate instrumental jazz/rock that used to be
called `progressive' and isn't recorded much any more. Also, the
hacker's musical range tends to be wide; many can listen with equal
appreciation to (say) Talking Heads, Yes, Spirogyra, Scott Joplin,
King Sunny Ade, The Pretenders, or one of Bach's Brandenburg
Concerti. It is also apparently true that hackerdom includes a
much higher concentration of talented amateur musicians than one
would expect from a similar-sized control group of <mundane> types.
<mutter> vt. To quietly enter a command not meant for the ears of
ordinary mortals. Frequently in "mutter an <incantation>".
{= N =}
<N> /en/ adj. 1. Some large and indeterminate number of objects;
"There were N bugs in that crock!"; also used in its original
sense of a variable name. 2. An arbitrarily large (and perhaps
infinite) number; "This crock has N bugs, as N goes to infinity".
3. A variable whose value is specified by the current context. For
example, when ordering a meal at a restaurant N may be understood
to mean however many people there are at the table. From the
remark "We'd like to order N wonton soups and a family dinner for
N-1." you can deduce that one person at the table wants to eat
only soup, even though you don't know how many people there are. A
silly riddle: "How many computers does it take to shift the bits
in a register? N+1: N to hold all the bits still, and one to shove
the register over." 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 <random numbers>,
<two-to-the-n>.
<nailed to the wall> [like a trophy] adj. Said of a bug finally
eliminated after protracted and even heroic effort.
<NAK> [from the ASCII mnemonic for 0010101] interj. 1. On-line joke
answer to ACK? (see <ACK>) -- "I'm not here". 2. On line answer
to a request for chat -- "I'm not available". 3. Used to
politely interrupt someone to tell them you don't understand their
point or that they have suddenly stopped making sense. See <ACK>,
sense #3. "And then, after we recode the project in COBOL..."
"Nak Nak Nak! I thought I heard you say COBOL!"
<nanoacre> /nan'o-ay-kr/ n. An areal unit (about 2mm.sq.) of
"real-estate" on a VLSI chip. The term derives its amusement
value from the fact that VLSI nanoacres have costs in the same
range as real acres once one figures in design and
fabrication-setup costs.
<nanobot> /nan'oh-bot/ n. A robot of microscopic proportions,
presumably built by means of <nanotechnology>. As yet, only used
informally (and speculatively!). Also sometimes called a
`nanoagent'.
<nanocomputer> /nan'oh-k@m-pyoo-tr/ n. A computer whose switching
elements are molecular in size. Designs for mechanical
nanocomputers which use single-molecule sliding rods for their
logic have been proposed. The controller for a <nanobot> would be
a nanocomputer.
<nanotechnology> /nan'-oh-tek-naw`l@-ji/ n. A hypothetical
fabrication technology in which objects are designed and built with
the individual specification and placement of each separate atom.
The first unequivocal nano-fabrication experiments are taking place
now (1990), for example with the deposition of individual xenon
atoms on a nickel substrate to spell the logo of a certain very
large computer company by two of its physicists. Nanotechnology
has been a hot topic in the hacker subculture ever since the term
was coined by K. Eric Drexler in his book `Engines of Creation',
where he predicted that nanotechnology could give rise to
replicating assemblers, permitting an exponential growth of
productivity and personal wealth. See also <blue goo>, <gray goo>,
<nanobot>.
<nastygram> n. 1. A protocol packet or item of email (the latter is
also called a `letterbomb') that takes advantage of misfeatures or
security holes on the target system to do untoward things. 2.
Disapproving mail, esp. from a net.god, pursuant to a violation of
<netiquette>. Compare <shitogram>. 3. (deprecated) An error reply
by mail from a <daemon>; in particular, a <bounce message>.
<neophilia> /nee-oh-fil'-ee-uh/ n. The trait of being excited and
pleased by novelty. Common trait of most hackers, SF fans, and
members of several other connected "leading-edge" subcultures
including the pro-technology "Whole-Earth" wing of the ecology
movement, space activists, theater people, the membership of MENSA,
and the <Discordian>/neo-pagan underground. All these groups
overlap heavily and (where evidence is available) seem to share
characteristic hacker tropisms for SF, <MUSIC> and <ORIENTAL FOOD>.
<nethack> /net'hak/ n. See <hack>, sense #12.
<netiquette> /net'ee-ket, net'i-ket/ [portmanteau "network
ettiquette"] n. Conventions of politeness recognized on <USENET>,
such as: avoidance of cross-posting to inappropriate groups, or
refraining from commercial pluggery on the net.
<neep-neep> /neep neep/ [onomatopoeic, from New York SF fandom] n. One
who is fascinated by computers. More general than <hacker>, as it
need not imply more skill than is required to boot games on a PC.
The gerund <neep-neeping> applies specifically to the long
conversations about computers that tend to develop in the corners
at most SF-convention parties. Fandom has a related proverb to the
effect that "Hacking is a conversational black hole!"
<net.*> /net dot/ pref. [USENET] Prefix used to describe people and
events related to USENET. From the time before the <Great
Renaming>, when all non-local newsgroups had names beginning
"net.". Includes net.god(s) (q.v.), net.goddesses (various
charismatic women with circles of on-line admirers), net.lurkers,
(see <lurker>), net.parties (a synonym for <boink> sense #2 (q.v.))
and many similar constructs. See also <net.police>.
<net.god> (net god) n. Used to refer to anyone who satisfies some
combination of the following conditions: has been visible on USENET
for more than five years, ran one of the original backbone sites,
moderated an important newsgroup, wrote news software, or knows
Gene, Mark, Rick, Mel, Henry, Chuq, and Greg personally. See
<demigod>.
<net.police> n. Those USENET readers who feel it is their
responsibility to pounce on and <flame> any posting which they
regard as offensive, or in violation of their understanding of
<netiquette>. Generally used sarcastically or pejoratively. Also
spelled `net police'. See also <net.>, <code police>.
<network address> n. As used by hackers, means an address on <the
network> (almost always a <bang path> or <Internet address>). An
essential to be taken seriously by hackers; in particular, persons
or organizations claiming to understand, work with, sell to, or
recruit from among hackers that *don't* display net addresses
are quietly presumed to be clueless poseurs and mentally flushed
(see <flush>, sense #3). Hackers often put their net addresses on
their business cards and wear them prominently in contexts where
they expect to meet other hackers face-to-face (see also
<SCIENCE-FICTION FANDOM>). This is mostly functional, but is also
a connotative signal that one identifies with hackerdom (like lodge
pins among Masons or tie-died T-shirts among Grateful Dead fans).
Net addresses are often used in email text as a more concise
substitute for personal names; indeed, hackers may come to know
each other quite well by network names without ever learning each
others' `legal' monikers. See also <sitename>.
<network, the> n. 1. The union of all the major academic and
noncommercial/hacker-oriented networks such as Internet, the old
ARPANET, NSFNet, BITNET and the virtual UUCP and <USENET>
"networks", plus the corporate in-house networks that gate to
them. A site is generally considered `on the network' if it can be
reached through some combination of Internet-style (@-sign) and
UUCP (bang-path) addresses. See <bang path>, <Internet address>,
<network address>. 2. A fictional conspiracy of libertarian
hacker-subversives and anti-authoritarian monkeywrenchers described
in Robert Anton Wilson's novel `Schrodinger's Cat', to which many
hackers have subsequently decided they belong (this is an example
of <ha ha only serious>).
<New Testament> n. [C programmers] The second edition of K&R's "The C
Programming Language" (Prentice-Hall 1988, ISBN 0-13-110362-8),
describing ANSI Standard C. See <K&R>.
<newbie> /n[y]oo'bee/ n. [orig. fr. British military & public-school
slang contraction of "new boy"] A USENET neophyte. This term
originated in the <newsgroup> "talk.bizarre" but is now in wide
use. Criteria for being considered a newbie vary wildly; a person
can be called a newbie in one newsgroup while remaining a respected
participant in another. The label "newbie" is sometimes applied
as a serious insult, to a person who has been around USENET for a
long time, but who carefully hides all evidence of having a clue.
See <biff>.
<newgrp wars> /n[y]oo'grp wohrz/ [USENET] n. Salvos of dueling
`newgrp' and `rmgroup' messages sometimes exchanged by persons on
opposite sides of a dispute over whether a <newsgroup> should be
created netwide. These usually settle out within a week or two as
it becomes clear whether the group has a natural constituency
(usually, it doesn't). At times, especially in the completely
anarchic `alt' hierarchy, the names of newsgroups themselves become
a form of comment or humor; cf. the spinoff of
alt.swedish.chef.bork.bork.bork from alt.tv.muppets in early 1990,
or any number of specialized abuse groups named after particularly
notorious <flamer>s.
<newline> /n[y]oo'lien/ n. 1. [UNIX] The ASCII LF character (0001010),
used under <UNIX> as a text line terminator. A Bell-Labs-ism
rather than a Berkeleyism; interestingly (and unusually for UNIX
slang) it is said originally to have been an IBM usage (though it
appears in the ASCII standard). 2. More generally, any magic
character sequence or operation (like Pascal's writeln() function)
required to terminate a text record. See <crlf>, <terpri>.
<newsfroup> /n[y]oos'froop/ [USENET] n. Silly written-only synonym for
<newsgroup>, originated as a typo but now in regular use on
USENET'S talk.bizarre and other not-real-tightly-wrapped groups.
<newsgroup> [USENET] n. One of USENET's large collection of topic
groups. Among the best-known are comp.lang.c (the C-language
forum), comp.1.wizards (for UNIX wizards), rec.arts.sf-lovers
(for science-fiction fans) and talk.politics.misc (miscellaneous
political discussions and <flamage>).
<nickle> n. A <nybble> + 1; 5 bits. Reported among developers for
Mattel's GI 1600 (the Intellivision games processor), a chip with
16-bit-wide RAM but 10-bit-wide ROM. See also <deckle>.
<night mode> n. 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.
<NMI> n. Non-Maskable Interrupt. See <priority interrupt>.
<noddy> [Great Britain; from the children's books] adj. Small and
unuseful, but demonstrating a point. Noddy programs are often
written when learning a new language or system. The archetypal
noddy program is <hello world>. Noddy code may be used to
demonstrate a feature or bug of a compiler, but would not be used
in a real program. May be used of real hardware or software to
imply that it isn't worth using. "This editor's a bit noddy."
<non-optimal (or sub-optimal) solution> n. An astoundingly stupid way
to do something. This term is generally used in deadpan sarcasm,
as its impact is greatest when the person speaking looks completely
serious. Compare <stunning>. See also <Bad Thing>.
<nonlinear> adj. [scientific computation] Behaving in an erratic and
unpredictable fashion. When used to describe the behavior of a
machine or program, it suggests that said machine or program is
being forced to run far outside of design specifications. This
behavior may be induced by unreasonable inputs, or may be triggered
when a more mundane bug sends the computation far away from its
expected course. When describing the behavior of a person,
suggests a tantrum or a <flame>. "When you talk to Bob, don't
mention the drug problem or he'll go nonlinear for hours."
<nontrivial> adj. Requiring real thought or significant computing
power. Often used as an understated way of saying that a problem
is quite difficult. See <trivial>, <uninteresting>, <interesting>.
<no-op> /noh-op/ alt. NOP (nop) [no operation] n. 1. A machine
instruction that does nothing (sometimes used in assembler-level
programming as filler for data areas). 2. A person who contributes
nothing to a project, or has nothing going on upstairs, or both.
As in "he's a no-op.". 3. Any operation or sequence of operations
with no effect, such as circling the block without finding a
parking space, or putting money into a vending machine and having
it fall immediately into the coin-return box, or asking someone for
help and being told to go away. "Oh well, that was a no-op."
<NP-> /en pee/ pref. Extremely. Used to modify adjectives describing
a level or quality of difficulty. "Getting this algorithm to
perform correctly in every case is NP-annoying." This is
generalized from the computer science terms "NP-hard" and
"NP-complete". NP is the set of Nondeterministic-Polynomial
algorithms, those which can be completed by a nondeterministic
finite state machine in an amount of time that is a polynomial
function of the size of the input.
<nuke> vt. 1. To intentionally delete the entire contents of a given
directory or storage volume. "On UNIX, rm -r /usr will nuke
everything in the usr filesystem." Never used for accidental
deletion. Oppose <blow away>. 2. Syn. for <dike>, applied to
smaller things such as files, features or code sections. 3. Used of
processes as well as files; frequently an alias for "kill -9" on
UNIX.
<null device> n. A <logical> input/output device connected to the <bit
bucket>; when you write to it nothing happens, when you reaad from
it you get a zero-length record full of nothing. Useful for
discarding unwanted output or using interactive programs in a
non-interactive way. See </dev/null>.
<numbers> [scientific computation] n. Results of a computation that may
not be physically significant, but at least indicate that the
program is running. May be used to placate management, grant
sponsors, etc. <Making numbers> means running a program because
output---any output, not necessarily meaningful output---is needed
as a demonstration of progress. See <pretty pictures>.
<NUXI problem> /nuk'see pro'blm, dh@/ n. This refers to the problem
of transferring data between machines with differing byte-order.
The string "UNIX" might look like "NUXI" on a machine with a
different "byte sex" (i.e. when transferring data from a
little-endian to a big endian or vice-versa). See also,
<big-endian>, <little-endian>, <swab>, and <bytesexual>.
<nybble> /nib'l/ [from v. `nibble' by analogy with `bite' -> `byte']
n. Four bits; one hexadecimal digit; a half-byte. Though `byte'
is now accepted technical jargon found in dictionaries, this useful
relative is still slang. Compare <crumb>, <taste>, <dynner>, see
also <bit>. Note: a correspondent in England alleges that this
spelling is never used on his side of the pond, as British
orthography would suggest the pronunciation /niebl/.
{= O =}
<Ob> /ob/ pref. Obligatory. A piece of <netiquette> that acknowledges
the author has been straying from the newsgroup's charter. For
example, if a posting in alt.sex has nothing particularly to do
with sex, the author may append "ObSex" (or "Obsex") and toss
off a question or vignette about some unusual erotic act.
<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." "The `find(1)' command's syntax is obscure."
The phrase <moderately obscure> implies that it could be figured
out but probably isn't worth the trouble. <Obscure in the extreme>
is a preferred emphatic form.
<OBFUSCATED C CONTEST> n. Annual contest run since 1984 over <the
network> by Landon Curt Noll & friends. The overall winner is he
who produces the most unreadable, creative and bizarre working C
program; various other prizes are awarded at the judges' whim.
Given C's terse syntax and macro-preprocessor facilities, this
gives contestants a lot of maneuvering room. The winning programs
often manage to be simultaneously a) funny, b) breathtaking works
of art, and c) Horrible Examples of how *not* to code in C.
This relatively short and sweet entry might help convey the flavor
of obfuscated C:
main(v,c)char**c;{for(v[c++]="Hello, world!\n)";(!!c)[*c]&&
(v--||--c&&execlp(*c,*c,c[!!c]+!!c,!c));**c=!c)write(!!*c,*c,
!!**c);}
See also <hello, world!>.
<octal forty> /ok'tl for'tee/ n. Hackish way of saying "I'm drawing a
blank" (octal 40 is the ASCII space character). See <wall>.
<off-by-one error> n. Exceedingly common error induced in many ways,
such as by starting at 0 when you should have started at 1 or vice
versa, or by writing < N instead of <= N or vice-versa. Also
applied to giving an object to the person next to the one who
should have gotten it. Often confused with <fencepost error>,
which is properly a particular subtype of it.
<off the trolley> adj. Describes the behavior of a program which
malfunctions but doesn't actually <crash> or get halted by the
operating system. See <glitch>, <bug>, <deep space>.
<offline> adv. Not now or not here. Example: "Let's take this
discussion offline." Specifically used on <USENET> to suggest
that a discussion be taken off a public newsgroup to email.
<old fart> n. Tribal elder. A title self-assumed with remarkable
frequency by (esp.) USENETters who have been programming for more
than about twenty five years; frequently appears in SIGs attached
to jargon file contributions of great archeological significance.
This is a term of insult in second or third person but pride in
first person.
<Old Testament> n. [C programmers] The first edition of the book
describing <Classic C>; see <K&R>.
<ONE BELL SYSTEM (IT WORKS)> This was the output from the old Unix V6
"1" command. The "1" command also contained a random number
generator which gave it a one in ten chance of recursively
executing itself.
<one-liner wars> n. Popular game among hackers who code in the
language APL (see <write-only language>). The objective is to see
who can code the most interesting and/or useful routine in one line
of operators chosen from APL's exceedingly <hairy> primitive set.
[This is not *quite* as silly as it sounds; I myself have
coded one-line <life> programs and once uttered a one-liner that
performed lexical analysis of its input string followed by a
dictionary lookup for good measure --- ESR] It has been reported
that a similar amusement was practised among <TECO> hackers.
<ooblick> /oo'blik/ [from Dr. Seuss' "Bartholomew and the Ooblick"]
n. A bizarre semi-liquid sludge made from cornstarch and water.
Enjoyed among hackers who make batches for playtime at parties for
its amusing and extremely non-Newtonian behavior; it pours and
splatters, but resists rapid motion like a solid and will even
crack when hit by a hammer. Often found near lasers.
<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 ekx one, close close." See <close>.
<open switch> [IBM, prob. fr. railroading] n. An unresolved issue.
<operating system> n. (Often abbreviated "OS") The foundation
software of a machine, of course; that which schedules tasks,
allocates storage, and presents a default interface to the user
between applications. The facilities the operating system provides
and its general design philosophy exert an extremely strong
influence on programming style and the technical culture that grows
up around a machine. Hacker folklore has been shaped primarily by
the UNIX, ITS, TOPS-10, TOPS-20/TWENEX, VMS, CP/M, MS-DOS, and
MULTICS operating systems (most importantly by ITS and UNIX). Each
of these has its own entry, which see.
<Orange Book> n. The U.S. Government's standards document (Trusted
Computer System Evaluation Criteria, DOD standard 5200.28-STD,
December, 1985) characterizing secure computing architectures,
defining levels A1 (most secure) through D (least). Stock UNIXes
are roughly C2. See also <Red Book>, <Blue Book>, <Green Book>,
<Silver Book>, <Purple Book>, <White Book>, <Pink-Shirt Book>,
<Dragon Book>, <Aluminum Book>.
<ORIENTAL FOOD> n. Hackers display an intense tropism towards Oriental
cuisine, especially Chinese, and especially of the spicier
varieties such as Szechuan and Hunan. This phenomenon (which has
also been observed in subcultures which overlap heavily with
hackerdom, most notably science-fiction fandom) has never been
satisfactorily explained, but is sufficiently intense that one can
assume the target of a hackish dinner expedition to be the best
local Chinese place and be right at least 3 times out of 4. See
also <ravs>, <great-wall>, <stir-fried random>. Thai, Indian,
Korean and Vietnamese cuisines are also quite popular.
<orphan> [UNIX] n. A process whose parent has died; one inherited by
`init(1)'. Compare <zombie>.
<orthogonal> [from mathematics] adj. Mutually independent;
well-separated; sometimes, irrelevant to. Used in a generalization
of its mathematical meaning to describe sets of primitives or
capabilities which, like a vector basis in geometry, span the
entire `capability space' of the system and are in some sense
non-overlapping or mutually independent. For example, in
architectures such as the MC68000 where all or nearly all registers
can be used interchangeably in any role with respect to any
instruction, the register set is said to be orthogonal. Or, in
logic, the set of operators `not' and `or' is orthogonal, but the
set `nand', `or' and `not' is not (because any one of these can be
expressed in terms of the other two via De Morgan's Laws). Also
used in comment on human discourse; "This may be orthogonal to the
discussion, but...".
<OS> /oh ess/ 1. [Operating System] n. Acronym heavily used in email,
occasionally in speech. 2. obs. n. On ITS, an output spy. See
Appendix A.
<OS/2> (oh ess too) n. The anointed successor to MS-DOS for Intel-286
and (allegedly) 386-based micros; proof that IBM/Microsoft couldn't
get it right the second time, either. Cited here because
mentioning it is usually good for a cheap laugh among hackers ---
the design was so <baroque> and the implementation of 1.x so bad
that three years after introduction you could still count the major
APPs shipping for it on the fingers of two hands. Often called
"Half-an-OS". A minority of DOS hackers retains hopes that the
32-bit 2.x version will turn out a winner. See <vaporware>,
<monstrosity>, <cretinous>, <second-system effect>.
<overrun screw> [C programming] n. A variety of <fandango on core>
produced by scribbling past the end of an array (C has no checks
for this). This is relatively benign and easy to spot if the array
is static; if it is auto, the result may be to <smash the stack>.
The term <overrun screw> is used esp. of scribbles beyond the end
of arrays allocated with `malloc(3)'; this typically trashes the
allocation header for the next block in the <arena>, producing
massive lossage within malloc and (frequently) a core dump on the
next operation to use `stdio(3)' or `malloc(3)' itself. See <spam>; see
also <memory leak>, <aliasing bug>, <precedence lossage>, <fandango
on core>.
{= P =}
<page in> [MIT] v. To become aware of one's surroundings again after
having paged out (see PAGE OUT). Usually confined to the sarcastic
comment, "So-and-so pages in. Film at 11." See <film at 11>.
<page out> [MIT] v. To become unaware of one's surroundings
temporarily, due to daydreaming or preoccupation. "Can you repeat
that? I paged out for a minute." See <page in>. Compare
<glitch>, <thinko>.
<panic> [UNIX] v. An action taken by a process or the entire operating
system when an unrecoverable error is discovered. The action
usually consists of: (1) displaying localized information on the
controlling terminal, (2) saving, or preparing for saving, a memory
image of the process or operating system, and (3) terminating the
process or rebooting the system.
<param> /p@-ram'/ n. Speech-only shorthand for "parameter". Compare
<arg>, <var>. The plural `params' is often further compressed to
`parms'.
<parity errors> pl.n. Those little lapses of attention or (in more
severe cases) consciousness, usually brought on by having spent all
night and most of the next day hacking. "I need to go home and
crash; I'm starting to get a lot of parity errors." Derives from a
relatively common but nearly always correctable transient error in
RAM hardware.
<parse> [from linguistic terminology via AI research] 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 simple; you just kretch the
glims and then aos the zotz." "I can't parse that." 3. Of
fish, to have to remove the 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 misfeature. A patch
may or may not work, and may or may not eventually be incorporated
permanently into the program. 2. v. To insert a patch into a piece
of code. 3. [in the UNIX world] n. a set of differences between two
versions of source code, generated with `diff(1)' and intended to be
mechanically applied using patch(1); often used as a way of
distributing source code upgrades and fixes over <USENET>.
<pathological> [scientific computation] adj. Purposefully engineered
as a worst case. An algorithm which can be broken by pathological
inputs may still be useful if such inputs are very unlikely to
occur in practice. The implication is that someone had to
explicitly set out to break an algorithm in order to come up with
such a crazy example.
<PBD> [abbrev of `Programmer Brain Damage'] n. Applied to bug reports
revealing places where the program was obviously broken due to an
incompetent or short-cited programmer. Compare UBD; see also
<brain-damaged>.
<PC-ism> n. A piece of code or coding technique that takes advantage
of the unprotected single-tasking environment in IBM PCs and the
like. e.g. by busy-waiting on a hardware register, direct diddling
of screen memory, or using hard timing loops. Compare
<ill-behaved>, <vaxism>, <unixism>. Also, <pc-ware> n., a program
full of PC-ISMs on a machine with a more capable operating system.
Pejorative.
<PD> /pee-dee/ adj. Common abbreviation for "public domain", applied
to software distributed over <USENET> and from Internet archive
sites. Much of this software is not in fact "public domain" in
the legal sense but travels under various copyrights granting
reproduction and use rights to anyone who can <snarf> a copy. See
<copyleft>.
<pdl> /pid'l/ or /pud'l/ [acronym for Push Down List] In ITS days, the
preferred MITism for <stack>. 2. Dave Lebling, one of the
coauthors of <Zork>; (his <network address> on the ITS machines was
at one time pdl@dms). 3. Program Design Language. Any of a large
class of formal and profoundly useless pseudo-languages in which
<management> forces one to design programs. <Management> often
expects it to be maintained in parallel with the code. Used
jokingly as in, "Have you finished the PDL?"
<PDP-10> [Programmable Data Processor model 10] n. The machine that
made timesharing real. Looms large in hacker folklore due to early
adoption in the mid-70s by many university computing facilities and
research labs including the MIT AI lab, Stanford and CMU. Some
aspects of the instruction set (most notably the bit-field
instructions) are still considered unsurpassed. Later editions
were labelled `DECsystem-10' as a way of differentiating them from
the PDP-11. The '10 was eventually eclipsed by the PDP-11 and VAX
machines and dropped from DEC's line in the early '80s, and in 1990
to have cut one's teeth on one is considered something of a badge
of honorable old-timerhood among hackers. See <TOPS-10>, <ITS>,
Appendix A.
<peek/poke> n.,v. The commands in most microcomputer BASICs for
directly accessing memory contents at an absolute address; often
extended to mean the corresponding constructs in any <HLL>. Much
hacking on small, non-MMU micros consists of <peek>ing around
memory, more or less at random, to find the location where the
system keeps "interesting" stuff. Long and variably accurate, lists
of such addresses for various computers circulate. The results of
<poke>s at these addresses may be highly useful, mildly amusing,
useless but neat or (most likely) total <lossage> (see <killer
poke>).
<percent-s> /per-sent' ess/ [From "%s", the formatting sequence in
C's `printf(3)' library function used to indicate that an arbitrary
string may be inserted] n. An unspecified person or object. "I
was just talking to some percent-s in administration." Compare
<random>.
<perf> /perf/ n. See <chad> (sense #1). The term "perfory" is also
heard.
<PERL> [Practical Extraction and Report Language, aka Pathologically
Eclectic Rubbish Lister] n. An interpreted language developed by
Larry Wall (lwall@jpl.nasa.gov, author of `patch(1)') and
distributed over USENET. Superficially resembles `awk(1)', but is
much more arcane (see AWK). Increasingly considered a <language of
choice> by UNIX sysadmins, who are almost always incorrigible
hackers. Perl has been described, in a parody of a famous remark
about `lex(1)', as the "Swiss-army chainsaw" of UNIX programming.
<pessimal> /pes'i-ml/ [Latin-based antonym for "optimal"] adj.
Maximally bad. "This is a pessimal situation." Also <pessimize>
v. to make as bad as possible. These words are the obvious
Latin-based antonyms for "optimal" and "optimize", but for some
reason they do not appear in most English dictionaries, although
"pessimize" is listed in the Oxford English Dictionary.
<pessimizing compiler> /pes'i-miez-ing kuhm-pie'lr/ [antonym of
`optimizing compiler'] n. A compiler that produces object code that
is worse than the straightforward or obvious translation. The
implication is that the compiler is actually trying to optimize the
program, but through stupidity is doing the opposite. A few
pessimizing compilers have been written on purpose, however, as
pranks.
<phase> 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 uncommon to change one's phase by as much as six hours/day
on a regular basis. "What's your phase?" "I've been getting in
about 8 PM lately, but I'm going to <wrap 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 , but less frequently, used, meaning you're working
9 to 5 (or more likely 10 to 6)). The act of altering one's cycle
is called "changing phase"; "phase shifting" has also been
recently reported from Caltech. 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.
However, some claim that either staying awake longer or sleeping
longer is easy, an that it's *shortening* your day or night
that's hard. The phenomenon of "jet lag" that afflicts travelers
who cross many time-zone boundaries may be attributed to two
distinct causes: the strain of travel per se, and the strain of
changing phase. Hackers who suddenly find that they must change
phase drastically in a short period of time, particularly the hard
way, experience something very like jet lag without travelling.
<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 reliability seems to be dependent on
conditions nobody has been able to determine. "This feature
depends on having the channel open in mumble mode, having the foo
switch set, and on the phase of the moon."
True story: Once upon a time, a program written by Gerry Sussman
(professor of Electrical Engineering at MIT) and Guy Steele had a
bug that really did depend on the phase of the moon! There is a
little subroutine that had traditionally been used in various
programs at MIT to calculate an approximation to the moon's true
phase; the phase is then printed out at the top of program
listings, for example, along with the date and time, purely for
fun. (Actually, since hackers spend a lot of time indoors, this
might be the only way they would ever know what the moon's phase
was!) Steele incorporated this routine into a LISP program that,
when it wrote out a file, would print a `timestamp" line almost 80
characters long. Very occasionally the first line of the message
would be too long and would overflow onto the next line, and when
the file was later read back in the program would <barf>. The
length of the first line depended on the precise time when the
timestamp was printed, and so the bug literally depended on the
phase of the moon!
The first paper edition of the Jargon File (Steele-1983) included
an example of this bug, but the typesetter "corrected" it. This
has since been described as the phase-of-the-moon-bug bug.
<pig, run like a> adj. To run very slowly on given hardware, said of
software. Distinct from <hog>.
<ping> /ping/ [from TCP/IP terminology] n.,v. 1. Slang term for a
small network message (ICMP ECHO) sent by a computer to check for
the presence and aliveness of another. Occasionally used as a
phone greeting. See <ACK>, also <ENQ>. 2. To verify the presence
of. 3. To get the attention of. From the Unix command by the same
name (an acronym of "Packet INternet Groper) that sends an ICMP
ECHO packet to another host. This was probably contrived to match
submariners' "ping" (sonar ranging pulse).
<Pink-Shirt Book> `The Peter Norton Programmer's Guide to the IBM
PC'. The original cover featured a picture of Peter Norton with a
silly smirk on his face, wearing a pink shirt. Perhaps in
recognition of this usage, the current edition has a different
picture of Norton wearing a pink shirt.
<PIP> /pip/ v. obs. To copy, from the program PIP on CP/M and RSX-11
that was used for file copying (and in RSX for just about every
other file operation you might want to do). Obsolete, but still
occasionally heard.
<pipeline> [UNIX, orig. by Doug McIlroy; now also used under MS-DOS
and elsewhere] n. A chain of <filter> programs connected
"head-to-tail", so that the output of one becomes the input of
the next. Under UNIX, user utilities can often be implemented or
at least prototyped by a suitable collection of pipelines and
temp-file grinding encapsulated in a shell script; this is much
less effort than writing C every time, and the capability is
considered one of UNIX's major winning features.
<pizza, ANSI standard> /pee'tz@, an'see stan'd@rd/ [CMU] Pepperoni
and mushroom pizza. Coined allegedly because most pizzas ordered
by CMU hackers during some period leading up to mid-1990 were of
that flavor. See also <rotary debugger>.
<plain-ASCII> Syn. <flat-ASCII>.
<playpen> [IBM] n. A room where programmers work. Compare <salt
mines>.
<playte> /din'r/ 16 bits, by analogy with <nybble> and byte. Usage:
rare and extremely silly. See also <dynner>.
<plingnet> /pling'net/ n. Syn. <UUCPNET>. Also see <COMMONWEALTH
HACKISH>.
<plonk> [USENET] The sound a <newbie> makes as he falls to the bottom
of a <kill file>. Almost exclusively used in the <newsgroup>
"talk.bizarre", this term (usually written "*plonk*") is a
form of public ridicule.
<plugh> /ploogh/ [from the <ADVENT> game] v. See <xyzzy>.
<PM> /pee em/ 1. [from "preventive maintenance"] v. to bring down a
machine for inspection or test purposes; see <scratch monkey>. 2.
n. Abbrev. for "Presentation Manager", an <elephantine> OS/2
graphical user interface.
<P.O.D.> /pee-oh-dee/ Acronym for `Piece Of Data' (as opposed to a
code section). Usage: pedantic and rare.
<pod> n. A Diablo 630 (or, latterly, any impact letter quality
printer). From the DEC-10 PODTYPE program used to feed formatted
text to same.
<poll> v.,n. 1. The action of checking the status of an input line,
sensor, or memory location to see if a particular external event
has been registered. 2. To ask. "I'll poll everyone and see where
they want to go for lunch."
<polygon pusher> n. A chip designer who spends most of his/her time at
the physical layout level (which requires drawing *lots* of
multi-colored polygons). Also "rectangle slinger".
<POM> /pee-oh-em/ n. <Phase of the moon>. Usage: usually used in the
phrase "POM dependent" which means <flaky>.
<POP> also <POPJ> /pop-jay/ [based on the stack operation that removes
the top of a stack, and the fact that procedure return addresses
are saved on the stack] 1. v. To remove something from a <stack>
or <pdl>. If a person says he has popped something from his stack,
he means he has finally finished working on it and can now remove
it from the list of things hanging over his head. 2. To return
from a digression (the J-form derives specifically from a <PDP-10>
assembler instruction). By verb doubling, "Popj, popj" means
roughly, "Now let's see, where were we?" See <RTI>.
<PPN> /pip'n/ [from "Project-Programmer Number"] n. A user-ID under
<TOPS-10> and its various mutant progeny at SAIL and BBN and
CompuServe and elsewhere. Old-time hackers from the PDP-10 era
sometimes use this to refer to user IDs on other systems as well.
<precedence lossage> /pre's@-dens los'j/ [C programmers] n. Coding
error in an expression due to unexpected grouping of arithmetic or
logical operators by the compiler. Used esp. of certain common
coding errors in C due to the nonintuitively low precedence levels
of &, | and ^. Can always be avoided by suitable use of
parentheses. See <aliasing bug>, <memory leak>, <smash the stack>,
<fandango on core>, <overrun screw>.
<prepend> /pree`pend'/ [by analogy with "append"] v. To prefix.
Like "append", but unlike "prefix" or "suffix" as a verb, the
direct object is always the thing being added and not the original
word (character string, etc). No, this is *not* standard
English, yet!
<pretty pictures> n. [scientific computation] The next step up from
<numbers>. Interesting graphical output from a program which may
not have any real relationship to the reality the program is
intended to model. Good for showing to <management>.
<prettyprint> v. 1. To generate `pretty' human-readable output from a
hairy internal representation; esp. used for the process of
<grind>ing (sense #2) LISP code. 2. To format in some particularly
slick and nontrivial way. See <grind>.
<prime time> [from TV programming] n. Normal high-usage hours on a
timesharing system, the `day shift'. Avoidance of prime time is a
major reason for <night mode> hacking.
<priority interrupt> [from the hardware term] n. Describes any
stimulus compelling enough to yank one right out of <hack mode>.
Classically used to describe being dragged away by an <SO> for
immediate sex, but may also refer to more mundane interruptions
such as a fire alarm going off in the near vicinity. Also called
an NMI (non maskable interrupt) especially in PC-land.
<Programmer's Cheer> "Shift to the left! Shift to the right! Push
down, pop up! Byte! Byte! Byte!" A joke so old it has hair on
it...
<propeller head> n. Used by hackers, this is syn. with <computer
geek>. Non-hackers sometimes use it to describe all techies.
Prob. derives from SF fandom's tradition of propeller beanies as
fannish insignia (though nobody actually wears them except as a
joke).
<protocol> n. See <do protocol>.
<prowler> [UNIX] n. A <DEMON> that is run periodically (typically once
a week) to seek out and erase core files, truncate administrative
logfiles, nuke lost+found directories, and otherwise clean up the
cruft that tends to pile up in the corners of a file system. See
also <GFR>, <reaper>, <skulker>.
<pseudo> /soo'do/ [USENET] n. 1. An electronic-mail or <USENET>
persona adopted by a human for amusement value or as a means of
avoiding negative repercussions of his/her net.behavior; a `nom de
USENET', often associated with forged postings designed to conceal
message origins. Perhaps the best-known and funniest hoax of this
type is <biff>. 2. Notionally, a <flamage>-generating AI program
simulating a USENET user. Many flamers have been accused of
actually being such entities, despite the fact that no AI program
of the required sophistication exists. However, in 1989 there was
a famous series of forged postings that used a
phrase-frequency-based travesty generator to simulate the styles of
several well-known flamers based on large samples of their back
postings. A significant number of people were fooled by these, and
the debate over their authenticity was only settled when the
perpetrator of the hoax came publicly forward to admit the deed.
<pseudoprime> n. A backgammon prime (six consecutive occupied points)
with one point missing. This term is an esoteric pun derived from
a mathematical method which, rather than determining precisely
whether a number is prime (has no divisors), uses a statistical
technique to decide whether the number is "probably" prime. A
number that passes this test is called a pseudoprime. The hacker
backgammon usage stems from the idea that pseudoprime is almost as
good as a prime: it does the job of a prime until proven otherwise,
and that probably won't happen.
<pseudosuit> n. A <suit> wannabee; a hacker who's decided that he
wants to be in management or administration and begins wearing
ties, sport coats and (shudder!) suits voluntarily. Chacun a son
gout...
<punt> [from the punch line of an old joke referring to American
football: "Drop back 15 yards and punt"] v. To give up, typically
without any intention of retrying. "Let's punt the movie
tonight." "I was going to hack all night to get this feature in,
but I decided to punt" may mean that you've decided not to stay up
all night, and may also mean you're not ever even going to put in
the feature.
<Purple Book> n. The `System V Interface Definition'. The covers
of the first editions were an amazingly nauseating shade of
off-lavender. See also <Red Book>, <Blue Book>, <Green Book>,
<Silver Book>, <Orange Book>, <White Book>, <Pink-Shirt Book>,
<Dragon Book>, <Aluminum Book>.
<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] Also PUSHJ (push-jay), based on the PDP-10 procedure
call instruction. 1. To put something onto a <stack> or <pdl>. If
a person says something has been pushed onto his stack, he means
yet another thing has been added to the list of things hanging over
his head for him to do. 2. v. To enter upon a digression, to save
the current discussion for later. Antonym of <POP>, <POPJ>; see
also <stack>, <pdl>.
<psychedelicware> [Great Britain] n. Syn. <display hack>.
{= Q =}
<quadruple bucky> n., obs. On a <space-cadet keyboard>, use of all
four of the shifting keys control, meta, hyper, and super while
typing a character key. This was very difficult to do! One
accepted technique was to press the left-control and left-meta keys
with your left hand, the right-control and right-meta keys with
your right hand, and the fifth key with your nose. Thus, this
combination was very seldom used in practice, because when you
invent a new command you usually assign it to some character that
is easier to type. If you want to imply that a program has
ridiculously many commands or features, you can say something like
"Oh, the command that makes it spin all the tapes while whistling
Beethoven's Fifth Symphony is quadruple-bucky-cokebottle". See
<double bucky>, <bucky bits>.
<quantum bogodynamics> /kwahn'tm boh`goh-die-nam'iks/ n. Theory which
characterizes the universe in terms of bogon sources (such as
politicians, used-car salesmen, TV evangelists, and SUITs in
general), bogon sinks (such as taxpayers and computers), and
bogosity potential fields. Bogon absorption, of course, causes
human beings to behave mindlessly and machines to fail (and may
cause them to emit secondary bogons as well); however, the precise
mechanics of the bogon-computron interaction are not yet understood
and remain to be elucidated. Quantum bogodynamics is most
frequently invoked to explain the sharp increase in hardware and
software failures in the presence of suits; the latter emit bogons
which the former absorb. See <bogon>, <computron>, <suit>.
<ques> /kwess/ 1. n. The question mark character ("?"). 2. interj.
What? Also frequently verb-doubled as "ques ques?" See <wall>.
<qux> /kwuhks/ The fourth of the standard metasyntactic variables,
after <baz> and before the QUU*X series. See <foo>, <bar>, <baz>,
<quux>. Note that this appears to a be recent mutation from
<quux>, and that many versions of the standard series just run
<foo>, <bar>, <baz>, <quux>,...
<quux> /kwuhks/ [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", for four u-letters
out of seven total).] 1. Originally, a meta-word like <foo> and
<foobar>. Invented by Guy Steele for precisely this purpose 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. In an
eloquent display of poetic justice, it has returned to the
originator in the form of a nickname, as punishment for inventing
this bletcherous word in the first place. 2. interj. See <foo>;
however, denotes very little disgust, and is uttered mostly for the
sake of the sound of it. 3. Guy L. Steele in his persona as "The
Great Quux", which is somewhat infamous for light verse and for
the "Crunchly" cartoons. 4. quuxy: adj. Of or pertaining to a
quux.
<QWERTY> /kwer'tee/ adj. Pertaining to a standard English typewriter
keyboard, as opposed to Dvorak or foreign-language layouts or a
<space-cadet keyboard> or APL keyboard.
{= R =}
<random> adj. 1. Unpredictable (closest to mathematical definition);
weird. "The system's been behaving pretty randomly." 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 misfeatures." "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 an assembler routine that could
easily have been coded using only three registers, but randomly
uses seven for assorted non-overlapping purposes, so that no one
else can invoke it without first saving four extra registers. 6.
In no particular order, though deterministic. "The I/O channels
are in a pool, and when a file is opened one is chosen randomly."
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. See also <J.
Random>, <some random X>.
<random numbers> n. When one wishes to specify a large but random
number of things, and the context is inappropriate for <N>, certain
numbers are preferred by hacker tradition (that is, easily
recognized as placeholders). These include
17 Long described at MIT as "the least random number", see 23.
23 Sacred number of Eris, Goddess of Discord (along with 17 & 5).
42 The Answer to the Question of Life, the Universe and Everything.
69 From the sexual act. This one was favored in MIT's ITS culture.
105 69 hex = 105 dec, and 69 dec = 105 oct
666 The Number of the Beast.
For further enlightenment, consult the `Principia Discordia',
`The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy', any porn movie, and the
Christian Bible's `Book Of Revelations'. See also
<Discordianism>.
<randomness> n. An unexplainable misfeature; gratuitous inelegance.
Also, a <hack> or <crock> which depends on a complex combination of
coincidences (or rather, the combination upon which the crock
depends for its accidental failure to malfunction). "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;
in particular, to destroy a program or information irrecoverably
Usage: often used in describing file-system damage. "So-and-so
was running a program that did absolute disk I/O and ended up
raping the master directory."
<rare> [UNIX] adj. CBREAK mode (character-by-character with interrupts
enabled). Distinguished from `raw' and `cooked'; the phrase
"half-cooked (rare?)" is used in the V7/BSD manuals to describe
the mode. Usage: rare.
<raster blaster> n. [Cambridge] Specialized hardware for <bitblt>
operations. Allegedly inspired by analogy with "Rasta Blasta",
British slang for the sort of portable stereo/radio/tapedeck
Americans call a `boom box' or `ghetto blaster'.
<raster burn> n. Eyestrain brought on by too many hours of looking at
low-res, poorly tuned or glare-ridden monitors, esp. graphics
monitors. See <terminal illness>.
<rave> [WPI] v. 1. To persist in discussing a specific subject. 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.
<Rave> differs slightly from <flame> in that <rave> implies that it
is the manner or persistence of speaking that is annoying, while
<flame> implies somewhat more strongly that the subject matter is
annoying as well.
<rave on!> imp. Sarcastic invitation to continue a <rave>, often by
someone who wishes the raver would get a clue but realizes this is
unlikely.
<ravs> /ravz/, also CHINESE RAVS n. Kuo-teh. A Chinese appetizer,
known variously in the plural as dumplings, potstickers and (around
Boston) `Peking Ravioli'. The term "rav" is short for
"ravioli", which among hackers always means the Chinese kind
rather than the Italian kind. Both consist of a filling in a pasta
shell, but the Chinese kind uses a thinner pasta and is cooked
differently, either by steaming or frying. A rav or dumpling can
be steamed or fried, but a potsticker is always the fried kind (so
called because it sticks to the frying pot and has to be scraped
off). "Let's get hot-and-sour soup and three orders of ravs."
See also <ORIENTAL FOOD>.
<READ.ME file> n. By convention, the top-level directory of a UNIX
source distribution always contains a file named `READ.ME' (or
README, or (rarely) ReadMe) which is a hacker's-eye introduction
containing a pointer to more detailed documentation, credits,
miscellaneous revision history notes, etc.
<read-only user> n. Describes a <luser> who uses computers almost
exclusively for reading USENET, bulletin boards and email, as
opposed to writing code or purveying useful information. See
<twink>.
<real programmer> [indirectly, from the book `Real Men Don't Eat
Quiche'] n. A particular sub-variety of hacker, one possessed of a
flippant attitude towards complexity that is arrogant even when
justified by experience. The archetypal `real programmer' likes to
program on the <bare metal>, and is very good at same; he remembers
the binary opcodes for every machine he's every programmed; thinks
that HLLs are sissy; and he uses a debugger to edit his code
because full-screen editors are for wimps. Real Programmers aren't
satisfied with code that hasn't been <bum>med into a state of
<tense>ness just short of rupture. Real Programmers never use
comments or write documentation; "If it was hard to write", says
the Real Programmer, "it should be hard to understand." Real
Programmers can make machines do things that were never in their
spec sheets; in fact, they're seldom really happy unless doing so.
A Real Programmer's code can awe you with its fiendish brilliance
even as it appalls by its level of crockishness. Real Programmers
live on junk food and coffee, hang line-printer art on their walls,
and terrify the crap out of other programmers --- because someday,
somebody else might have to try to understand their code in order
to change it. Their successors generally consider it a <Good
Thing> that there aren't many Real Programmers around any more.
<Real Soon Now> [orig. from SF's fanzine community, popularized by
Jerry Pournelle's BYTE column] adj. 1. Supposed to be available
(or fixed, or cheap, or whatever) real soon now according to
somebody, but the speaker is quite skeptical. 2. When the
gods/fates/other time commitments permit the speaker to get to it.
Often abbreviated RSN.
<real time> adv. Doing something while people are watching or waiting.
"I asked her how to find the calling procedure's program counter
on the stack and she came up with an algorithm in real time."
<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 project, course, etc.). See
<user>. Hackers who are also students may also be real users. "I
need this fixed so I can do a problem set. I'm not complaining out
of randomness, but as a real user." See also <luser>.
<Real World> n. 1. In programming, those institutions at which
programming may be used in the same sentence as FORTRAN, COBOL,
RPG, <IBM>, etc. Places where programs do such commercially
necessary but intellectually uninspiring things as compute payroll
checks and invoices. 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 person. See also <fear and loathing>, <mundane>, and
<uninteresting>.
<reaper> n. A <prowler> which GFRs files (see <GFR>). A file removed
in this way is said to have been "reaped".
<rectangle slinger> n. See <polygon pusher>.
<recursion> n. See <recursion>. See also <tail recursion>.
<RECURSIVE ACRONYMS> pl.n. A hackish (and especially MIT) tradition is
to choose acronyms which refer humorously to themselves or to other
acronyms. The classic examples were two MIT editors called EINE
("EINE Is Not EMACS") and ZWEI ("ZWEI Was EINE Initially").
More recently, <GNU> (q.v., sense #1) is said to stand for "GNU's
Not UNIX!"
<Red Book> n. 1. Informal name for one of the three standard
references on PostScript (`PostScript Language Reference Manual',
Adobe Systems, Addison-Wesley 1985 QA76.73.P67P67, ISBN
0-201-10174-2); the others are known as the <Green Book> and <Blue
Book>. 2. `Smalltalk-80: The Interactive Programming
Environment', Adele Goldberg, Addison-Wesley 1984,
QA76.8.S635G638, ISBN 0-201-11372-4 (this is also associated with
blue and green books). 3. Any of the 1984 standards issued by the
CCIT 8th plenary assembly. Until now, these have changed color
each review cycle (1988 was <Blue Book>, 1992 will be <Green
Book>); however, it is rumored that this convention is going to be
dropped befor 1992. These include, among other things, the X.400
email spec and the Group 1 through 4 fax standards. 4. The new
version of the <Green Book> (sense #4), "IEEE 1003.1-1990", aka
"ISO 9945-1", is (because of the colour and the fact that it is
printed on A4 paper), known in the USA as "The Ugly Red Book That
Won't Fit On The Shelf", and in Europe as "The Ugly Red Book
That's A Sensible Size". See also <Green Book>, <Blue Book>,
<Purple Book>, <Silver Book>, <Orange Book>, <White Book>,
<Pink-Shirt Book>, <Dragon Book>, <Aluminum Book>.
<regexp> /reg'exp/ [UNIX] n. 1. Common written and spoken abbreviation
for `regular expression', one of the wildcard patterns used, e.g.,
by UNIX utilities such as `grep(1)', `sed(1)' and `awk(1)'. These use
conventions similar to but more elaborate than those described
under <glob>. 2. Name of a well-known PD regexp-handling package
in portable C, written by revered USENETter Henry Spencer
(henry@zoo.toronto.edu).
<reincarnation, cycle of> n. Term used to refer to a well-known effect
whereby function in a computing system family is migrated out to
special purpose peripheral hardware for speed, then the peripheral
evolves towards more computing power as it does its job, then
somebody notices that it's inefficient to support two asymmetrical
processors in the architecture and folds the function back into the
main CPU, at which point the cycle begins again. Several
iterations of this cycle have been observed in graphics processor
design, and at least one or two in communications and
floating-point processors. Also known as "the Wheel of Life",
"the Wheel of Samsara", and other variations of the basic
Hindu/Buddhist theological idea.
<religious issues> n. Questions which seemingly cannot be raised
without touching off holy wars>, such as "What is the best
editor/language/operating system/architecture/shell/mail
reader/news reader". See also <theology>.
<replicator> n. Any construct that acts to produce copies of itself;
this could be a living organism, an idea (see <meme>), a program
(see <worm>, <wabbit> and <virus>), a pattern in a cellular
automaton (see <life>, sense #1), or (speculatively) a robot.
<retcon> /ret'-con/ ["retroactive continuity", from USENET's
rec.arts.comics] 1. n. the common situation in pulp fiction (esp.
comics, soaps) where a new story "reveals" new things about
events previous stories, usually leaving the "facts" the same
(thus preserving "continuity") while completely changing their
interpretation. E.g., revealing that a whole season's episodes of
Dallas was a dream was a retcon. 2. v.t. To write such a story
about (a character or fictitious object). Thus, "Byrne has
retconned Superman's cape so that it is no longer unbreakable".
3. v.i. Used of something "transformed" in this way -
"Marvelman's old adventures were retconned into synthetic
dreams", "Swamp Thing was retconned from a transformed person
into a sentient vegetable."
[This is included because it's a good example of hackish linguistic
innovation in a field completely unrelated to computers. The word
"retcon" will probably spread through comics fandom and lose its
association with hackerdom within a couple of years; for the
record, it started here. -- ESR]
<retrocomputing> /ret'-roh-k@m-pyoo'ting/ n. Refers to emulations of
way-behind-the state-of-the-art hardware or software, or
implementations of never-was-state-of-the-art; esp. if such
implementations are elaborate practical jokes and/or parodies of
more `serious' designs. Perhaps the most widely distributed
retrocomputing utility was the `pnch(6)' program on V7 and other
early UNIX versions, which would accept up to 80 characters of text
argument and display the corresponding pattern in Hollerith card
code. Other well-known retrocomputing hacks have included the
programming language <INTERCAL>, a jcl-emulating shell for UNIX,
the card-punch-emulating editor named 029, and various elaborate
PDP-11 hardware emulators and RT-11 OS emulators written just to
keep an old, sourceless <Zork> binary running.
<RFC> /ahr ef see/ n. Request For Comment. One of a long-established
series of numbered Internet standards widely followed by commercial
and PD software in the Internet and UNIX communities. Perhaps the
single most influential one has been RFC-822 (the Internet
mail-format standard). The RFCs are unusual in that they are
floated by technical experts acting on their own initiative and
reviewed by the Internet at large, rather than formally promulgated
through an institution such as ANSI. For this reason they remain
known as RFCs even once adopted.
<RFE> n. 1. Request For Enhancement. 2. [Bellcore, Sun] Radio Free
Ethernet, a system (originated by Peter Langston) for broadcasting
audio among Sun SPARCstations over the ethernet.
<rice box> [from ham radio slang] n. Any Asian-made commodity
computer, esp. an 8086, 80286, 80386 or 80486-based machine built
to IBM PC-compatible ISA or EISA-bus standards.
<Right Thing, The> n. That which is *obviously* the correct or
appropriate thing to use, do, say, etc. Often capitalized, always
emphasized in speech as though capitalized. Use of this term often
implies that in fact reasonable people may disagree. "Never let
your conscience keep you from doing the right thing!" "What's
the right thing for LISP to do when it reads (a mod 0)? Should it
return a, or give a divide-by-zero error?" Antonym: <Wrong
Thing>.
<RL> [MUD community] n. Real Life. "Firiss laughs in RL" means
Firiss's player is laughing.
<roach> [Bell Labs] v. To destroy, esp. of a data structure. Hardware
gets <toast>ed, software gets roached.
<robust> adj. Said of a system which has demonstrated an ability to
recover gracefully from the whole range of exception conditions in
a given environment. One step below <bulletproof>. Compare
<smart>, oppose <brittle>.
<root> n. [UNIX] 1. The top node of the system directory structure
(home directory of the root user). 2. The "superuser" account
that ignores permission bits, user number zero on a UNIX system.
This account has the user name `root'. 3. By extension, the
privileged system-maintenance login on any OS. 4. Thus, <root
mode>: Syn. with <wizard mode> or <wheel mode>. Like these, it is
often generalized to describe privileged states in systems other
than OSs. 5. <go root>: to temporarily enter <root mode> in order
to perform a privileged operation. This use is deprecated in
Australia, where v. "root" is slang for "to have sex with".
<rotary debugger> [Commodore] n. Essential equipment for those late
night or early morning debugging sessions. Mainly used as
sustenance for the hacker. Comes in many decorator colors such as
Sausage, Pepperoni, and Garbage. See <pizza, ANSI standard>.
<rogue> [UNIX] n. Graphic Dungeons-And-Dragons-like game written under
BSD UNIX and subsequently ported to other UNIX systems. The
original BSD `curses(3)' screen-handling package was hacked together
by Ken Arnold to support `rogue(6)' and has since become one of
UNIX's most important and heavily used application libraries.
Nethack, Omega, Larn and an entire subgenre of computer dungeon
games all took off from the inspiration provided by `rogue(6)'. See
<hack>.
<room-temperature IQ> [IBM] 80 or below. Used in describing the
expected intelligence range of the <luser>. As in "Well, but
how's this interface gonna play with the room-temperature IQ
crowd?" See <drool-proof paper>.
<rot13> /rot-ther'teen/ [USENET, from "rotate alphabet 13 places"]
n.,v. The simple encryption of replacing each English letter with
the one 13 places forward or back along the alphabet, so that "The
butler did it!" becomes "Gur ohgyre qvq vg!" Most Usenet news
reading and posting programs include a rot13 feature. It is used
as if to enclose the text in a sealed wrapper that the reader must
choose to open, for posting things that might offend some readers,
answers to puzzles, or discussion of movie plot surprises.
<RSN> adj. See <Real Soon Now>.
<RTFM> /ahr-tee-ef-em/ [UNIX] Abbrev. for "Read The Fucking Manual".
1. Used by GURUs to brush off questions they consider trivial or
annoying. Compare <Don't do that, then!>. 2. Used when reporting
a problem to indicate that you aren't just asking out of
<randomness>. "No, I can't figure out how to interface UNIX to my
toaster and yes I have RTFM." Unlike sense #1 this use is
considered polite.
<RTI> /ahr-tee-ie/ interj. The mnemonic for the `return from
interrupt' instruction on Intel microprocessors. Equivalent to
"Now, where was I?" or used to end a conversational digression.
See <POP>, <POPJ>.
<rude> [WPI] adj. 1. (of a program) Badly written. 2. Functionally
poor, e.g. a program which is very difficult to use because of
gratuitously poor (random?) design decisions. See <cuspy>.
<runes> pl.n. 1. Anything that requires <heavy wizardry> or <black
art> to <parse>; core dumps, JCL commands, or even code in a
language you don't have the faintest idea how to read. Compare
<casting the runes>. 2. Special display characters (for example,
the high-half graphics on an IBM PC). 3. <runic> adj. Syn.
<obscure>. VMS fans sometimes refer to UNIX as `Runix'; UNIX fans
return the compliment by expanding VMS to `Vachement Mauvais
Systeme' (lit. "Cowlike Bad System").
{= S =}
<sacred> adj. Reserved for the exclusive use of something (a
metaphorical extension of the standard meaning). "Accumulator 7
is sacred to the UUO handler." Often means that anyone may look
at the sacred object, but clobbering it will screw whatever it is
sacred to. Example: The comment "Register 7 is sacred to the
interrupt handler" appearing in a program would be interpreted by
a hacker to mean that one part of the program, the "interrupt
handler", uses register 7, and if any other part of the program
changes the contents of register 7 dire consequences are likely to
ensue.
<sadistics> /s@'dis'tiks/ n. University slang for statistics and
probability theory, often used by hackers.
<saga> [WPI] n. A cuspy but bogus raving story dealing with N random
broken people.
<sagan> [from Carl Sagan's TV series on PBS, think "Billions and
Billions"] n. A large quantity of anything. "There's a sagan
different ways to tweak EMACS." "The US Government spends sagans
on military hardware."
<SAIL> n. Stanford University Artificial Intelligence Lab. An
important site in the early development of LISP; with the MIT AI
LAB, CMU and the UNIX community, one of the major founts of hacker
culture traditions. The SAIL machines were shut down in late May
1990, scant weeks after the MIT AI lab's ITS cluster went down for
the last time.
<salescritter> /sayls'kri-tr/ n. Pejorative hackerism for a computer
salesperson. Hackers tell the following joke:
Q. What's the difference between a used car dealer and a computer
salesman?
A. The used car dealer knows he's lying.
This reflects the widespread hacker belief that salescritters are
self-selected for stupidity (after all, if they had brains and the
inclination to use them they'd be making more money programming).
The term "salesthing" is also common. Compare <marketroid>,
<suit>.
<salt mines> n. Dense quarters housing large numbers of programmers
working long hours on grungy projects, with some hope of seeing the
end of the tunnel in N years. Noted for their absence of sunshine.
Compare <playpen>.
<sandbender> [IBM] n. A person involved with silicon lithography and
the physical design of chips. Compare <ironmonger>, <polygon
pusher>.
<say> v. In some contexts, to type to a terminal. "To list a
directory verbosely, you have to say `ls -l'". Tends to imply
a carriage-return-terminated command (a `sentence'). A computer
may also be said to `say' things to you even if it doesn't have a
speech synthesizer, by displaying them on a terminal in response to
your commands. Hackers find it odd that this usage confuses other
people.
<SCIENCE-FICTION FANDOM> n. Another voluntary subculture having a very
heavy overlap with hackerdom; most hackers read SF and/or fantasy
fiction avidly, and many go to "cons" (SF conventions) or are
involved in fandom-connected activities like the Society for
Creative Anachronism. Some hacker slang originated in SF fandom;
see <defenestration>, <great-wall>, <cyberpunk>, <h infix>, <ha ha
only serious>, <IMHO>, <mundane>, <neep-neep>, <Real Soon Now>.
Additionally, the jargon terms <cowboy>, <cyberspace>, <de-rez>,
<go flatline>, <ice>, <virus>, <wetware>, <wirehead> and <worm>
originated in SF itself.
<scratch> [from "scratchpad"] 1. adj. A device or recording medium
attached to a machine for testing or temporary-use purposes; one
which can be <SCRIBBLED> on without loss. Usually in the combining
forms "scratch memory", "scratch disk", "scratch tape",
"scratch volume". See <scratch monkey>. 2. [primarily IBM] v. To
delete (as in a file).
<scratch monkey> n. As in, "Before testing or reconfiguring, always
mount a". A proverb used to advise caution when dealing with
irreplaceable data or devices. Used in memory of Mabel, the
Swimming Wonder Monkey who expired when a computer vendor PM'd a
machine which was regulating the gas mixture that the monkey was
breathing at the time. See Appendix A. See <scratch>.
<screw> [MIT] n. A <lose>, usually in software. Especially used for
user-visible misbehavior caused by a bug or misfeature.
<screwage> /scroo'@j/ n. Like <lossage> but connotes that the failure
is due to a designed-in misfeature rather than a simple inadequacy
or mere bug.
<scrog> /skrog/ [Bell Labs] v. To damage, trash or corrupt a data
structure. "The cblock got scrogged." Also reported as
"skrog", and ascribed to "The Wizard of Id" comix. Equivalent
to <scribble> or <mangle>
<scrozzle> /skroh'zl/ v. Used when a self-modifying code segment runs
incorrectly and corrupts the running program, or vital data. "The
damn compiler scrozzled itself again!"
<scribble> n. To modify a data structure in a random and
unintentionally destructive way. "Bletch! Somebody's
disk-compactor program went berserk and scribbled on the i-node
table." "It was working fine until one of the allocation routines
scribbled on low core." Synonymous with <trash>; compare <mung>,
which conveys a bit more intention, and <mangle>, which is more
violent and final.
SCSI /ess see ess ie/ n. Small Computer System Interface is a
system-level interface between a computer and intelligent devices.
Typically annotated in literature with "sexy" (/sek'see/) and
"scuzzy" (/skuhz'zee/) as pronunciation guides...the latter being
the predominating form, much to the dismay of the designers and
marketing people.
<search-and-destroy mode> n. Hackerism for the search-and-replace
facility in an editor, so called because an incautiously chosen
match pattern can cause <infinite> damage.
<second-system effect> n. When designing the successor to a relatively
small, elegant and successful system, there is a tendency to become
grandiose in one's success and perpetrate an <elephantine>
feature-laden monstrosity. The term was first used by Fred Brooks
in his classic book "The Mythical Man-Month". It described the
jump from a set of nice, simple, operating monitors on the IBM 70xx
series to OS/360 on the 360 series.
<segfault> n.,v. Syn for <segment>, <seggie>.
<seggie> /seg'ee/ [UNIX] n. Shorthand for <segmentation fault>
reported from Britain.
<segment> /seg'ment/ v. To experience a <segmentation fault>.
Confusingly, this is often accented on the first syllable rather
than on the second as for mainstream v. segment; this is because
it's actually a noun shorthand that has been verbed.
<segmentation fault (or violation)> n. [UNIX] 1. Error in which a
running program attempts to access memory not allocated to it and
<core dump> with a segment violation error. 2. To lose a train of
thought or a line of reasoning. Also uttered as an exclamation at
the point of befuddlement.
<self-reference> n. See <self-reference>.
<selvage> /selv'@j/ [from sewing] n. See <chad> (sense #1).
<semi> /se'mee/ 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." (That is, maybe not for an
hour). "We did consider that possibility semi-seriously." See
also <infinite>.
<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. A particularly common term on the Internet,
which is rife with "name servers" "domain servers" "news
servers" "finger servers" and the like.
<SEX> [Sun User's Group & elsewhere] n. 1. Software EXchange. A
technique invented by the blue-green algae hundreds of millions of
years ago to speed up their evolution, which had been terribly slow
up until then. Today, SEX parties are popular among hackers and
others. 2. The rather Freudian mnemonic often used for Sign Extend,
a machine instruction found in many architectures. Amusingly, the
Intel 8048 (the microcontroller used in IBM PC keyboards) was
missing straight SEX but had logical-or and logical-and
instructions ORL and ANL.
<shareware> n. <freeware> for which the author requests some payment,
usually in the accompanying documentation files or in an
announcement made by the software itself. Such payment may or may
not buy additional support or functionality. See <guiltware>,
<crippleware>.
<shelfware> n. Software purchased on a whim (by an individual user) or
in accordance with policy (by a corporation or government) but not
actually required for any particular use. Therefore, it often ends
up on some shelf.
<shell> [UNIX, now used elsewhere] n. 1. The command interpreter used
to pass commands to an operating system. 2. More generally, any
interface program which mediates access to a special resource or
<server> for convenience, efficiency or security reasons; for this
meaning, the usage is usually "a shell around" whatever. This
sort of program is also called a "wrapper".
<shell out> [UNIX] n. To spawn an interactive subshell from within a
program such as a mailer or editor. "Bang foo runs foo in a
<subshell>, while bang alone shells out."
<shift left (or 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! You
can move to that empty one to the left (right)." Usage: often
used without the "logical", or as "left shift" instead of
"shift left". Sometimes heard as LSH (lish), from the PDP-10
instruction set.
<shitogram> /shit'oh-gram/ n. A *really* nasty piece of email.
Compare <nastygram>, <flame>.
<shriek> See <excl>. Occasional CMU usage, also in common use among
mathematicians, especially category theorists.
<sig block> /sig blok/ [UNIX; often written ".sig" there] n. Short
for "signature", used specifically to refer to the electronic
signature block which most UNIX mail- and news-posting software
will allow you to automatically append to outgoing mail and news.
The composition of one's sig can be quite an art form, including an
ASCII logo or one's choice of witty sayings (see <sig quote>); but
many consider large sigs a waste of <bandwidth>, and it has been
observed that the size of one's sig block is usually inversely
proportional to one's longevity and level of prestige on the net.
<sig quote> /sig kwoht/ [USENET] n. A maxim, quote, proverb, joke or
slogan embedded in one's <SIG> and intended to convey something of
one's philosophical stance, pet peeves, or sense of humor. "He
*must* be a Democrat --- he posted a sig quote from Dan
Quayle."
<silicon> n. Hardware, esp. ICs or microprocessor-based computer
systems (compare <iron>). Contrasted with software.
<silly walk> [from Monty Python] v. A ridiculous procedure required to
accomplish a task. Like <grovel>, but more <random> and humorous.
"I had to silly-walk through half the /usr directories to find the
maps file."
<silo> n. The FIFO input-character buffer in an RS-232 line card. So
called from DEC terminology used on DH and DZ line cards for the
VAX and PDP-11.
<Silver Book> n. Jensen & Wirth's infamous `Pascal User Manual
and Report', so called because of the silver cover of the
widely-distributed Springer-Verlag second edition of 1978 (ISBN
0-387-90144-2). See <Red Book>, <Green Book>, <Blue Book>, <White
Book>, <Purple Book>, <Orange Book>, <Pink-Shirt Book>, <Dragon
Book>, <Aluminum Book>
<sitename> [UNIX/Internet] n. The unique electronic name of a computer
system, used to identify it in UUCP mail, USENET or other forms of
electronic information interchange. The folklore interest of
sitenames stems from the creativity and humor they often display.
Interpreting a sitename is not unlike interpreting a vanity license
plate; one has to mentally unpack it, allowing for mono-case and
length restrictions and the lack of whitespace. Hacker tradition
deprecates dull, institutional-sounding names in favor of punchy,
humorous and clever coinages (except that it is considered
appropriate for the official public gateway machine of an
organization to bear the organization's name or acronym).
Mythological references, cartoon characters, animal names, and
allusions to SF or fantasy literature are probably the most popular
sources for sitenames (in roughly that order). See also <network
address>.
<skulker> n. Syn. <prowler>.
<slap on the side> adj. A type of external expansion marketed by
computer manufacturers (e.g. Commodore for their Amiga 500/1000
series). Various SOTS boxes provided necessities such as memory,
hard drive controllers, and "conventional" expansion slots.
<sleep> v. On a timesharing system, a process which relinquishes its
claim on the scheduler until some given event occurs or a specified
time delay elapses is said to `go to sleep'.
<slim> n. A small, derivative change (e.g. to code).
<slop> n. 1. A one-sided <fudge factor>, that is, an allowance for
error but only in one of two directions. For example, if you need
a piece of wire ten feet long and have to guess when you cut it,
you make very sure to cut it too long, by a large amount if
necessary, rather than too short by even a little bit, because you
can always cut off the slop but you can't paste it back on again.
When discrete quantities are involved, slop is often introduced to
avoid the possibility of a <fencepost error>. 2. n. The ratio of
the size code generated by a compiler to the size of equivalent
<hand-hacked> assembler code, minus 1; i.e., the space (or maybe
time) you lose because you didn't do it yourself. This number is
often used as a measure of the goodness of a compiler; slop below
5% is very good, and 10% is usually acceptable for most purposes.
With modern compiler technology, esp. on RISC machines, the
compiler's slop may actually be *negative*; that is, humans
may be unable to generate code as good. This is one of the reasons
assembler programming is no longer common.
<slopsucker> n. A lowest-priority task that must wait around until
everything else has "had its fill" of machine resources. Only
when the machine would otherwise be idle is the task allowed to
"suck up the slop." Also called a <hungry puppy>. One common
variety of slopsucker hunts for large prime numbers. Compare
<background>.
<sluggy> /sluh'gee/ adj. Hackish variant of `sluggish'. Used only of
people, esp. someone just waking up after a long <gronk out>.
<slurp> v. To read a large data file entirely into core before working
on it (This may be contrasted with the strategy of reading a small
piece at a time, processing it, and then reading the next piece).
"This program slurps in a 1K-by-1K matrix and does an FFT."
<smart> adj. Said of a program that does the <Right Thing> 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 (yet).
Compare <robust> (smart programs can be <brittle>).
<smart terminal> n. A terminal that has enough computing capability to
perform useful work independently of the main computer. The
development of workstations and personal computers has made this
term and the product it describes semi-obsolescent, but one may
still hear variants of the phrase "act like a smart terminal"
used to describe the behavior of workstations/PCs with respect to
programs that execute almost entirely out of a remote <server>'s
storage, using said devices as displays.
There's a classic quote from Rob Pike (inventor of the <blit>
terminal): "A smart terminal is not a smart*ass* terminal,
but rather a terminal you can educate." This illustrates a common
design problem; the attempt to make peripherals (or anything else)
intelligent sometimes results in finicky, rigid "special
features" that become just so much dead weight if you try to use
the device in any way the designer didn't anticipate. Flexibility
and programmability, on the other hand, are *really* smart.
<smash case> v. To lose or obliterate the uppercase/lowercase
distinction in text input. "MS-DOS will automatically smash case
in the filename you give when you create one".
<smash the stack> [C programming] n. On many C implementations it is
possible to corrupt the execution stack by writing past the end of
an array declared auto in a routine. Code that does this is said
to `smash the stack', and can cause return from the routine to jump
to a random text address. This can produce some of the most
insidious data-dependent bugs known to mankind. Variants include
`trash the stack', `<scribble> the stack', `<mangle> the stack';
`<mung> the stack' is not used as this is never done intentionally.
See <spam>; see also <aliasing bug>, <fandango on core>, <memory
leak>, <precedence lossage>, <overrun screw>.
<smiley> n. See <emoticon>.
<smoke test> n. 1. A rudimentary form of testing applied to electronic
equipment following repair or reconfiguration in which AC power is
applied and during which the tester checks for sparks, smoke, or
other dramatic signs of fundamental failure. 2. By extension, the
first run of a piece of software after construction or a critical
change. See <magic smoke>.
<smoking clover> [ITS] n. A <display hack> originally due to Bill
Gosper. Many convergent lines are drawn on a color monitor in AOS
mode (so that every pixel struck has its color incremented). The
color map is then rotated. The lines all have one endpoint in the
middle of the screen; the other endpoints are spaced one pixel
apart around the perimeter of a large square. This results in a
striking, rainbow-hued, shimmering four-leaf clover. Gosper joked
about keeping it hidden from the FDA lest it be banned.
<SMOP> /smop/ [Simple (or Small) Matter of Programming] n. 1. A piece
of code, not yet written, whose anticipated length is significantly
greater than its complexity. Usage: used to refer to a program
that could obviously be written, but is not worth the trouble. It
is also used ironically to imply that a difficult problem can be
easily solved because a program can be written to do it; the irony
is that it is very clear that writing such a program will be a
great deal of work. Example: "It's easy to change a FORTRAN
compiler to compile COBOL as well; it's just a SMOP." 2. Often
used ironically by the intended victim when a suggestion for a
program is made which seems easy to the suggester, but is obviously
a lot of work to the programmer.
<snail-mail> n. Paper mail, as opposed to electronic. Sometimes
written as the single word `SnailMail'. Derives from earlier
coinage `USnail' for which there have been parody posters and
stamps made. Oppose <email>.
<snarf> /snarf/ v. 1. To grab, esp. a large document or file for the
purpose of using it either with or without the author's permission.
See <BLT>. Variant: "snarf down", to snarf, sometimes with the
connotation of absorbing, processing, or understanding. "I think
I'll snarf down the list of DDT commands so I'll know what's
changed recently." 2. [in the UNIX community] to fetch a file or
set of files across a network. See also <blast>.
<snarf & barf> /snarf-n-barf/ n. The act of grabbing a region of text
using a <WIMP> environment and then stuffing the contents of that
region into another region or into the same region, to avoid
re-typing a command line.
<snark> [Lewis Carroll, via the Michigan Terminal System] n. 1. A
system failure. When a user's process bombed, the operator would
get a message "Help, Help, Snark in MTS!". 2. More generally,
any kind of unexplained or threatening event on a computer. Often
used to refer to events or log file entries which might indicate an
attempted security violation. 3. UUCP name of snark.thyrsus.com,
home site of the Jargon File 2.x.x versions.
<sneakernet> n. Term used (generally with ironic intent) for transfer
of electronic information by physically carrying tape, disks, or
some other media from one machine to another. "Never
underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon filled with magtape,
or a 747 filled with CD-ROMs." Also called "Tennis-Net",
"Armpit-Net".
<sniff> v.,n. Synonym for POLL.
<S.O.> /ess-oh/ n. Acronym for Significant Other, almost invariably
written abbreviated and pronounced "ess-oh" by hackers. In fact
the form without periods "SO" is most common. Used to refer to
one's primary relationship, esp. a live-in to whom one is not
married. See <MOTAS>, <MOTOS>, <MOTSS>.
<softcopy> n. [by analogy with `hardcopy'] A machine readable form of
corresponding hardcopy. See <bits>.
<software bloat> n. The results of <second system effect>. Commonly
cited examples include `ls(1)', <X>, <BSD>, <Missed'em-five> and
<OS/2>OS/2.
<software rot> n. (Also known as <bit decay>, <bit rot>) Hypothetical
disease the existence of which has been deduced from the
observation that unused programs or features will often stop
working after sufficient time has passed, even if "nothing has
changed". The theory explains that bits decay as if they were
radioactive. As time passes, the contents of a file or the code in
a program will become increasingly garbled.
There actually are physical processes that produce such effects
(the alpha particles such as are found in cosmic rays can change
the contents of a computer memory unpredictably, and various kinds
of subtle media failures can corrupt files in mass storage) but
they are quite rare.
More commonly, "software rot" strikes when a program's
assumptions become out of date. If the design was insufficiently
<robust> it may fail in mysterious ways. For example, due to
endemic shortsightedness in the design of COBOL programs, most will
succumb to software rot when their two-digit year counters wrap
around at the beginning of the year 2000.
Historical note: software rot in an even funnier sense than the
mythical one was a real problem on early research computers (e. g.
the R1, see <grind crank>). If a program that depended on a
peculiar instruction hadn't been run in quite a while, the user
might discover that the opcodes no longer did the things as they
used to. ("Hey, so-and-so needs an instruction to do
such-and-such. We can snarf this one, right? No one uses it.")
<softwarily> /soft-weir'i-lee/ adv. In a way pertaining to software.
"The system is softwarily unreliable." The adjective
"softwary" is *not* used. See <hardwarily>.
<some random X> adj. Used to indicate a member of class X, with the
implication that the particular X is interchangeable with most
other Xs in whatever context was being discussed. "I think some
random cracker tripped over the guest timeout last night."
<sorcerer's apprentice mode> n. A bug in a protocol where, under some
circumstances, the receipt of a message causes more than one
message to be sent, each of which, when received, triggers the same
bug. Used esp. of such behavior caused by <bounce message> loops
in <email> software. Compare <broadcast storm>.
<SOS> n.,obs. /ess-oh-ess/ 1. An infamously <losing> text editor.
Once, back in the 1960's, when a text editor was needed for the
PDP-6, a hacker crufted togrther a quick-and-dirty "stopgap
editor" to be used until a better one was written. Unfortunately,
the old one was never really discarded when new ones (in
particular, <TECO>) came along. SOS is a descendant of that
editor; SOS means "Son of Stopgap", and many PDP-10 users gained
the dubious pleasure of its acquaintance. Since then other
programs similar in style to SOS have been written, notably BILOS
(bye'lohss) the Brother-In-Law Of Stopgap. See also <TECO>. 2.
/sahss/ n. Inverse of <AOS>, from the PDP-10 instruction set.
<space-cadet keyboard> n. The Knight keyboard, a now-legendary device
used on MIT LISP machines which inspired several still-current
slang terms and influenced the design of <EMACS>. It was inspired
by the Stanford keyboard and equipped with no less than
*seven* shift keys: four keys for <bucky bits> (`control',
`meta', `hyper', and `super') and three like the regular shift key,
called `shift', `top', and `front'. Many keys have three symbols
on them: a letter and a symbol on the top, and a Greek letter on
the front. For example, the "L" key has an "L" and a two-way
arrow on the top, and the Greek letter lambda on the front. If you
press this key with the right hand while playing an appropriate
"chord" with the left hand on the shift keys, you can get the
following results:
L lower-case "l"
shift-L upper-case "L"
front-L Greek lower-case lambda
front-shift-L Greek upper-case lambda
top-L two-way arrow (front and shift are ignored)
And of course each of these may also be typed with any combination
of the control, meta, hyper, and super keys. On this keyboard you
can type over 8000 different characters! This allows the user to
type very complicated mathematical text, and also to have thousands
of single-character commands at his disposal. Many hackers were
actually willing to memorize the command meanings of that many
characters if it will reduce typing time (this view rather
obviously shaped the interface of EMACS). Other hackers, however,
thought having that many bucky bits is overkill, and object that
such a keyboard can require three or four hands to operate. See
<bucky bits>, <cokebottle>, <meta bit>.
<SPACEWAR> n. A space-combat simulation game first implemented on the
PDP-1 at MIT in 1960-61. SPACEWAR aficionados formed the core of
the early hacker culture at MIT. Ten years later a descendant of
the game motivated Ken Thompson to build, in his spare time on a
scavenged PDP-7, the operating system that became <UNIX>. Ten years
after that, SPACEWAR was commercialized as one of the first video
games; descendants are still feeping in video arcades everywhere.
<spaghetti code> n. Describes code with a complex and tangled control
structure, esp. one using many GOTOs, exceptions or other
`unstructured' branching constructs. Pejorative. The synonym
"kangaroo code" has been reported.
<spaghetti inheritance> n. [Encountered among users of object-oriented
languages that use inheritance, such as Smalltalk] A convoluted
class-subclass graph, often resulting from carelessly deriving
subclasses from other classes just for the sake of reusing their
code. Coined in a (successful) attempt to discourage such
practice, through guilt by association with <spaghetti code>.
<spam> [from the <MUD> community] v. To crash a program by overrunning
a fixed-size buffer with excessively large input data. See also
<overrun screw>, <smash the stack>.
<spell> n. Syn. <incantation>.
<spiffy> /spi'fee/ adj. 1. Said of programs having a pretty, clever or
exceptionally well-designed interface. "Have you seen the spiffy X
version of <empire> yet?" 2. Said sarcastically of programs which
are perceived to have little more than a flashy interface going for
them. Which meaning should be drawn depends delicately on tone of
voice and context.
<spin> v. Equivalent to <buzz>. More common among C and UNIX
programmers.
<spin-lock> [Cambridge] n. A <busy-wait>. Preferred in Britain.
<splat> n. 1. Name used in many places (DEC, IBM, and others) for the
ASCII asterisk ("*") character. 2. [MIT] Name used by some
people for the ASCII number-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 "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 whatever the
local interpretation of splat is. 5. [Rochester Institute of
Technology] The command key on a Macintosh. Usage: nobody really
agrees what character "splat" is, but the term is common.
<spooge> /spooj/ 1. n. Inexplicable or arcane code, or random and
probably incorrect output from a computer program. 2. v. To
generate code or output as in definition 1.
<spool> [fr. early IBM "Simultaneous Peripheral Operation Off-Line",
but this acronym is widely thought to have been contrived for
effect] v. To send files to some device or program (a `spooler')
that queues them up and does something useful with them later. The
spooler usually understood is the `print spooler' controlling
output of jobs to a printer, but the term has been used in
connection with other peripherals (especially plotters and graphics
devices).
<stack> n. A person's stack 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 stack. "I'm afraid I've got real work to
do, so this'll have to be pushed way down on my stack." "I
haven't done it yet because every time I pop my stack something new
gets pushed." If you are interrupted several times in the middle
of a conversation, "my stack overflowed" means "I forget what we
were talking about" (the implication is that too many items were
pushed onto the stack than could be remembered, and so the least
recent items were lost). The usual physical example of a stack is
to be found in a cafeteria: a pile of plates sitting on a spring in
a well in a cart, so that when you put a plate on the top they all
sink down, and when you take one off the top the rest spring up a
bit. See also <PUSH> and <POP>.
At MIT, all the <stack> usages used to be more commonly found with
<pdl>, and this may still be true. Everywhere else <stack> seems
to be the preferred term.
<stack puke> n. Some micros are said to "puke their guts onto the
stack" to save their internal state during exception processing.
On a pipelined machine this can take a while (up to 92 bytes for a
bus fault on the 68020, for example).
<stale pointer bug> n. Synonym for <aliasing bug> used esp. among
microcomputer hackers.
<state> n. Condition, situation. "What's the state of your latest
hack?" "It's winning away." "The system tried to read and
write the disk simultaneously and got into a totally wedged
state." A standard question is "What's your state?" which means
"What are you doing?" or "What are you about to do?" Typical
answers might be "I'm about to gronk out", or "I'm hungry".
Another standard question is "What's the state of the world?"
meaning "What's new?" or "What's going on?". The more terse and
humorous way of asking these conventions would be "State-p?".
<stiffy> [ULowell] n. 3.5" <microfloppies>, so called because their
jackets are more firm than the 5.25" and 8" floppy.
<stir-fried random> alt. <stir-fried mumble> n. Term used for frequent
best dish of those hackers who can cook. Consists of random fresh
veggies and meat wokked with random spices. Tasty and economical.
See <random>, <great-wall>, <ravs>, <ORIENTAL FOOD>; see also
<mumble>.
<stomp on> v. To inadvertently overwrite something important, usually
automatically. Example: "All the work I did this weekend got
stomped on last night by the nightly-server script." Compare
<scribble>, <mangle>, <trash>, <scrog>, <roach>.
<stoppage> /sto'p@j/ n. Extreme lossage (see <lossage>) resulting in
something (usually vital) becoming completely unusable. "The
recent system stoppage was caused by a <fried> transformer."
<stubroutine> /stuhb'roo-teen/ [contr. of "stub routine"] n. Tiny,
often vacuous placeholder for a subroutine to be written or fleshed
out later.
<stunning> adj. Mind-bogglingly stupid. Usually used in sarcasm.
"You want to code *what* in ADA? That's...a stunning idea!"
See also <non-optimal solution>.
<subshell> [UNIX, MS-DOS] n. An OS command interpreter (see <shell>)
spawned from within a program, such that exit from the command
interpreter returns one to the parent program in a state that
allows it to continue execution. Oppose <chain>.
<sucking mud> [Applied Digital Research] adj. Crashed or wedged.
Usually said of a machine that provides some service to a network,
such as a file server. This Dallas regionalism derives from the
East Texas oil field lament, "Shut 'er down, Ma, she's a-suckin'
mud." Often used as a query. "We are going to reconfigure the
network, are you ready to suck mud?"
<suit> n. 1. Ugly and uncomfortable `business clothing' often worn by
non-hackers. Invariably worn with a `tie', a strangulation device
which partially cuts off the blood supply to the brain. It is
thought that this explains much about the behavior of suit-
wearers. 2. A person who habitually wears suits, as distinct from a
techie or hacker. See <loser>, <burble> and <brain-damaged>.
English, BTW, is relatively kind; our Soviet correspondent informs
us that the corresponding idiom in Russian hacker jargon is
`sovok', lit. a tool for grabbing garbage.
<sunspots> n. Notional cause of an odd error. "Why did the program
suddenly turn the screen blue?" "Sunspots, I guess". Also cause
of bitrot, from the genuine, honest-to-god fact that sunspots will
increase cosmic radiation which can flip single bits in memory.
Needless to say, although real sunspot errors happen, they are
extremely rare. See <cosmic rays>, <phase of the moon>.
<sun-stools> n. Unflattering hackerism for SunTools, a pre-X windowing
environment notorious in its day for size, slowness and misfeatures
(X, however, is larger and slower; see <second-system effect>).
<SUPDUP> /soop'doop/ 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.
<superprogrammer> n. A prolific programmer; one who can code
exceedingly well and quickly. Not all hackers are
superprogrammers, but many are. (Productivity can vary from one
programmer to another by factors of as much as 1000. For example,
programmer A might be able to write an average of 3 lines of
working code in one day, while another, with the proper tools and
skill, might be able to write 3,000 lines of working code in one
day. This variance is astonishing, appearing in very few other
areas of human endeavor.) The term superprogrammer is more
commonly used within such places as IBM than in the hacker
community. It tends to stress productivity rather than creativity
or ingenuity. Hackers tend to prefer the terms <hacker> and
<wizard>.
<Suzie COBOL> /soo'zee koh'bol/ 1. [IBM, prob. fr. Frank Zappa's
"little Suzy Creamcheese"] n. A coder straight out of training
school who knows everything except the benefits of comments in
plain English. Also (fashionable among personkind wishing to avoid
accusations of sexism) `Sammy Cobol' or (in some non-IBM circles)
`Cobol Charlie'. 2. [proposed] Meta-name for any <code grinder>,
analogous to <J. Random Hacker>.
<swab> [From the PDP-11 "byte swap" instruction, and immortalized in
the option "conv=swab" to <DD>] 1. v. to solve the <NUXI problem>
by swapping bytes in a file. 2. Also, the program in V7 UNIX used
to perform this action, or anything functionally equivalent to it.
See also <big-endian>, <little-endian>, <bytesexual>.
<swap space> n. Storage space. "I'm just using that corner of the
machine room for swap space".
<swapped> adj. From the older (per-task) method of using secondary
storage devices to implement support for multitasking. 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 the Scheme Report 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 problem."). Compare <page in>, <page out>.
<swizzle> v. To convert external names or references within a data
structure into direct pointers when the data structure is brought
into main memory from external storage; also called "pointer
swizzling"; the converse operation is sometimes termed
<unswizzling>.
<sync> /sink/ [UNIX] n.,v. 1. To force all pending I/O to the disk.
2. More generally, to force a number of competing processes or
agents to a state that would be `safe' if the system were to crash;
thus, to checkpoint. See <flush>.
<syntactic sugar> [coined by Peter Landin] n. Features added to a
language or formalism to make it `sweeter' for humans, that do not
affect the expressiveness of the formalism (compare <chrome>). Used
esp. when there is an obvious and trivial translation of the
`sugar' feature into other constructs already present in the
notation. Example: C's "a[i]" notation is syntactic sugar for
"*(a + i)". "Syntactic sugar causes cancer of the semicolon."
--- Alan Perlis.
<sys-frog> [the PLATO system] n. Playful hackish variant of
"sysprog" which is in turn short for "systems-programmer".
<system> n. 1. The supervisor program or OS on a computer. 2. n. The
entire computer system, including input/output devices, the
supervisor program or OS, and possibly other software. 3. Any
large-scale program. 4. Any method or algorithm. 5. The way
things are usually done. Usage: a fairly ambiguous 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 =}
<t> /tee/ 1. [from LISP terminology for "true"] Yes. Usage: used in
reply to a question, particularly one asked using the "-P"
convention). See NIL. In LISP, the name T means "true", among
other things. Some hackers use "T" and "NIL" instead of
"yes" and "no" almost reflexively. This sometimes causes
misunderstandings. When a waiter or flight attendant asks whether
a hacker wants coffee, he may well respond "T", meaning that he
wants coffee; but of course he will be brought a cup of tea
instead. As it happens, most hackers like tea at least as well as
coffee, particularly those who frequent Chinese restaurants, so
it's not that big a problem. 2. See <time t>. 3. In
transaction-processing circles, an abbreviation for the noun
"transaction". 4. [Purdue] Alternate spelling of <tee>
<tail recursion> n. See <tail recursion>.
<talk mode> n. The state a terminal is in when linked to another via a
bidirectional character pipe, to support on-line dialogue between
two or more users. Talk mode has a special set of jargon words,
used to save typing, which are not used orally:
BCNU Be seeing you.
BTW By the way...
BYE? Are you ready to unlink? (This is the standard way to
end a talk mode conversation; the other person types BYE
to confirm, or else continues the conversation.)
CUL See you later.
ENQ? Are you busy? Expects ACK or NAK in return.
FOO? A greeting, also meaning R U THERE? Often used in the
case of unexpected links, meaning also "Sorry if I
butted in" (linker) or "What's up?" (linkee).
FYI For your information...
FYA For your amusement...
GA Go ahead (used when two people have tried to type\
simultaneously;
this cedes the right to type to the other).
HELLOP A greeting, also meaning R U THERE? (An instance of the
"-P" convention.)
JAM Just a minute... Equivalent to SEC...
NIL No (see the main entry for NIL).
O Over to you (lower-case works too).
OO Over and out (lower-case works too).
/ Another form of "Over to you" (from x/y as "x overy y")
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).
WTF The universal interrogative particle. WTF knows what
it means?
WTH What the hell?
<double CRLF> When the typing party has finished, he types two CRLFs
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.
<name>: 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 shortened to a
unique prefix (possibly a single letter) during a very long
conversation.
/\/\/\ A giggle or chuckle (rare). On a MUD, this almost certainly mean
`earthquake fault'.
Most of the above "sub-jargon" is used at both Stanford and MIT.
Several of these are also common in EMAIL, esp. FYI, FYA, BTW,
BCNU, and CUL. A few other abbreviations have been reported from
commercial networks such as GEnie and Compuserve where on-line
`live' chat including more than two people is common and usually
involves a more `social' context, notably
<g> grin
BBL be back later
BRB be right back
HHOJ ha ha only joking
HHOS <ha ha only serious>
LOL laughing out loud
ROTF rolling on the floor
ROTFL rolling on the floor laughing
AFK away from keyboard
b4 before
CU l8tr see you later
MORF Male or Female?
TTFN ta-ta for now
OIC Oh, I see
rehi hello again
These are not used at universities or in the UNIX world;
conversely, most of the people who know these are unfamiliar with
FOO?, BCNU, HELLOP, NIL, and T.
The <MUD> community uses a mixture of USENET/Internet emoticons, a
few of the more natural of the old-style talk mode abbrevs, and
some of the `social' list above; specifically, MUD respondents
report use of BBL, BRB, LOL, b4, BTW, WTF, and WTH. The use of
rehi is also common; in fact, mudders are fond of re- compounds and
will frequently `rehug' or `rebonk' (see <bonk/oif>) people. The
verbe `re' by itself is construed as `repeat my last action
toward'. In general, though, mudders express a preference for
typing things out in full rather than using abbreviations; this may
be due to the relative youth of the MUD cultures, which tend to
include many touch typists and assume high-speed links. The
following uses specific to MUDs are reported:
UOK? Are you OK?
THX Thanks (mutant of TNX)
CU l8er See you later (mutant of CU l8tr)
See also <hakspek>, <emoticon>, <bonk/oif>.
<tanked> adj. Same as <down>, used primarily by UNIX hackers. See
also <hosed>. Popularized as a synonym for "drunk" by Steve
Dallas in the late lamented "Bloom County" comics.
<tar and feather> [from UNIX `tar(1)'] v. To create a transportable
archive from a group of files by first sticking them together with
the tape archiver `tar(1)' and then compressing the result (see
<compress>). The latter is dubbed `feathering' by analogy to what
you do with an airplane propeller to decrease wind resistance;
smaller files, after all, slip through comm links more easily.
<taste> n. [primarily MIT-DMS] 1. 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. Taste refers to sound judgement on
the part of the creator; a program or feature can *exhibit*
taste but cannot "have" taste. On the other hand, a feature can
have <flavor>. Also, <flavor> has the additional meaning of
"kind" or "variety" not shared by "taste". <flavor> is a
more popular word among hackers than "taste", though both are
used. 2. Also as <tayste>; two bits. Compare <crumb>, <dynner>,
<playte>, <nybble>.
<TCB> /tee see bee/ [IBM] 1. Trouble Came Back. Intermittent or
difficult-to reproduce problem which has failed to respond to
neglect. Compare <heisenbug>. Not to be confused with: 2. Trusted
Computing Base, an "official" jargon term from the <Orange Book>.
<TECO> /tee'koh/ obs. 1. v. Originally, to edit using the TECO editor
in one of its infinite variations (see below); sometimes still used
to mean "to edit" even when not using TECO! Usage: rare and now
primarily historical. 2. [originally an acronym for (paper)
"Tape Editor and COrrector"; later, "Text Editor and
Corrector"] n. A text editor developed at MIT, and modified by
just about everybody. If all the dialects are included, TECO might
have been the single most prolific editor in use before <EMACS>
to which it was directly ancestral. Noted for its powerful
programming-language-like features and its incredibly hairy syntax.
It is literally the case that every possible sequence of ASCII
characters is a valid, though probably uninteresting, TECO program;
one common hacker game used to be mentally working out what the
teco commands corresponding to human names did. As an example,
here is a TECO program that takes a list of names like this:
Loser, J. Random
Quux, The Great
Dick, Moby
sorts them alphabetically according to last name, and then puts the
last name last, removing the comma, to produce this:
Moby Dick
J. Random Loser
The Great Quux
The program is:
[1 J ^P $ L $ $
J <.-Z; .,(S,$ -D .)FX1 @F^B $K :L I $ G1 L>$$
(where ^B means "Control-B" (ASCII 0000010) and $ is actually an
<escape> (ASCII 0011011) character)
In fact, this very program was used to produce the second, sorted
list from the first list! The first hack at it had a <bug>: gls
(the author) had accidentally omitted the "@" in front of
"F^B", which as anyone can see is clearly the wrong thing. It
worked fine the second time. There is no space to describe all the
features of TECO, but it may be of interest that "^P" means
"sort" and "J <.-Z; ... L>" is an idiomatic series of commands
for "do once for every line".
In 1990, TECO is now pretty much one with the dust of history,
having been replaced in the affections of hackerdom by <EMACS>. It
can still be found lurking on VMS and a couple of crufty PDP-11
operating systems, however.
<tee> n.,v. [Purdue] A carbon copy of an electronic transmission,
"Oh, you're sending him the <bits> to that? Slap on a tee for
me." From the UNIX command `tee(1)'. Can also mean `save one for
me' as in "Tee a slice for me!". Also spelled `T'.
<Telerat> /tel'@-rat/ n. Unflattering hackerism for "Teleray", a
line of extremely losing terminals. See also <terminak>,
<sun-stools>, <HP-SUX>.
<TELNET> /telnet/ v. To communicate with another ARPAnet host using
the <TELNET> program. 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."
<ten finger interface> n. The interface between two networks which
cannot be directly connected for security reasons; refers to the
practice of placing two terminals side by side and having an
operator read from one and type into the other.
<tense> adj. Of programs, very clever and efficient. A tense piece of
code often got that way because it was highly <bum>med, but
sometimes it was just based on a great idea. A comment in a clever
display routine by Mike Kazar, a student hacker at CMU: "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.
<tenured graduate student> n. One who has been in graduate school for
ten years (the usual maximum is five or six): a "ten-yeared"
student (get it?). Students don't really get tenure, of course,
the way professors do, but a tenth-year graduate student has
probably been around the university longer than any non-tenured
professor.
<teraflop club> /ter'a-flop kluhb/ [FLOP = Floating Point Operation]
n. Mythical group of people who consume outrageous amounts of
computer time in order to produce a few simple pictures of glass
balls with intricate ray tracing techniques. Cal Tech professor
James Kajiya is said to have been the founding member. See also
<kilo>.
<terminak> /ter'mi-nak/ [Caltech, ca. 1979] n. Any malfunctioning
computer terminal. A common failure mode of Lear-Siegler ADM3a
terminals caused the "L" key to produce the "K" code instead;
complaints about this tended to look like "Terminak #3 has a bad
keyboard. Pkease fix." See <sun-stools>, <Telerat>, <HP-SUX>.
<terminal brain death> n. Extreme form of <terminal illness> (sense
#1).
<terminal illness> n. 1. Syn. with <raster burn>. 2. The `burn-in'
condition your CRT tends to get if you don't have a screen saver.
<terminal junkie> [Great Britain] n. An early <larval stage> hacker
who spends most of their time wandering the directory tree and
writing <noddy> programs just to get his/her fix of computer time.
Variants include "terminal jockey", "console junkie", or <console
jockey>. The term "console jockey" seems to imply more expertise
than the other three.
<terpri> /ter'pree/ [from the LISP 1.5 (and later, MacLISP) function
to start a new line of output] v. To output a <CRLF>. Now
rare. It is a contraction of "TERminate PRInt line".
<TeX> /tekh/ n. An extremely powerful <macro>-based text-formatter
written by Donald E. Knuth, very popular in the computer-science
community (it is good enough to have displaced UNIX `troff(1)', the
other favored formatter, even at many UNIX installations). TeX
fans insist on the correct (guttural) pronunciation spelling (all
caps, with the E depressed below the baseline) of the name (the
mixed-case "TeX" is considered an acceptable kluge on ASCII-only
devices). They like to proliferate names from the word `TeX' ---
such as TeXnichian (TeX user), TeXhacker (TeX programmer),
TeXmaster (competent TeX programmer), TeXhax, TeXnique.
<thanks in advance> [USENET] Conventional net.politeness ending a
posted request for information or assistance. Sometimes written
"advTHANKSance". See <net.>, <netiquette>.
<theology> n. 1. Ironically used to refer to <religious issues>. 2.
Technical fine points of an abstruse nature, esp. those where the
resolution is of theoretical interest but relatively <marginal>
with respect to actual use of a design or system. Used esp. around
software issues with a heavy AI or language design component.
Example: the deep- vs. shallow-binding debate in the design of
dynamically-scoped LISPs.
<theory> n. Used in the general sense of idea, plan, story, or set of
rules. This is a generalization and abuse of the technical
meaning. "What's the theory on fixing this TECO loss?" "What's
the theory on dinner tonight?" ("Chinatown, I guess.")
"What's the current theory on letting lusers on during the day?"
"The theory behind this change is to fix the following well-known
screw..."
<thinko> /thin'ko/ [by analogy with `typo'] n. A bubble in the stream
of consciousness; a momentary, correctable glitch in mental
processing, especially one involving recall of information learned
by rote. Syn. <braino>. Compare <mouso>.
<This time, for sure>! Ritual affirmation frequently uttered during
protracted debugging sessions involving numerous small obstacles
(as, in for example, attempts to bring up a UUCP connection). For
the proper effect, this must be uttered in a fruity imitation of
Bullwinkle the Moose. Also heard: "Hey, Rocky! Watch me pull a
rabbit out of my hat!". The canonical response is, of course,
"But that trick *never* works!". See <HUMOR, HACKER>.
<thrash> v. To move wildly or violently, without accomplishing
anything useful. Paging or swapping systems which are overloaded
waste most of their time moving data into and out of core (rather
than performing useful computation), and are therefore said to
thrash. Someone who keeps changing his mind is said to be
thrashing.
<thread> /thred/ n. [USENET, GEnie] Common abbreviation of `topic
thread', a more or less continuous chain of postings on a single
topic. Also in 2. <upthread>: earlier in the discussion. "As Joe
pointed out upthread..."
<three-finger salute> n. Syn. for <vulcan nerve pinch>.
<thunk> [mythically, the sound made by data when pushed onto the
stack] n. 1. " ... a piece of coding which which provides an
address." --- P.Z Ingerman, who invented <thunk>s in 1961 as a way
of binding actual parameters to their formal definitions in
Algol-60 procedure calls. If a procedure is called with an
expression in the place of a formal parameter, the compiler
generates a <thunk> to compute the expression and leave the address
of the result in some standard location such as an index register.
2. Later generalized into an expression, frozen together with its
environment for later evaluation if and when needed. The process
of unfreezing these <thunk>s is called `forcing'. 3. Stub routine,
in an overlay programming environment, which loads and jumps to the
correct overlay. 4. People and activities scheduled in a thunklike
manner. "It occurred to me the other day that I am rather
accurately modelled by a thunk --- I frequently need to be forced
to completion." --- paraphrased from a .plan file.
<tick> n. 1. The width of one tick of the system clock on the
computer. Often 1 AC cycle time (1/60 second in the U.S. and
Canada, and 1/50 most other places) but more recently 1/100 sec has
become common. Syn <jiffy>. 2. In simulations, the discrete unit
of time that passes "between" iterations of the simulation
mechanism. In AI applications, 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 simulation is
often pejoratively referred to as "tick-tick-tick" simulation,
especially when the issue of simultaneity of events with long,
independent chains of causes is <handwave>d.
<tick-list features> [Acorn Computers] n. Features in software or
hardware that customers insist on but never use (calculators in
desktop TSRs and that sort of thing).
<time sink> n. A project which consumes unbounded amounts of time.
<time t> /tiem tee/ 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." means, in the
context of going out for dinner, "If we meet at Louie's directly,
we can meet there a little later than if we meet on campus and then
have to travel to Louie's." (Louie's is a Chinese restaurant in
Palo Alto that is a favorite with hackers. Had the number 30 been
used instead of "one", it would have implied that the travel time
from campus to Louie's is thirty minutes; whatever time T is (and
that hasn't been decided on yet), you can meet half an hour later
at Louie's than you could on campus and end up eating at the same
time. 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. Sometimes the word "time" is
omitted if there is no danger of confusing "T" as a time with
"T" meaning "yes".
<tip of the ice-cube> [IBM] n. The visible part of something small and
insignificant. Used as an ironic comment in situations where "tip
of the iceberg" might be appropriate if the subject were actually
nontrivial.
<tired iron> [IBM] n. Hardware that is perfectly functional but enough
behind the state of the art to have been superseded by new
products, presumably with enough improvement in bang-per-buck that
the old stuff is starting to look a bit like a <dinosaur>.
<tits on a keyboard> n. Small bumps on certain keycaps to keep
touch-typists registered. (Usually on the 5 of a numeric keypad,
and on F and J of a QWERTY keyboard.)
<TLA> /tee el ay/ [Three-Letter-Acronym] n. 1. Self-describing acronym
for a species with which computing terminology is infested. 2. Any
confusing acronym at all. Examples include MCA, FTP, SNA, CPU,
MMU, SCCS, DMU, FPU, TLA, NNTP. People who like this looser usage
argue that not all TLAs have three letters, just as not all four
letter words have four letters. One also hears of "ETLA"
(Extended Three Letter Acronym, pronounced /ee tee el ay/ ) being
used to describe four-letter acronyms.
<toast> 1. n. Any completely inoperable system, esp. one that has just
crashed; "I think BUACCA is toast." 2. v. To cause a system to
crash accidentally, especially in a manner that requires manual
rebooting. "Rick just toasted harp again."
<toaster> n. 1. The archetypal really stupid application for an
embedded microprocessor controller esp. `toaster oven'; often used
in comments which imply that a scheme is inappropriate technology.
"<DWIM> for an assembler? That'd be as silly as running UNIX on
your toaster!" 2. A very very dumb computer. "You could run this
program on any dumb toaster." See <bitty box>, <toaster>, <toy>.
<toggle> v. To change a BIT from whatever state it is in to the other
state; to change from 1 to 0 or from 0 to 1. This probably comes
from "toggle switches", such as standard light switches, though
the word "toggle" apparently originally referred to the mechanism
that keeps the switch in the position to which it is flipped,
rather than to the fact that the switch has two positions. There
are four things you can do to a bit: set it (force it to be 1),
clear (or zero) it, leave it alone, or toggle it. (Mathematically,
one would say that there are four distinct boolean-valued functions
of one boolean argument, but saying that is much less fun than
talking about toggling bits.)
<tool> 1. n. A program primarily used to create other programs, such
as a compiler or editor or cross-referencing program. Oppose
<app>, <operating system>. 2. [UNIX] An application program with a
simple, "transparent" (typically text-stream) interface designed
specifically to be used in programmed combination with other tools
(see <filter>). 3. [MIT] v.i. To work; to study. See <hack>.
<TOPS-10> /tops-ten/ n. DEC's proprietary OS for the fabled <PDP-10>
machines, long a favorite of hackers but now effectively extinct.
A fountain of hacker folklore; see Appendix A. See also <ITS>,
<TOPS-20>, <TWENEX>, <VMS>, <operating system>. TOPS-10 was
sometimes called BOTS-10 ("from bottoms-ten") as a comment on the
inappropriateness of describing it as the top of anything.
<TOPS-20> /tops-twen'tee/ n. See <TWENEX>.
<tourist> [from MIT's ITS system] n. A guest on the system, especially
one who generally logs in over a network from a remote location for
games and other trivial purposes. One step below <luser>.
<touristic> adj. Having the quality of a <tourist>. Often used as a
pejorative, as in "losing touristic scum".
<toy> n. A computer system; always used with qualifiers. 1. <nice
toy>: One which supports the speaker's hacking style adequately.
2. <just a toy>: A machine that yields insufficient <computron>s
for the speaker's preferred uses. This is not condemnatory as is
<bitty box>; toys can at least be fun. See also <Get a real
computer!>, <bitty box>.
<toy problem> [AI] n. A deliberately simplified or even oversimplified
case of a challenging problem used to investigate, prototype, or
test algorithms for the real problem. Sometimes used pejoratively.
See also <gedanken>.
<trap> 1. n. A program interrupt, usually used specifically to refer
to an interrupt caused by some illegal action taking 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. 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." This term is associated with
assembler programming (INTERRUPT is more common among HLL
programmers) and appears to be fading into history as the role of
assembler continues to shrink.
<trap door> alt. <trapdoor> n. Syn. with <back door>.
<trash> v. To destroy the contents of (said of a data structure). The
most common of the family of near-synonyms including <mung>,
<mangle> and <scribble>.
<tree killer> [Sun] n. 1. A printer. 2. A person who wastes paper.
This should be interpreted in a broad sense; `wasting paper'
includes the production of <spiffy> but <content-free> documents.
Thus, most <suits> are tree-killers.
<trivial> adj. 1. In explanation, too simple to bother detailing. 2.
Not worth the speaker's time. 3. Complex, but solvable by methods
so well-known that anyone not utterly <cretinous> would have
thought of them already. Hackers' notions of triviality may be
quite at variance with those of non-hackers. See <nontrivial>,
<uninteresting>.
<troglodyte> [Commodore] n. 1. A hacker who never leaves his cubicle.
The term `Gnoll' (from D&D) is also reported. 2. [proposed] A
curmudgeon attached to an obsolescent computing environment.
<troglodyte mode> [Rice University] n. Programming with the lights
turned off, sunglasses on, and the (character) terminal inverted
(black on white) because you've been up for so many days straight
that your eyes hurt. Loud music blaring from a stereo stacked in
the corner is optional but recommended. See <larval stage>,
<mode>.
<trojan horse> [coined by MIT-hacker-turned-spook Dan Edwards] n. A
program designed to break security or damage a system that is
disguised as something else benign, such as a directory lister or
archiver. See <virus>, <worm>.
<true-hacker> [analogy with "trufan" from SF fandom] n. One who
exemplifies the primary values of hacker culture, esp. competence
and helpfulness to other hackers. A high complement. "He spent
six hours helping me bring up UUCP and netnews on my FOOBAR 4000
last week --- unequivocally the act of a true-hacker." Compare
<demigod>, oppose <munchkin>.
<tty> /tee-tee-wie/ [UNIX], /ti'tee/ [ITS, but some UNIX people say it
this way as well] n. 1. Terminal of the teletype variety,
characterized by a noisy mechanical printer, a very limited
character set, and poor print quality. Usage: antiquated (like the
TTYs themselves). 2. [especially UNIX] Any terminal at all;
sometimes used to refer to the particular terminal controlling a
given job.
<tube> n. A CRT terminal. Never used in the mainstream sense of TV;
real hackers don't watch TV, except for Loony Toons and Rocky &
Bullwinkle and the occasional cheesy old swashbuckle movie.
<tunafish> n. In hackish lore, refers to the mutated punchline of an
age-old joke to be found at the bottom of the man pages of
`tunefs(8)' in the original <BSD> 4.2 distribution. The joke
was removed in later releases once commercial sites started
developing 4.2. Tunefs relates to the `tuning' of file-system
parameters for optimum performance, and at the bottom of a few
pages of <black art> writings was a BUGS section consisting of the
line "You can tune a filing system, but you can't tunafish."
<tune> [from automotive or musical usage] v. To optimize a program or
system for a particular environment, esp. by adjusting numerical
parameters designed as <hook>s for tuning, e.g. by changing #define
lines in C. One may `tune for time' (fastest execution) `tune for
space' (least memory utilization) or `tune for configuration' (most
efficient use of hardware). See <bum>, <hot spot>, <hand-hacking>.
<tweak> v. 1. To change slightly, usually in reference to a value.
Also used synonymously with <twiddle>. If a program is almost
correct, rather than figuring out the precise problem, you might
just keep tweaking it until it works. See <frobnicate> and <fudge
factor>. 2. To <tune> or <bum> a program. This is preferred usage
in England.
<TWENEX> /twe-neks/ n. The TOPS-20 operating system by DEC. TOPS-10
was a typically crufty DEC operating system for the PDP-10, so
TOPS-20 was the obvious name choice for the DEC-20 OS. Bolt,
Beranek and Newman (BBN) had developed their own system, called
<TENEX> (TEN EXecutive), and in creating TOPS-20 DEC copied TENEX
and adapted it for the 20. The term TWENEX was therefore a
contraction of "twenty TENEX". DEC people cringed when they
heard TOPS-20 referred to as "TWENEX", but the term caught on
nevertheless. The written abbreviation "20x" was also used.
TWENEX was successful and very popular; in fact, there was a period
in the 1980s when it commanded almost as fervent a culture of
partisans as UNIX or ITS --- but DEC's decision to scrap all the
internal rivals to the VAX architecture and the relatively stodgy
VMS OS killed the DEC-20 and put a sad end to TWENEX's brief day in
the sun.
<twiddle> n. 1. tilde (ASCII 176, "~"). Also called "squiggle",
"sqiggle" (sic---pronounced "skig'gul"), and "twaddle", 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>. To speak of twiddling a bit connotes
aimlessness, and at best doesn't specify what you're doing to the
bit; by contrast, toggling a bit has a more specific meaning (see
<toggle>).
<twink> /twink/ [UCSC] n. Equivalent to <read-only user>.
<two-to-the-n> q. Used like N, but referring to bigger numbers. "I
have two to the N things to do before I can go out for lunch"
means you probably won't show up.
<two-pi> q. The number of years it takes to finish one's thesis.
Occurs in stories in the form: "He started on his thesis; two pi
years later...".
<twonkie> n. The software equivalent of a Twinkie; a useless
"feature" added to look sexy and placate a <marketroid>.
{= U =}
<UBD> [abbreviation for "User Brain Damage"] An abbreviation used to
close out trouble reports obviously due to utter cluelessness on
the user's part. Compare <PBD>; see also <brain-damaged>.
<undefined external reference> excl. [UNIX] Message from UNIX's
linker. Used to indicate loose ends in an argument or discussion.
<under the hood> prep. [hot-rodder talk] 1. Used to introduce the
underlying implementation of a product (hardware, software, or
idea). Implies that the implementation is not intuitively obvious
from the appearance, but the speaker is about enable the listener
to <zen> it. "Let's now look under the hood to see how ..." 2.
Can also imply that the implementation is much simpler than the
appearance would indicate, as in "Under the hood, we are just
fork/execling the shell." 3. Inside a chassis, as in "Under the
hood, this baby has a 40MHz 68030!"
<uninteresting> adj. 1. Said of a problem which, while <nontrivial>,
can be solved simply by throwing sufficient resources at it. 2.
Also said of problems for which a solution would neither advance
the state of the art nor be fun to design and code. True hackers
regard uninteresting problems as an intolerable waste of time, to
be solved (if at all) by lesser mortals. See <WOMBAT>, <SMOP>;
oppose <interesting>.
<UN*X> n. Used to refer to the Unix operating system (trademark and/or
copyright AT&T) in writing, but avoiding the need for the ugly (tm)
typography. Also used to refer to any or all varieties of Unixoid
operating systems. Ironically, lawyers now say (1990) that the
requirement for superscript-tm has no legal force, but the asterisk
usage is entrenched anyhow. It has been suggested that there may
be a psychological connection to practice in certain religions
where the name of the deity is never written out in full, e.g. JHWH
or G-d is used. See also <glob>.
<unwind the stack> v. 1. During the execution of a procedural language
one is said to `unwind the stack' from a called procedure up to a
caller when one discards the stack frame and any number of frames
above it, popping back up to the level of the given caller. In C
this is done with longjmp/setjmp; in LISP with THROW/CATCH. This
is sometimes necessary when handling exceptional conditions. See
also <smash the stack>. 2. People can unwind the stack as well, by
quickly dealing with a bunch of problems "Oh hell, let's do lunch.
Just a second while I unwind my stack".
<unwind-protect> [MIT, from the name of a LISP operator] n. A task you
must remember to perform before you leave a place or finish a
project. "I have an unwind-protect to call my advisor."
<UNIX> /yoo'niks/ [In the authors' words, "A weak pun on MULTICS"]
n. A popular interactive time-sharing system originally invented in
1969 by Ken Thompson after Bell Labs left the MULTICS project,
mostly so he could play SPACEWAR on a scavenged PDP7. Dennis
Ritchie, the inventor of C, is considered a co-author of the
system. The turning point in UNIX's history came when it was
reimplemented almost entirely in C in 1974, making it the first
source-portable operating system. Fifteen years and a lot of
changes later UNIX is the most widely used multiuser
general-purpose operating system in the world. Many people (q.v.
<UNIX weenie>) consider this the single most important victory yet
of hackerdom over industry opposition. See <Version 7>, <BSD
UNIX>, <USG UNIX>.
<UNIX conspiracy> [ITS] n. According to a conspiracy theory long
popular among <ITS> and <TOPS-20> fans, UNIX's growth is the result
of a plot hatched during the 70s at Bell Labs, whose intent was to
hobble AT&T's competitors by making them dependent upon a system
whose future evolution was to be under AT&T control. This would be
accomplished by disseminating an operating system that is seemingly
inexpensive and easily portable, but relatively unreliable and
insecure. In this view, UNIX was designed to be one of the first
computer viruses (see <virus>), but a virus spread to computers
indirectly by people and market forces, rather than directly
through disks and networks. Adherents of this "UNIX virus"
theory like to cite the fact that the well-known quotation "UNIX
is snake oil" was uttered by DEC president Kenneth Olsen shortly
before DEC began actively promoting its own family of UNIX
workstations.
<unixism> n. A piece of code or coding technique that depends on of
the protected multi-tasking environment with relatively low
process-spawn overhead that exists on UNIX systems. Common
<unixism>s include: gratuitous use of `fork(2)'; the assumption that
certain undocumented but well-known features of UNIX libraries like
`stdio(3)' are supported elsewhere; reliance on <obscure>
side-effects of system calls (use of `sleep(2)' with a zero argument
to clue the scheduler that you're willing to give up your
time-slice, for example); the assumption that freshly-allocated
memory is empty, the assumption that it's safe to never free()
memory, etc.
<UNIX weenie> [ITS] n. 1. A derogatory pun on "UNIX wizard", common
among hackers who use UNIX by necessity, but would prefer
alternatives. The implication is that, while the person in
question may consider mastery of UNIX arcana to be a wizardly
skill, the only real skill involved is the ability to tolerate, and
the bad taste to wallow in, the incoherence and needless complexity
that are alleged to infest many UNIX programs. "This shell script
tries to parse its arguments in 69 bletcherous ways. It must have
been written by a real UNIX weenie." 2. A derogatory term for
anyone who engages in uncritical praise of UNIX. Often appearing
in the context "stupid UNIX weenie". See <Weenix>, <UNIX
conspiracy>.
<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."
<upload> /uhp'lohd/ v. 1. To transfer code or data over a digital comm
line from a smaller `client' system to a larger `host' one. Oppose
<download>. 2. [speculatively] To move the essential patterns and
algorithms which make up one's mind from one's brain into a
computer. Only those who are convinced that such patterns and
algorithms capture the complete essence of the self view this
prospect with aplomb.
<urchin> n. See <munchkin>.
<USENET> /yoos'net/ or /yooz'net/ [from "Users' Network"] n. A
distributed bulletin board system supported mainly by UNIX
machines, international in scope and probably the largest
non-profit information utility in existence. As of early 1990 it
hosts over 700 topic groups and distributes up to 15 megabytes of
new technical articles, news, discussion, chatter, and <flamage>
every day. See <newsgroup>.
<user> n. 1. Someone doing "real work" with the computer, who uses a
computer as a means rather than an end. Someone who pays to use a
computer. See <real user>. 2. A programmer who will believe
anything you tell him. One who asks silly questions. (This is
slightly unfair. It is true that users ask questions (of
necessity). Sometimes they are thoughtful or deep. Very often
they are annoying or downright stupid, apparently because the user
failed to think for two seconds or look in the documentation before
bothering the maintainer.) See <luser>. 3. Someone who uses a
program from the outside, however skillfully, without getting into
the internals of the program. One who reports bugs instead of just
going ahead and fixing them. 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. (The few users who do are known as
<real winners>.) The term is a relative one: a consummate hacker
may be a user with respect to some program he himself does not
hack. A LISP hacker might be one who maintains LISP or one who
uses LISP (but with the skill of a hacker). A LISP user is one who
uses LISP, whether skillfully or not. Thus there is some overlap
between the two terms; the subtle distinctions must be resolved by
context.
<user friendly> adj. Programmer-hostile. Generally used by hackers in
a critical tone, to describe systems which hold the user's hand so
obsessively that they make it painful for the more experienced and
knowledgeable to get any work done. See <menuitis>, <drool-proof
paper>, <Macintrash>, <user-obsequious>.
<user-obsequious> adj. Emphatic form of <user friendly>. Connotes a
system so verbose, inflexible, and determinedly simple-minded that
it is nearly unusable. "Design a system any fool can use and only
a fool will want to use it".
<USG UNIX> /yoo-ess-jee yoo'niks/ n. Refers to AT&T UNIX versions
after <Version 7>, especially System III and System V releases 1, 2
and 3. So called because at that time AT&T's support crew was
called the `UNIX Support Group'. See <BSD UNIX>.
<UUCPNET> n. The store-and-forward network consisting of all the
world's UNIX machines (and others running some clone of the UUCP
(UNIX-to-UNIX Copy Program) software). Any machine reachable via a
<bang path> is on UUCPNET. See <network address>.
{= V =}
<vadding> /vad'ing/ [from VAD, a permutation of ADV (i.e. <ADVENT>),
used to avoid a particular sysadmin's continual search-and-destroy
sweeps for the game] n. A leisure-time activity of certain hackers
involving the covert exploration of the "secret" parts of large
buildings --- basements, roofs, freight elevators, maintenance
crawlways, steam tunnels and the like. A few go so far as to learn
locksmithing in order to synthesize vadding keys. The verb is `to
vad'. The most extreme and dangerous form of vadding is <elevator
rodeo>, aka <elevator surfing>, a sport played by wrasslin' down a
thousand-pound elevator car with a three-foot piece of string, and
then exploiting this mastery in various stimulating ways (such as
elevator hopping, shaft exploration, rat-racing and the
ever-popular drop experiments). Kids, don't try this at home!
<vanilla> adj. Ordinary flavor, standard. See <flavor>. When 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. Applied to hardware and
software. As in "Vanilla Version 7 UNIX can't run on a vanilla
11/34". Also used to orthogonalize TTL nomenclature; for instance
a 74V00 is what TI calls a 7400, as distinct from a 74LS00, etc.
This word differs from <canonical> in that the latter means "the
thing you always use (or the way you always do it) unless you have
some strong reason to do otherwise", whereas <vanilla> simply
means "ordinary". For example, when hackers go on a <Great
Wall>, hot-and-sour wonton soup is the <canonical> wonton soup to
get (because that is what most of them usually order) even though
it isn't the <vanilla> wonton soup.
<vannevar> /van'@-var/ n. A bogus technological prediction or
foredoomed engineering concept, esp. one which fails by implicitly
assuming that technologies develop linearly, incrementally, and in
isolation from one another when in fact the learning curve tends to
be highly nonlinear, revolutions are common, and competition is the
rule. The prototype was Vannevar Bush's prediction of "electronic
brains" the size of the Empire State Building with a
Niagara-Falls-equivalent cooling system for their tubes and relays,
at a time when the semiconductor effect had already been
demonstrated. Other famous vannevars have included magnetic-bubble
memory, LISP machines and a paper from the late 1970s that
purported to prove limits on maximum areal densities for ICs less
than were in fact exceeded routinely five years later.
<vaporware> n. Products announced far in advance of any shipment
(which may or may not actually take place).
<var> /veir/ or /vahr/ n. Short for "variable". Compare <arg>,
<param>.
<VAX> /vaks/ n. 1. [from Virtual Address eXtension] The most
successful minicomputer design in industry history, possibly
excepting its immediate ancestor the PDP-11. Between its release in
1978 and eclipse by <killer micro>s after about 1986 the VAX was
probably the favorite hacker machine of them all, esp. after the
1982 release of 4.2BSD UNIX (see <BSD UNIX>). Esp. noted for its
large, assembler-programmer-friendly instruction set, an asset
which became a liability after the RISC revolution following about
1985. 2. A major brand of vacuum cleaner in Britain. Cited here
because its alleged sales pitch, "Nothing sucks like a VAX!"
became a sort of battle-cry of RISC partisans. Ironically, the
slogan was actually that of a rival brand called Electrolux.
<VAXen> /vak'sn/ [from "oxen", perhaps influenced by "vixen"] n.
pl. The plural standardly used among hackers for the DEC VAX
computers. "Our installation has four PDP-10's and twenty
<vaxen>." See <boxen>.
<vaxism> n. A piece of code that excebits <vaxocentrism> in critical
areas. Compare <PC-ism>, <unixism>.
<vaxocentrism> /vak`soh-sen'trizm/ [analogy with "ethnocentrism"] n.
A notional disease said to afflict C programmers who persist in
coding according to certain assumptions valid (esp. under UNIX) on
<VAXen>, but false elsewhere (this can create substantial
portability problems). Among these are:
1. The assumption that dereferencing a null pointer is safe because
it is all bits zero, and location 0 is readable and zero (it may
instead cause an illegal-address trap on non-VAXEN, and even on
VAXEN under OSs other than BSD UNIX).
2. The assumption that pointer and integer types are the same size,
and that pointers can be stuffed into integer variables and drawn
back out without being truncated or mangled.
3. The assumption that a data type of any size may begin at any
byte address in memory (for example, that you can freely construct
and dereference a pointer to a word-sized object at an odd
address). On many (esp. RISC) architectures better optimized for
HLL execution speed this is invalid and can cause an illegal
address fault or bus error.
4. The (related) assumption that there is no `padding' at the end
of types and that in an array you can thus step right from the last
byte of a previous component to the first byte of the next one.
5. The assumption that memory address space is globally flat and
that the array reference foo[-1] is necessarily valid This is not
true on segment-addressed machines like Intel chips (yes,
segmentatation is universally considered a <brain-damaged> way to
design but that is a separate issue).
6. The assumption that objects can be arbitrarily large with no
special considerations (again, not true on segmented
architectures);
7. The assumption that the parameters of a routine are stored in
memory, contiguously, and in strictly ascending or descending order
(fails on many RISC architectures).
8. The assumption that bits and addressable units within an object
are ordered in the same way and that this order is a constant of
nature (fails on <big-endian> machines).
9. The assumption that it is meaningful to compare pointers to
different objects not located within the same array, or to objects
of different types (the former fails on segmented architectures,
the latter on word-oriented machines or others with multiple
pointer formats).
10. The assumption that a pointer to any one type can freely be cast
into a pointer to any other type (fails on word- oriented machines
pr others with multiple pointer formats).
11. The assumption that "int" is 32 bits (fails on 286-based
systems under some compilers), or (nearly equivalently) the
assumption that sizeof(int) == sizeof(long).
12. The assumption that argv[] is writeable (fails in some
embedded-systems C environments).
13. The assumption that characters are signed (fails on the 68000
series and elsewhere).
14. The assumption that all pointers are the same size and format,
which means you don't have to worry about getting the types correct
in calls (fails on word-oriented machines or others with multiple
pointer formats).
Note that a programmer can be validly be accused of vaxocentrism
even if he/she has never seen a VAX. The terms "vaxocentricity"
and "all-the-world's-a-VAX syndrome" have been used synonymously.
<veeblefester> /vee'b@l-fes-tr/ [from the "Born Loser" comix via
Commodore; prob originally from Mad Magazine's "Veeblefeetzer" c.
1960] n. Any obnoxious person engaged in the alleged professions
of marketing or management. Antonym of <hacker>. Compare <suit>,
<marketroid>.
<venus flytrap> [after the plant] n. See <firewall machine>.
<verbiage> /ver'bee-@j/ [IBM] n. Documentation.
<Version 7> alt. V7 /vee-se'vn/ n. The 1978 unsupported release of
<UNIX> ancestral to all current commercial versions. Before
the release of the POSIX/SVID standards V7's features were often
treated as a UNIX portability baseline. See <BSD>, <USG UNIX>,
<UNIX>. Some old-timers impatient with commercialization and
kernel bloat still maintain that V7 was the Last True UNIX.
<vi> /vee ie/, *not* /vie/ and *never* /siks/ [from `Visual
Interface'] n. A screen editor <crufted together> by Bill Joy for
an early <BSD> version. Became the de-facto standard UNIX editor
and a nearly undisputed hacker favorite until the rise of <EMACS>
after about 1984. Tends to frustrate new users no end, as it will
neither take commands while accepting input text nor vice versa,
and the default setup provides no indication of which mode one is
in. Nevertheless it is still widely used (about half the
respondents in a USENET poll preferred it), and even EMACS fans
often resort to it as a mail editor and for small editing jobs
(mainly because it starts up faster than bulky EMACS). See
<holy wars>.
<virgin> adj. Unused, in reference to an instantiation of a program.
"Let's bring up a virgin system and see if it crashes again."
Esp. useful after contracting a <virus> through <SEX>. Also, by
extension, unused buffers and the like within a program.
<virus> [from SF] n. A cracker program that propagates itself by
`infecting' (embedding itself in) other trusted programs,
especially operating systems. See <worm>, <trojan horse>.
<virtual> adj. 1. Common alternative to <logical>, but never used with
compass directions. 2. Performing the functions of. Virtual
memory acts like real memory but isn't. This word is nearly
synonymous with <logical>, but is never used of directions. Note
that for any thing X, a logical X is either a real X or a virtual
X, but not both.
<virtual reality> n. 1. Computer simulations that involve 3D graphics
and use devices such as the Dataglove to allow the user interact
with the simulation. See <cyberspace>. 2. A form of network
interaction incorporating aspects of role-playing games,
interactive theater, improvisational comedy and "true
confessions" magazines. In a "virtual reality" forum (such as
USENET's alt.callahans newsgroup or the MUD experiments on
Internet) interaction between the participants is written like a
shared novel complete with scenery, "foreground characters" which
may be personae utterly unlike the people who write them, and
common "background characters" manipulable by all parties. The
one iron law is that you may not write irreversible changes to a
character without the consent of the person who "owns" it.
Otherwise anything goes. See <bamf>, <cyberspace>.
<visionary> n. One who hacks vision, in the sense of an Artificial
Intelligence researcher working on the problem of getting computers
to "see" things using TV cameras. (There isn't any problem in
sending information from a TV camera to a computer. The problem
is, how can the computer be programmed to make use of the camera
information? See <SMOP>.)
<VMS> /vee em ess/ n. DEC's proprietary operating system for their VAX
minicomputer; one of the seven or so environments that loom largest
in hacker folklore. Many UNIX fans generously concede that VMS
would probably be the hacker's favorite commercial OS if UNIX
didn't exist; though true, this makes VMS fans furious. One major
hacker gripe with it is its slowness, thus the following limerick:
There once was a system called VMS
Of cycles by no means abstemious.
It's chock-full of hacks
And runs on a VAX
And makes my poor stomach all squeamious.
---The Great Quux
See also <VAX>, <TOPS-10>, <TOPS-20>, <UNIX>.
<voodoo programming> [from George Bush's "voodoo economics"] n. Use
by guess or cookbook of an <obscure>, <hairy> system feature or
algorithm which one does not truly understand. The implication is
that the technique may not work, and if it doesn't one will never
know why. Compare <magic>, <deep magic>, <heavy wizardry>.
<vulcan nerve pinch> n. [From the old Star Trek TV series via
Commodore Amiga hackers] The keyboard combination that forces a
soft-boot or jump to ROM monitor (on machines that support such a
feature). On many micros this is Ctrl-Alt-Del; on Macintoshes, it
is <Cmd>-<Power switch>! Also called <three-finger salute>.
<vulture capitalist> n. Pejorative hackerism for "venture
capitalist", deriving from the common practice of pushing
contracts that deprive inventors of both control over their own
innovations and most of the money they ought to have made from
them.
{= W =}
<wabbit> /wab'it/ [almost certainly from Elmer Fudd's immortal line
"you wascal wabbit!"] n. 1. A legendary early hack reported on a
System/360 at RPI and elsewhere around 1978. The program would
reproduce itself twice every time it was run, eventually crashing
the system. 2. By extension, any hack that includes infinite
self-replication but is not a <virus> or <worm>. See also <cookie
monster).
<waldo> /wol'doh/ [probably taken from the story "Waldo", by
Heinlein, which is where the term was first used to mean a remote
mechanical agent controlled by a human limb] At Harvard
(particularly by Tom Cheatham and students) this is used instead of
<foobar> as a meta-syntactic variable and general nonsense word.
See <foo>, <bar>, <foobar>, <quux>.
<walk> n.,vt. Traversal of an actual or <logical> data structure,
especially a linked-list data structure in <core>. See also
<codewalker>, <silly-walk>, <clobber>.
<walking drives> n. An occasional failure mode of magnetic-disk drives
back in the days when they were 14" wide <washing machine>s. Those
old <dinosaur> parts carried terrific angular momentum; the
combination of a misaligned spindle or worn bearings and stick-slip
interactions with the floor could cause them to "walk" across a
room, lurching alternate corners forward a couple of millimeters at
a time. There is a legend about a drive that walked over to the
only door to the computer room and jammed it shut; the staff had to
cut a hole in the wall in order to get at it! Walking could also be
induced by certain patterns of drive access (a fast seek across the
whole width of the disk, followed by a slow seek in the other
direction). It is known that some bands of old-time hackers
figured out how to induce disk-accessing patterns that would do
this to particular drive models and held disk-drive races. This is
not a joke!
<wall> [WPI] interj. 1. An indication of confusion, usually spoken
with a quizzical tone. "Wall??" 2. A request for further
explication. Compare <octal forty>.
It is said that "WALL?" really came from "talking to a blank
wall". It was initially used in situations where, after one
carefully answered a question, the questioner stared at you
blankly, having understood nothing that was explained. One would
then throw out a "HELLO, WALL?" to elicit some sort of response
from the questioner. Later, confused questioners began voicing
"WALL?" themselves.
There is an anecdote about a child in a hospital who is addressed
by a nurse over an intercom and replies "What do you want, Wall?"
<wall time> n. 1. `Real world' time (what the clock on the wall shows)
as opposed to the system clock's idea of time. 2. The real running
time of a program, as opposed to the number of <clocks> required to
execute it (on a timesharing system these will differ, as no one
program gets all the <clocks>).
<wallpaper> n. 1. A file containing a listing (e.g., assembly listing)
or transcript, esp. a file containing a transcript 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
Stanford 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). However, the UNIX world doesn't
have an equivalent term, so perhaps <wallpaper> will take hold
there. The term probably originated on ITS, where the commands to
begin and end transcript files were :WALBEG and :WALEND, with
default file DSK:WALL PAPER. 2. The background pattern used on
graphical workstations (this is jargon under the "Windows"
graphical user interface to MS-DOS). 3. <wallpaper file> n. The
file that contains the wallpaper information before it is actually
printed on paper. (Sometimes you don't intend ever to produce a
real paper copy of the file, because you can look at the file
directly on your terminal, but it is still called a "wallpaper
file".)
<washing machine> n. Old-style hard disks in floor-standing cabinets.
So called because of the size of the cabinet and the
"top-loading" access to the media packs -- and, of course, they
were always set on "spin cycle". The washing-machine idiom
transcends language barriers; it's even used in Russian hacker
jargon. See <walking drives>. The thick channel cables connecting
these were called "bit hoses" (see HOSE).
<weasel> [Cambridge University] A "naive user", one who deliberately
or accidentally does things which are stupid or ill-advised.
Roughly synonymous with <luser>.
<wedged> adj. 1. To be stuck, incapable of proceeding without help.
This is different from having crashed. If the system has crashed,
then it has become totally non-functioning. If the system is
wedged, it is trying to do something but cannot make progress; it
may be capable of doing a few things, but not be fully operational.
For example, the system may become wedged if the disk controller
fries; there are some things you can do without using the disks,
but not many. Being wedged is slightly milder than being <hung>.
Also see <gronk>, <locked up>, <hosed>. 2. This term is sometimes
used to describe a <deadlock> condition. 3. Often refers to
humans suffering misconceptions. 4. [UNIX] Specifically used to
describe the state of a TTY left in a losing state by abort of a
screen-oriented program or one that has messed with the line
discipline in some obscure way. 5. <wedgitude> (wedj'i-tood) n.
The quality or state of being wedged.
<weeble> /weeb'l/ [Cambridge University] interj. Use to denote
frustration, usually at amazing stupidity. "I stuck the disk in
upside down." "Weeble..." Compare <gurfle>.
<weeds> n. Refers to development projects or algorithms that have no
possible relevance or practical application. Comes from "off in
the weeds". Used in phrases like "lexical analysis for microcode
is serious weeds..."
<Weenix> [ITS] n. A derogatory term for <UNIX>, derived from <UNIX
weenie>.
<well-behaved> adj. 1. [primarily <MS-DOS>] Said of software
conforming to system interface guidelines and standards. Well
behaved software uses the operating system to do chores such as
keyboard input, allocating memory and drawing graphics. Oppose
<ill-behaved>. 2. Software that does its job quietly and without
counterintuitive effects. Esp. said of software having an
interface spec sufficiently simple and well-defined that it can be
used as a tool by other software.
<well-connected> adj. Said of a computer installation, this means it
has reliable email links with the network and/or relays a large
fraction of available <USENET> newsgroups.
<wetware> [prob. from the novels of Rudy Rucker] n. 1. The human
brain, as opposed to computer hardware or software (as in "Wetware
has at most 7 +/- 2 registers"). 2. Human beings (programmers,
operators, administrators) attached to a computer system, as
opposed to the system's hardware or software.
<what> n. The question mark character (`?'). See <ques>. Usage:
rare, used particularly in conjunction with <wow>.
<wheel> [from Twenex, q.v.] n. A privileged user or <wizard> (sense
#2). The term was invented on the TENEX operating system, and
carried over to <TWENEX>, Xerox-IFS, and others. It entered the
UNIX culture from <TWENEX> and has been gaining popularity there
(esp. at university sites). Privilege bits are sometimes called
"wheel bits". The state of being in a privileged logon is
sometimes called "wheel mode". See also <root>.
<wheel wars> [Stanford University] A period in <larval stage> during
which student wheels hack each other by attempting to log each
other out of the system, delete each other's files, and otherwise
wreak havoc, usually at the expense of the lesser users.
<White Book> n. Syn. <K&R>.
<whizzy> (sometimes `wizzy') [Sun] adj. A <cuspy> program; usually
feature-rich and well presented.
<WIBNI> Bell Labs, Wouldn't It Be Nice If] n. What most requirements
documents/specifications consist entirely of. Compare <IWBNI>.
<widget> n. 1. A meta-thing. Used to stand for a real object in
didactic examples (especially database tutorials). Legend has it
that the original widgets were holders for buggy whips. 2. [poss.
from "window gadget"] A user interface object in X Window System
graphical user interfaces.
<wiggles> n. [scientific computation] In solving partial differential
equations by finite difference and similar methods, wiggles are
sawtooth (up-down-up-down) oscillations at the shortest wavelength
representable on the grid. If an algorithm is unstable, this is
often the most unstable waveform, so it grows to dominate the
solution. Alternatively, stable (though inaccurate) wiggles can be
generated near a discontinuity by a Gibbs phenomenon.
<WIMP environment> n. [acronymic from Window, Icon, Mouse, Pointer] A
graphical-user-interface based environment, as described by a
hacker who prefers command-line interfaces for their superior
flexibility and extensibility.
<win> [from MIT jargon] 1. v. To succeed. A program wins if no
unexpected conditions arise. 2. Success, or a specific instance
thereof. A pleasing outcome. A <feature>. 3. <big win>: n.
Serendipity. 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. 4. <win big> v. To
experience serendipity. "I went shopping and won big; there was a
two-for-one sale." 5. <win win> interj. Expresses pleasure at a
<win>. Oppose <lose>.
<winnage> /win'@j/ 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, programmer or
person. 2. <real winner>: Often sarcastic, but also used as high
praise.
<winnitude> /win'i-tood/ n. The quality of winning (as opposed to
<winnage>, which is the result of winning). "That's really great!
Boy, what winnitude!"
<wirehead> n. [prob. from notional SF slang for an electrical brain
stimulation junkie] 1. A hardware hacker, especially one who
concentrates on communications hardware. 2. An expert in local
area networks. A wirehead can be a network software wizard too,
but will always have the ability to deal with network hardware,
down to the smallest component. Wireheads are known for their
ability to lash up an Ethernet terminator from spare resistors, for
example.
<wish list> n. A list of desired features or bug fixes that probably
won't get done for a long time, usually because the person
responsible for the code is too busy or can't think of a clean way
to do it.
<wizard> n. 1. A person who knows how a complex piece of software or
hardware works (that is, who <grok>s it); esp. someone who can
find and fix bugs quickly in an emergency. This term differs
somewhat from <hacker>. Someone is a hacker if he has general
hacking ability, but is only a wizard with respect to something if
he has specific detailed knowledge of that thing. A good hacker
could become a wizard for something given the time to study it. 2.
A person who is permitted to do things forbidden to ordinary
people. For example, an Adventure wizard at Stanford may play the
Adventure game during the day, which is forbidden (the program
simply refuses to play) to most people because it uselessly
consumes too many <cycle>s. 3. A UNIX expert, esp. a UNIX systems
programmer. This usage is well enough established that "UNIX
Wizard" is a recognized job title at some corporations and to most
headhunters. See <guru>.
<wizard book> n. Abelson and Sussman's "Structure and Interpretation
of Computer Programs", an excellent CS text used in introductory
courses at MIT. So called because of the wizard on the cover of
the MIT Press edition.
<wizard mode> [from nethack] n. A special access mode of a program or
system, usually passworded, that permits some users godlike
privileges. Generally not used for operating systems themselves
(<root mode> or <wheel mode> would be used instead).
<wizardly> adj. Pertaining to wizards. A wizardly <feature> is one
that only a wizard could understand or use properly.
<WOMBAT> [Waste Of Money, Brains and Time] adj. Applied to problems
which are both profoundly <uninteresting> in themselves and
unlikely to benefit anyone interesting even if solved. Often used
in fanciful constructions such as "wrestling with a wombat". See
also <crawling horror>, <SMOP>. Also note the rather different
usage as a meta-syntactic variable under <COMMONWEALTH HACKISH>
<wonky> /won'kee/ [from Australian slang] adj. Yet another approximate
synonym for <broken>. Specifically connotes a malfunction which
produces behavior seen as crazy, humorous, or amusingly perverse.
"That was the day the printer's font logic went wonky and
everybody's listings came out in Elvish." Also in "wonked out".
See <funky>, <demented>.
<worm> [from `tapeworm' in John Brunner's "Shockwave Rider", via
XEROX PARC] n. A cracker program that propagates itself over a
network, reproducing itself as it goes. See <virus>. Perhaps the
best known example was RTM's `Internet Worm' in '88, a `benign' one
that got out of control and shut down hundreds of Suns and VAXen
nationwide. See also <cracker>, <trojan horse>, <ice>.
<wound around the axle> adj. In an infinite loop. Often used by older
computer types.
<wow> See <excl>.
<wrap around> v. (also n. `wraparound' and v. shorthand "wrap") 1.
This is "jargon" in its normal computer usage, i.e., describing
the action of a counter that starts over at 0 or at <minus
infinity> after its maximum value has been reached, and continues
incrementing, either because it is programmed to do so, or because
of an overflow like a car's odometer starting over at 0. 2. To
<change phase> gradually and continuously by maintaining a steady
wake-sleep cycle somewhat longer than 24 hours, e.g. living 6 long
days in a week.
<write-only code> [a play on "read-only memory"] n. Code
sufficiently arcane, complex, or ill-structured that it cannot be
modified or even comprehended by anyone but the original author. A
<Bad Thing>.
<write-only language> n. A language with syntax (or semantics)
sufficiently dense and bizarre that any routine of significant size
is <write-only code>. A sobriquet often applied to APL,
though INTERCAL certainly deserves it more.
<write-only memory> n. The obvoius antonym to "read-only memory".
In frustration with the long and seemingly useless chain of
approvals required of component specifications, during which no
actual checking seemed to occur, an engineer at Signetics created a
specification for a write-only memory, and included it with a bunch
of other specifications to be approved. This inclusion only came
to the attention of Signetics when regular customers started
calling and asking for pricing information. Signetics published a
corrected edition of the data book, and requested the return of the
"erroneous" ones. Later, about 1974, Signetics bought a double
page spread in Electronics magazine's April issue, and used the
spec as an April Fools' day joke. Instead of the more conventional
characteristic curves, the 25120 "fully encoded, 9046 x N, Random
Access, write-only-memory" data sheet included diagrams of "bit
capacity vs. Temp.", "Iff vs. Vff", "Number of pins remaining
vs. number of socket insertions" and "AQL vs. selling price".
The 25120 required a 6.3 VAC VFF supply, a +10V VCC, and VDD of 0V,
+/- 2%.
<Wrong Thing, the> n. A design, action or decision which is clearly
incorrect or inappropriate. Often capitalized; always emphasized
in speech as if capitalized. The opposite of the Right Thing; more
generally, anything that is not the Right Thing. In cases were
"the good is the enemy of the best", the merely good, while good,
is nevertheless the Wrong Thing.
<wugga wugga> /wuh'guh wuh'guh/ n. Imaginary sound that a computer
program makes as it labors with a tedious or difficult task.
Compare <cruncha cruncha cruncha>, <grind> (sense #4).
<WYSIWYG> /wiz'ee-wig/ adj. User interface (usu. text or graphics
editor) characterized as being "what you see is what you get;" as
opposed to one which uses more-or-less obscure commands which do
not result in immediate visual feedback. The term can be mildly
derogatory, as it is often used to refer to dumbed-down interfaces
targeted at non-programmers, while a hacker has no fear of obscure
commands. On the other hand, EMACS was one of the very first
WYSIWYG editors, replacing (actually, at first overlaying) the
extremely obscure, command-based TECO.
{= X =}
<x> /eks/ n. 1. Used in various speech and writing contexts in roughly
its algebraic sense of "unknown within a set defined by context"
(compare `N'). Thus: the abbreviation 680x0 stands for 68000,
68010, 68020, 68030 or 68040, and 80x86 stands for 80186, 80286
80386 or 80486 (note that a UNIX hacker might write these as
680[01234]0 and 80[1234]86 or 680?0 and 80?86 respectively; see
GLOB). 2. An over-sized, over-featured, over-engineered window
system developed at MIT and widely used on UNIX systems.
<xor> /eks'ohr/ conj. Exclusive or. "A xor B" means "A or B, but
not both". Example: "I want to get cherry pie xor a banana
split." This derives from the technical use of the term as a
function on truth-values that is true if either of two arguments is
true but not both.
<xref> /eks'ref/ v.,n. Hackish standard abbreviation for
`cross-reference'.
<XXX> /eks-eks-eks/ n. A marker that attention is needed. Commonly
used in program comments to indicate areas that are <kluged up> or
need to be. Some hackers liken XXX code to pornographic movies
that contain the symbol.
<xyzzy> /eks-wie-zee-zee-wie/, /ik-zi'zee/, /eks-wie-ziz'ee/ [from the
ADVENT game] adj. The <canonical> "magic word". This comes from
<ADVENT>, in which the idea is to explore an underground cave with
many rooms to collect treasure. If you type XYZZY at the
appropriate time, you can move instantly between two otherwise
distant points. If, therefore, you encounter some bit of MAGIC,
you might remark on this quite succinctly by saying simply
"XYZZY"! Example: "Ordinarily you can't look at someone else's
screen if he has protected it, but if you type
quadruple-bucky-clear the system will let you do it anyway."
"XYZZY!" XYZZY has actually been implemented as an undocumented
no-op command on several OSs; in Data General's AOS/VS, for
example, it would typically respond "Nothing happens." just as
<ADVENT> did if the magic was invoked at the wrong spot or before a
player had performed the action that enabled the word. See
<plugh>.
{= Y =}
<YA*> ["Yet Another"] abbrev. In hackish acronyms this almost
invariably expands to <Yet Another> following the precedent set by
UNIX `yacc(1)'. See <YABA>.
<YABA> /ya'buh/ [Cambridge University] n. Yet Another Bloody Acronym.
Whenever some program is being named, someone invariably suggests
that it be given a name which is acronymic. The response from
those with a trace of originality is to remark ironically that the
proposed name would then be "YABA-compatible". Also used in
response to questions like "What is WYSIWYG?" "YABA." See also
<TLA>.
<YAUN> /yawn/ [Acronym for "Yet Another UNIX Nerd"] n. Reported from
the San Diego Computer Society (predominently a microcomputer
users' group) as a good-natured punning insult aimed at UNIX
zealots.
<Yet Another> adj. [UNIX] From UNIX's `yacc(1)' ("Yet Another Compiler-
Compiler") LALR parser generator. 1. Of your own work: humorous
allusion often used in titles to acknowledge that the topic is not
original -- though the content is. As in "Yet Another AI Group"
or "Yet Another Simulated Annealing Algorithm". 2. Of other's
work: describes something of which there are far too many. See
also <YA*>, <YABA>, <YAUN>.
<You are not expected to understand this.> cav. [UNIX] Canonical
comment describing something <magic> or too complicated to bother
explaining properly. From a comment in the context-switching code
of the V6 UNIX kernel.
<You know you've been hacking too long when...> The set-up line
for a genre of one-liners told by hackers about themselves. These
include the following:
* not only do you check your email more often than your paper
mail, but you remember your <network address> faster than your
postal one.
* your <SO> kisses you on the neck and the first thing you
think is "Uh, oh, <priority interrupt>".
* you go to balance your checkbook and discover that you're
doing it in octal.
* your computers have a higher street value than your car.
* `round numbers' are powers of 2, not 10.
* you've woken up more than once to recall of a dream in
some programming language.
* you realize you've never met half of your best friends.
All but one of these have been reliably reported as hacker traits
(some of them quite often). Even hackers may have trouble spotting
the ringer.
<Your mileage may vary.> cav. [from the standard disclaimer attached
to EPA mileage ratings by American car manufacturers] A ritual
warning often found in UNIX freeware distributions. Translates
roughly as "Hey, I tried to write this portably but who
*knows* what'll happen on your system?"
<Yow!> /yow/ [from Zippy the Pinhead comix] interj. Favored hacker
expression of humorous surprise or emphasis. "Yow! Check out what
happens when you twiddle the foo option on this display hack!"
Compare <gurfle>.
<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> /yoo-shyang hohl fish/ n. obs. The character
gamma (extended SAIL ASCII 11), which with a loop in its tail looks
like a little fish swimming down the page. The term is actually
the name of a Chinese dish in which a fish is cooked whole (not
<parse>d) and covered with Yu Shiang sauce. Usage: was used
primarily by people on the MIT LISP Machine, which could display
this character on the screen. Tends to elicit incredulity from
people who hear about it second-hand.
{= Z =}
<zap> 1. n. Spiciness. 2. v. To make food spicy. 3. v. To make
someone "suffer" by making his food spicy. (Most hackers love
spicy food. Hot-and-sour soup is considered wimpy unless it makes
you blow your nose for the rest of the meal.) 4. ZAPPED adj.
Spicy. This term is used to distinguish between food that is hot
(in temperature) and food that is "hot", that is, spicy. For
example, the Chinese appetizer Bon Bon Chicken is a kind of chicken
salad that is cold but zapped. See also <ORIENTAL FOOD>, <laser
chicken>. 5. To modify, usually to correct. Also implies surgical
precision. (In some communities, used to describe modifying a
program's binary executable.) 6. To erase or reset.
<zen> v. To figure out something by meditation, or by a sudden flash
of enlightenment. Originally applied to bugs, but occasionally
applied to problems of life in general. "How'd you figure out the
buffer allocation problem?" "Oh, I zenned it". Contrast <grok>,
which connotes a time-extended version of zenning a system.
Compare <hack mode>.
<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. One may
speak of something being "logically zeroed" rather than being
"physically zeroed". See <scribble>.
<zeroth> /zee'rohth/ adj. [C] First. Comes from C's 0-based indexing
of arrays.
<zipperhead> [IBM] n. A person with a closed mind.
<zombie> [UNIX] n. A process which has died but has not yet
relinquished its process table slot (because the parent process
hasn't executed a `wait(2)' for it yet). These show up in `ps(1)'
listings occasionally. Compare <orphan>.
<zork> /zork/ n. Second of the great early experiments in computer
fantasy gaming; see <ADVENT>. Originally written on MIT-DMS during
the late seventies, later distributed with BSD UNIX and
commercialized as "The Zork Trilogy" by Infocom.
Appendix A: Hacker Folklore
***************************
This appendix contains several fables and legends which illuminate
the meaning of various entries in the main text. All of this material
except THE UNTIMELY DEMISE OF MABEL THE MONKEY appeared in the 1983
paper edition of the Jargon File (but not in the previous on-line
versions).
The Meaning of "Hack"
*********************
"The word HACK doesn't really have 69 different meanings", according
to Phil Agre, an MIT hacker. "In fact, HACK has only one meaning, an
extremely subtle and profound one which defies articulation. Which
connotation is implied by a given use of the word depends in similarly
profound ways on the context. Similar remarks apply to a couple of
other hacker words, most notably RANDOM."
Hacking might be characterized as "an appropriate application of
ingenuity". Whether the result is a quick-and-dirty patchwork job or
a carefully crafted work of art, you have to admire the cleverness
that went into it.
An important secondary meaning of `hack' is `a creative practical
joke'. This kind of hack is often easier to explain to non-hackers
than the programming kind. Accordingly, here are three examples of
practical joke hacks:
In 1961, students from Caltech (California Institute of Technology in
Pasadena) hacked the Rose Bowl football game. One student posed as a
reporter and "interviewed" the director of the University of
Washington card stunts (such stunts involve people in the stands who
hold up colored cards to make pictures). The reporter learned exactly
how the stunts were operated, and also that the director would be out
to dinner later.
While the director was eating, the students (who called themselves the
"Fiendish Fourteen") picked a lock and stole one of the direction
sheets for the card stunts. They then had a printer run off 2300
copies of the sheet. The next day they picked the lock again and
stole the master plans for the stunts, large sheets of graph paper
colored in with the stunt pictures. Using these as a guide, they
carefully made "corrections" for three of the stunts on the
duplicate instruction sheets. Finally, they broke in once more,
replacing the stolen master plans and substituting the stack of
altered instruction sheets for the original set.
The result was that three of the pictures were totally different.
Instead of spelling "WASHINGTON", the word "CALTECH" was flashed.
Another stunt showed the word "HUSKIES", the Washington nickname,
but spelled it backwards. And what was supposed to have been a
picture of a husky instead showed a beaver. (Both Caltech and MIT use
the beaver as a mascot. Beavers are nature's engineers.)
After the game, the Washington faculty athletic representative said,
"Some thought it ingenious; others were indignant." The Washington
student body president remarked, "No hard feelings, but at the time
it was unbelievable. We were amazed."
This is now considered a classic hack, particularly because revising
the direction sheets constituted a form of programming not unlike
computer programming.
Another classic hack:
One winter, late at night, an MIT fraternity hosed down an underpass
that is part of a commuter expressway near MIT. This produced an ice
slick that "trapped" a couple of small cars: they didn't have the
momentum or traction to climb out of the underpass. While it was
clever to apply some simple science to trap a car, it was also very
dangerous as it could have caused a collision. Therefore this was a
very poor hack overall. (There is another story about an even less
appealing hack in which some MIT students used thermite to weld a
trolley car to its tracks. The story may be apocryphal, however.)
And yet another:
On November 20, 1982, MIT hacked the Harvard-Yale football game. Just
after Harvard's second touchdown against Yale in the second quarter, a
small black ball popped up out of the ground at the 40-yard line, and
grew bigger, and bigger, and bigger. The letters "MIT" appeared all
over the ball. As the players and officials stood around gawking, the
ball grew to six feet in diameter and then burst with a bang and a
cloud of white smoke.
As the Boston Globe later reported, "If you want to know the truth,
M.I.T. won The Game."
The prank had taken weeks of careful planning by members of MIT's
Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity. The device consisted of a weather
balloon, a hydraulic ram powered by Freon gas to lift it out of the
ground, and a vacuum-cleaner motor to inflate it. They made eight
separate expeditions to Harvard Stadium between 1 and 5 AM, in which
they located an unused 110-volt circuit in the stadium, and ran buried
wiring from the stadium circuit to the 40-yard line, where they buried
the balloon device. When the time came to activate the device, two
fraternity members had merely to flip a circuit breaker and push a
plug into an outlet.
This stunt had all the earmarks of a perfect hack: surprise,
publicity, the ingenious use of technology, safety, and harmlessness.
The use of manual control allowed the prank to be timed so as not to
disrupt the game (it was set off between plays, so the outcome of the
game would not be unduly affected). The perpetrators had even
thoughtfully attached a note to the balloon explaining that the device
was not dangerous and contained no explosives.
Harvard president Derek Bok commented: "They have an awful lot of
clever people down there at MIT, and they did it again." President
Paul E. Gray of MIT said, "There is absolutely no truth to the rumor
that I had anything to do with it, but I wish there were." Such is
the way of all good hacks.
The Untimely Demise of Mabel the Monkey (a Cautionary Tale)
***********************************************************
The following, modulo a couple of inserted commas and capitalization
changes for readability, is the exact text of a famous USENET message.
The reader may wish to review the definitions of PM and MOUNT in the main
text before continuing.
Date: Wed 3 Sep 86 16:46:31-EDT
From: "Art Evans" <Evans@TL-20B.ARPA>
Subject: Always Mount a Scratch Monkey
To: Risks@CSL.SRI.COM
My friend Bud used to be the intercept man at a computer vendor for
calls when an irate customer called. Seems one day Bud was sitting at
his desk when the phone rang.
Bud: Hello. Voice: YOU KILLED MABEL!!
B: Excuse me? V: YOU KILLED MABEL!!
This went on for a couple of minutes and Bud was getting nowhere, so he
decided to alter his approach to the customer.
B: HOW DID I KILL MABEL? V: YOU PM'ED MY MACHINE!!
Well, to avoid making a long story even longer, I will abbreviate what had
happened. The customer was a Biologist at the University of Blah-de-blah,
and he had one of our computers that controlled gas mixtures that Mabel (the
monkey) breathed. Now, Mabel was not your ordinary monkey. The University
had spent years teaching Mabel to swim, and they were studying the effects
that different gas mixtures had on her physiology. It turns out that the
repair folks had just gotten a new Calibrated Power Supply (used to
calibrate analog equipment), and at their first opportunity decided to
calibrate the D/A converters in that computer. This changed some of the gas
mixtures and poor Mabel was asphyxiated. Well, Bud then called the branch
manager for the repair folks:
Manager: Hello
B: This is Bud, I heard you did a PM at the University of
Blah-de-blah.
M: Yes, we really performed a complete PM. What can I do
for you?
B: Can you swim?
The moral is, of course, that you should always mount a scratch monkey.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
There are several morals here related to risks in use of computers.
Examples include, "If it ain't broken, don't fix it." However, the
cautious philosophical approach implied by "always mount a scratch
monkey" says a lot that we should keep in mind.
Art Evans
Tartan Labs
TV Typewriters: A Tale Of Hackish Ingenuity
*******************************************
Here is a true story about a glass tty. One day an MIT hacker was in
a motorcycle accident and broke his leg. He had to stay in the
hospital quite a while, and got restless because he couldn't HACK (use
the computer). Two of his friends therefore took a display terminal
and a telephone connection for it to the hospital, so that he could
use the computer by telephone from his hospital bed.
Now this happened some years before the spread of home computers, and
computer terminals were not a familiar sight to the average person.
When the two friends got to the hospital, a guard stopped them and
asked what they were carrying. They explained that they wanted to
take a computer terminal to their friend who was a patient.
The guard got out his list of things that patients were permitted to
have in their rooms: TV, radio, electric razor, typewriter, tape
player... no computer terminals. Computer terminals weren't on the
list, so they couldn't take it in. Rules are rules.
Fair enough, said the two friends, and they left again. They were
frustrated, of course, because they knew that the terminal was as
harmless as a TV or anything else on the list... which gave them an
idea.
The next day they returned, and the same thing happened: a guard
stopped them and asked what they were carrying. They said, "This is
a TV typewriter!" The guard was skeptical, so they plugged it in and
demonstrated it. "See? You just type on the keyboard and what you
type shows up on the TV screen." Now the guard didn't stop to think
about how utterly useless a typewriter would be that didn't produce
any paper copies of what you typed; but this was clearly a TV
typewriter, no doubt about it. So he checked his list: "A TV is all
right, a typewriter is all right... okay, take it on in!"
Two Stories About "Magic" (As Told By Guy Steele)
*************************************************
When Barbara Steele was in her fifth month of pregnancy, her doctor
sent her to a specialist to have a sonogram made to determine whether
there were twins. She dragged her husband Guy along to the
appointment. It was quite fascinating; as the doctor moved an
instrument along the skin, a small TV screen showed cross-sectional
pictures of the abdomen.
Now Barbara and I had both studied computer science at MIT, and we
both saw that some complex computerized image-processing was involved.
Out of curiosity, we asked the doctor how it was done, hoping to learn
some details about the mathematics involved. The doctor, not knowing
our educational background, simply said, "The probe sends out sound
waves, which bounce off the internal organs. A microphone picks up
the echoes, like radar, and send the signals to a computer---and the
computer makes a picture." Thanks a lot! Now a hacker would have
said, "... and the computer *magically* makes a picture",
implicitly acknowledging that he has glossed over an extremely
complicated process.
Some years ago I was snooping around in the cabinets that housed the
MIT AI Lab's PDP-10, and noticed a little switch glued to the frame of
one cabinet. It was obviously a homebrew job, added by one of the
lab's hardware hackers (no one know who).
You don't touch an unknown switch on a computer without knowing what
it does, because you might crash the computer. The switch was labeled
in a most unhelpful way. It had two positions, and scrawled in pencil
on the metal switch body were the words "magic" and "more magic".
The switch was in the "more magic" position.
I called another hacker over to look at it. He had never seen the
switch before either. Closer examination revealed that the switch
only had one wire running to it! The other end of the wire did
disappear into the maze of wires inside the computer, but it's a basic
fact of electricity that a switch can't do anything unless there are
two wires connected to it. This switch had a wire connected on one
side and no wire on its other side.
It was clear that this switch was someone's idea of a silly joke.
Convinced by our reasoning that the switch was inoperative, we flipped
it. The computer instantly crashed.
Imagine our utter astonishment. We wrote it off as coincidence, but
nevertheless restored the switch to the "more magic" position before
reviving the computer.
A year later, I told this story to yet another hacker, David Moon as I
recall. He clearly doubted my sanity, or suspected me of a
supernatural belief in the power of this switch, or perhaps thought I
was fooling him with a bogus saga. To prove it to him, I showed him
the very switch, still glued to the cabinet frame with only one wire
connected to it, still in the "more magic" position. We scrutinized
the switch and its lone connection, and found that the other end of
the wire, though connected to the computer wiring, was connected to a
ground pin. That clearly made the switch doubly useless: not only was
it electrically nonoperative, but it was connected to a place that
couldn't affect anything anyway. So we flipped the switch.
The computer promptly crashed.
This time we ran for Richard Greenblatt, a long-time MIT hacker, who
was close at hand. He had never noticed the switch before, either.
He inspected it, concluded it was useless, got some diagonal cutters
and diked it out. We then revived the computer and it ran fine ever
since.
We still don't know how the switch crashed the machine. There is a
theory that some circuit near the ground pin was marginal, and
flipping the switch changed the electrical capacitance enough to upset
the circuit as millionth-of-a-second pulses went through it. But
we'll never know for sure; all we can really say is that the switch
was MAGIC.
I still have that switch in my basement. Maybe I'm silly, but I
usually keep it set on "more magic."
A Selection of AI Koans
***********************
These are perhaps the funniest examples of a genre of jokes told at
the MIT AI lab about various noted computer scientists and hackers.
* * *
A novice was trying to fix a broken Lisp machine by turning the power
off and on.
Knight, seeing what the student was doing spoke sternly: "You can not
fix a machine by just power-cycling it with no understanding of what
is going wrong."
Knight turned the machine off and on.
The machine worked.
[Ed note: This is much funnier if you know that Tom Knight was one of the
Lisp machine's principal designers]
* * *
One day a student came to Moon and said, "I understand how to
make a better garbage collector. We must keep a reference count
of the pointers to each cons."
Moon patiently told the student the following story:
"One day a student came to Moon and said, "I understand how
to make a better garbage collector...
[Ed. note: The point here is technical. Pure reference-count garbage
collectors have problems with `pathological' structures that point
to themselves.]
* * *
In the days when Sussman was a novice Minsky once came to him as
he sat hacking at the PDP-6.
"What are you doing?", asked Minsky.
"I am training a randomly wired neural net to play Tic-Tac-Toe",
Sussman replied.
"Why is the net wired randomly?", asked Minsky.
"I do not want it to have any preconceptions of how to play",
Sussman said.
Minsky then shut his eyes.
"Why do you close your eyes?", Sussman asked his teacher.
"So that the room will be empty."
At that moment, Sussman was enlightened.
* * *
A disciple of another sect once came to Drescher as he was
eating his morning meal.
"I would like to give you this personality test", said the
outsider, "because I want you to be happy."
Drescher took the paper that was offered him and put it
into the toaster, saying:
"I wish the toaster to be happy, too."
OS and JEDGAR
*************
This story says a lot about the style of the ITS culture.
On the ITS system there was a program that allowed you to see what is
being printed on someone else's terminal. It worked by "spying" on
the other guy's output, by examining the insides of the monitor
system. The output spy program was called OS. Throughout the rest of
the computer science (and also at IBM) OS means "operating system",
but among old-time ITS hackers it almost always meant "output spy".
OS could work because ITS purposely had very little in the way of
"protection" that prevented one user from interfering with another.
Fair is fair, however. There was another program that would
automatically notify you if anyone started to spy on your output. It
worked in exactly the same way, by looking at the insides of the
operating system to see if anyone else was looking at the insides that
had to do with your output. This "counterspy" program was called
JEDGAR (pronounced as two syllables: /jed'gr/), in honor of the former
head of the FBI.
But there's more. The rest of the story is that JEDGAR would ask the
user for "license to kill". If the user said yes, then JEDGAR would
actually gun the job of the luser who was spying. However, people
found this made life too violent, especially when tourists learned
about it. One of the systems hackers solved the problem by replacing
JEDGAR with another program that only pretended to do its job. It
took a long time to do this, because every copy of JEDGAR had to be
patched, and to this day no one knows how many people never figured
out that JEDGAR had been defanged.
Appendix B: A Portrait of J. Random Hacker
******************************************
This profile reflects detailed comments on an earlier `trial balloon'
version from about a hundred USENET respondents. Where comparatives
are used, the implicit `other' is a randomly selected group from the
non-hacker population of the same size as hackerdom.
General appearance:
-------------------
Intelligent. Scruffy. Intense. Abstracted. Interestingly for a
sedentary profession, more hackers run to skinny than fat; both
extremes are more common than elswhere. Tans are rare.
Dress:
------
Casual, vaguely post-hippy; T-shirts, jeans, running shoes,
Birkenstocks (or bare feet). Long hair, beards and moustaches are
common. High incidence of tie-die and intellectual or humorous
`slogan' T-shirts (only rarely computer related, that's too obvious).
A substantial minority runs to `outdoorsy' clothing --- hiking boots
("in case a mountain should suddenly spring up in the machine room",
as one famous parody put it), khakis, lumberjack or chammy shirts and
the like.
Very few actually fit the National-Lampoon-Nerd stereotype, though it
lingers on at MIT and may have been more common before 1975. These
days, backpacks are more common than briefcases, and the hacker `look'
is more whole-earth than whole-polyester.
Hackers dress for comfort, function, and minimal maintenance hassles
rather than for appearance (some, unfortunately, take this to extremes
and neglect personal hygiene). They have a very low tolerance of
suits or other `business' attire, in fact it is not uncommon for
hackers to quit a job rather than conform to dress codes.
Female hackers never wear visible makeup and many use none at all.
Reading habits:
---------------
Omnivorous, but usually includes lots of science and science fiction.
The typical hacker household might subscribe to "Analog",
"Scientific American", "Co-Evolution_Quarterly" and
"Smithsonian". Hackers often have a reading range that astonishes
`liberal arts' people but tend not to talk about it as much. Many
hackers spend as much of their spare time reading as the average
American burns up watching TV, and often keep shelves and shelves of
well-thumbed books in their homes.
Other interests:
----------------
Some hobbies are widely shared and recognized as going with the
culture, including: science fiction. Music (see the MUSIC entry).
Medievalism. Chess, go, wargames and intellectual games of all kinds.
Role-playing games such as Dungeons and Dragons used to be extremely
popular among hackers but have lost a bit of their former luster as
they moved into the mainstream and became heavily commercialized.
Logic puzzles. Ham radio. Other interests that seem to correlate
less strongly but positively with hackerdom include: linguistics and
theater teching.
Physical Activity and Sports:
-----------------------------
Many (perhaps even most) hackers don't do sports at all and are
determinedly anti-physical.
Among those that do, they are almost always self-competitive ones
involving concentration, stamina and micromotor skills; martial arts,
bicycling, kite-flying, hiking, rock-climbing, sailing, caving,
juggling.
Hackers avoid most team sports like the plague (volleyball is a
notable and unexplained exception).
Education:
----------
Nearly all hackers past their teens are either college-degreed or
self-educated to an equivalent level. The self-taught hacker is often
considered (at least by other hackers) to be better-motivated and more
respected than his B.Sc. counterpart. Academic areas from which
people often gravitate into hackerdom include (besides the obvious
computer science and electrical engineering) physics, mathematics,
electrical engineering, linguistics, and philosophy.
Things hackers detest and avoid:
--------------------------------
IBM mainframes. Smurfs and other forms of offensive cuteness.
Bureaucracies. Stupid people. Easy listening music. Television
(except for cartoons, movies, the old _Star_Trek_ and the new
_Simpsons_). Business suits. Dishonesty. Incompetence. Boredom.
BASIC. Character-based menu interfaces.
Food:
-----
Ethnic. Spicy. Oriental, esp. Chinese and most especially Szechuan,
Hunan and Mandarin (hackers consider Cantonese vaguely declasse).
Thai food has experienced flurries of popularity. Where available
high-quality Jewish delicatessen food is much esteemed. A visible
minority of Midwestern and Southwestern hackers prefers Mexican.
For those all-night hacks, pizza and microwaved burritos are big.
Interestingly, though the mainstream culture has tended to think of
hackers as incorrigible junk-food junkies, many have at least mildly
health-foodist attitudes and are fairly discriminating about what they
eat. This may be generational; anecdotal evidence suggests that the
stereotype was more on the mark ten years ago.
Politics:
---------
Vaguely left of center, except for the strong libertarian contingent
which rejects conventional left-right politics entirely. The only
safe generalization is that almost all hackers are anti-authoritarian,
thus both conventional conservatism and "hard" leftism are rare.
Hackers are far more likely than most non-hackers to either a) be
aggressively apolitical, or b) entertain peculiar or idiosyncratic
political ideas and actually try to live by them day-to-day.
Gender & Ethnicity:
-------------------
Hackerdom is still predominently male. However, the proportion of
women is clearly higher than the low-single-digit range typical for
technical professions.
Hackerdom is predominantly Caucasian with a strong minority of Jews
(east coast) and Asians (west coast). The Jewish contingent has
exerted a particularly pervasive cultural influence (see Food, and
note that several common slang terms are obviously mutated Yiddish).
Hackers as a group are about as color-blind as anyone could ask for,
and ethnic prejudice of any kind tends to be met with extreme
hostility; the ethnic distribution of hackers is understood by them to
be a function of who tends to seek and get higher education.
It has been speculated that hackish gender- and color-blindness is
partly a positive effect of ASCII-only network channels.
Religion:
---------
Agnostic. Atheist. Non-observant Jewish. Neo-pagan. Very commonly
three or more of these are combined in the same person. Conventional
faith-holding Christianity is rare though not unknown (at least on the
east coast, more hackers wear yarmulkes than crucifixes).
Even hackers who identify with a religious affiliation tend to be
relaxed about it, hostile to organized religion in general and all
forms of religious bigotry in particular. Many enjoy `parody'
religions such as Discordianism and the Church of the SubGenius.
Also, many hackers are influenced to varying degrees by Zen Buddhism
or (less commonly) Taoism, and blend them easily with their `native'
religions.
There is a definite strain of mystical, almost Gnostic sensibility
that shows up even among those hackers not actively involved with
neo-paganism, Discordianism, or Zen. Hacker folklore that pays homage
to `wizards' and speaks of incantations and demons has too much
psychological truthfulness about it to be entirely a joke.
Ceremonial chemicals:
---------------------
Most hackers don't smoke tobacco and use alcohol in moderation if at
all (though there is a visible contingent of exotic-beer fanciers).
Limited use of `soft' drugs (esp. psychedelics such as marijuana, LSD,
psilocybin etc) used to be relatively common and is still regarded
with more tolerance than in the mainstream culture. Use of `downers'
and opiates, on the other hand, appears to be particularly rare;
hackers seem in general to dislike drugs that `dumb them down'. On
the other hand, many hackers regularly wire up on caffeine and sugar
for all-night hacking runs.
Communication style:
--------------------
See the dictionary notes on `Hacker speech style'. Though hackers
often have poor person-to-person communication skills, they are as a
rule extremely sensitive to nuances of language and very precise in
their use of it. They are often better at written communication than
spoken.
Geographical Distribution:
--------------------------
In the U.S., hackerdom revolves on a Bay Area/Boston axis; about half
of the hard core seems to live within a hundred miles of Cambridge or
Berkeley. Hackers tend to cluster around large cities, especially
`university towns' such as the Raleigh/Durham area in North Carolina
or Princeton, New Jersey (this may simply reflect the fact that many
are students or ex-students living near their alma maters).
Sexual habits:
--------------
Hackerdom tolerates a much wider range of sexual and lifestyle
variation than the mainstream culture. It includes a relatively large
gay contingent. Hackers are more likely to live in polygynous or
polyandrous relationships, practice open marriage or live in communes
or group houses. In this as in some other respects (see Dress)
hackerdom semi-consciously maintains `counterculture' values.
Personality Characteristics:
----------------------------
The most obvious common `personality' characteristics of hackers are
high intelligence, consuming curiosity, and facility with intellectual
abstractions. Also, most hackers are `neophiles', stimulated by and
appreciative of novelty (especially intellectual novelty). Most are
also relatively individualistic and anti-conformist.
Contrary to stereotype, hackers are *not* usually intellectually
narrow; they tend to be interested in any subject that can provide
mental stimulation, and can often discourse knowledegeably and even
interestingly on any number of obscure subjects --- assuming you can
get them to talk at all as opposed to, say, going back to hacking.
Hackers are `control freaks' in a way that has nothing to do with the
usual coercive or authoritarian connotations of the term. In the same
way that children delight in making model trains go forward and back
by moving a switch, hackers love making complicated things like
computers do nifty stuff for them. But it has to be *their*
nifty stuff; they don't like tedium or nondeterminism. Accordingly
they tend to be careful and orderly in their intellectual lives and
chaotic elsewhere. Their code will be beautiful, even if their desks
are buried in three feet of crap.
Hackers are generally only very weakly motivated by conventional
rewards such as social approval or money. They tend to be attracted
by challenges and excited by interesting toys, and to judge the
interest of work or other activities in terms of the challenges
offered and the toys they get to play with.
In terms of Myers-Briggs and equivalent psychometric systems,
hackerdom appears to concentrate the relatively rare INTJ and INTP
types; that is, introverted, intuitive and thinker types (as opposed
to the extroverted-sensate personalities the predominate in the
mainstream culture). ENT[JP] types are also concentrated among
hackers but are in a minority.
Weaknesses of the hacker personality:
-------------------------------------
Relatively little ability to identify emotionally with other people.
This may be because hackers generally aren't much like `other people'.
Unsurprisingly, there is also a tendency to self-absorption,
intellectual arrogance, and impatience with people and tasks perceived
to be wasting one's time. As a result, many hackers have difficulty
maintaining stable relationships.
As cynical as hackers sometimes wax about the amount of idiocy in the
world, they tend at bottom to assume that everyone is as rational,
`cool', and imaginative as they consider themselves. This bias often
contributes to weakness in communication skills. Hackers tend to be
especially poor at confrontations and negotiation.
Hackers are often monumentally disorganized and sloppy about dealing
with the physical world. Bills don't get paid on time, clutter piles
up to incredible heights in homes and offices, and minor maintenance
tasks get deferred indefinitely.
The sort of person who uses phrases like `incompletely socialized'
usually thinks hackers are. Hackers regard such people with contempt
when they notice them at all.
Miscellaneous:
--------------
Hackers are more likely to keep cats than dogs. Many drive incredibly
decrepit heaps and forget to wash them; richer ones drive spiffy
Porsches and RX-7s and then forget to wash them.
Appendix C: Bibliography
************************
Here are some other books you can read to help you understand the
hacker mindset.
Godel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid
Hofstadter, Douglas
Basic Books, New York 1979
ISBN 0-394-74502-7
This book reads like an intellectual Grand Tour of hacker
preoccupations. Music, mathematical logic, programming, speculations
on the nature of intelligence, biology, and Zen are woven into a
brilliant tapestry themed on the concept of encoded self-reference.
The perfect left-brain companion to _Illuminatus_.
Illuminatus (three vols)
1. The Golden Apple
2. The Eye in the Pyramid
3. Leviathan
Shea, Robert & Wilson, Robert Anton
Dell Books, New York 1975
ISBN 0-440-{14688-7,34691-6,14742-5}
This work of alleged fiction is an incredible berserko-surrealist
rollercoaster of world-girdling conspiracies, intelligent dolphins,
the fall of Atlantis, who really killed JFK, sex, drugs, rock and roll
and the Cosmic Giggle Factor. First published in 3 volumes, but
there's now a one-volume trade paperback carried by most chain
bookstores under SF. The perfect right-brain companion to Hofstadter's
"Godel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid". See <Eris>,
<Discordianism>, <random numbers>, <Church Of The Sub-Genius>.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Douglas Adams
Pocket Books 1981, New York
ISBN 0-671-46149-4
This Monty-Python-in-Space spoof of SF genre traditions has been
popular among hackers ever since the original British radio show.
Read it if only to learn about Vogons (see <bogons>) and the
significance of the number 42 (see <random numbers>) --- also why the
winningest chess program of 1990 was called "Deep Thought".
The Tao of Programming
James Geoffrey
Infobooks 1987, Santa Monica,
ISBN 0-931137-07-1
This gentle, funny spoof of the "Tao Te Ching" contains much that is
illuminating about the hacker way of thought. "When you have learned
to snatch the error code from the trap frame, it will be time for you
to leave."
Hackers
Steven Levy
Anchor/Doubleday 1984, New York
ISBN 0-385-19195-2
Levy's book is at its best in describing the early MIT hackers at the
Model Railroad Club and the early days of the microcomputer
revolution. He never understood UNIX or the networks, though, and his
enshrinement of Richard Stallman as "the last true hacker" turns out
(thankfully) to have been quite misleading.
The Cuckoo's Egg
Clifford Stoll
Doubleday 1989, New York
ISBN 0-385-24946-2
Clifford Stoll's absorbing tale of how he tracked Markus Hess and the
Chaos Club cracking-ring nicely illustrates the difference between
`hacker' and `cracker'. And Stoll's portrait of himself and his lady
Barbara and his friends at Berkeley and on the Internet paints a
marvelously vivid picture of how hackers and the people around them
like to live and what they think.
The Devil's DP Dictionary
by Stan Kelly-Bootle
McGraw-Hill Inc, 1981
ISBN 0-07-034022-6
This pastiche of Ambrose Bierce's famous work is similar in format to
the Jargon File (and quotes several entries from jargon-1) but
somewhat different in tone and intent. It is more satirical and less
anthropological, and largely a product of the author's literate and
quirky imagination. For example, it defines "computer science" as
"A study akin to numerology and astrology, but lacking the precision
of the former and the success of the latter"; also as "The boring
art of coping with a large number of trivialities."
The Devouring Fungus: Tales from the Computer Age
by Karla Jennings
W. W. Norton 1990, New York
ISBN 0-393-30732-8
The author of this pioneering compendium knits together a great deal
of computer and hacker-related folklore with good writing and a few
well-chosen cartoons. She has a keen eye for the human aspects of the
lore and is very good at illuminating the psychology and evolution of
hackerdom. Unfortunately, a number of small errors and awkwardnesses
suggest that she didn't have the final manuscript vetted by a hackish
insider; the glossary in the back is particularly embarrassing, and at
least one classic tale (the Magic Switch story in this file's Appendix
A) is given in incomplete and badly mangled form. Nevertheless, this
book is a win overall and can be enjoyed by hacker and non-hacker
alike.
True Names...and Other Dangers
by Vernor Vinge
Baen Books 1987, New York
ISBN 0-671-65363
Hacker demigod Richard Stallman believes the title story of this book
"expresses the spirit of hacking best". This may well be true; it's
certainly difficult to recall anyone doing a better job. The other
stories in this collection are also fine work by an author who is
perhaps one of today's very best practitioners of the hard-SF genre.