Xref: utzoo alt.folklore.computers:8403 comp.unix.internals:1712 comp.misc:11046 Path: utzoo!utgpu!cs.utexas.edu!wuarchive!uunet!cbmvax!snark!eric From: eric@snark.thyrsus.com (Eric S. Raymond) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.unix.internals,comp.misc Subject: The Jargon File v2.3.1 03 JAN 1991, part 2 of 11 Message-ID: <1Z0vRp#8kC5G23mLmsh8tQH1z5KvTkO=eric@snark.thyrsus.com> Date: 3 Jan 91 21:02:01 GMT Lines: 1030 ---- Cut Here and unpack ---- #!/bin/sh # This is a shell archive (shar 3.10) # made 01/03/1991 21:01 UTC by eric@snark.thyrsus.com # Source directory /usr2/eric/jargon # # existing files WILL be overwritten # # This shar contains: # length mode name # ------ ---------- ------------------------------------------ # 53856 -rw-r--r-- jsplit.ab # touch 2>&1 | fgrep '[-amc]' > /tmp/s3_touch$$ if [ -s /tmp/s3_touch$$ ] then TOUCH=can else TOUCH=cannot fi rm -f /tmp/s3_touch$$ # ============= jsplit.ab ============== sed 's/^X//' << 'SHAR_EOF' > jsplit.ab && X writing the assemblers that will be used to write the compiler back X ends that will give the new machine a real development environment. X 2. The same phrase is also used to describe a style of X that relies on bit-level peculiarities of a X particular hardware design, esp. tricks for speed and space X optimization that rely on crocks like overlapping opcodes (or, in X one famous case, interleaving of opcodes on a magnetic drum to X minimize fetch delays due to the device's rotational latency). X This sort of thing has become less common as the relative costs of X programming time and machine resources have changed, but is still X found in heavily constrained environments like industrial embedded X systems. See . X X /barf/ [from mainstream slang meaning "vomit"] 1. interj. X Term of disgust. See . 2. To say "Barf!" or emit some X similar expression of disgust. 3. vi. To fail to work because of X unacceptable input. May mean to give an error message. Examples: X "The division operation barfs if you try to divide by zero." X (that is, division by zero fails in some unspecified spectacular X way) "The text editor barfs if you try to read in a new file X before writing out the old one." 4. Also , X : adj. Said of something which would make anyone barf, X if only for aesthetic reasons. See , . Note that in X Commonwealth English, "barf" is generally replaced by "puke" or X "vom". is sometimes also used as a metasyntactic variable X like or . X X adj. Feature-encrusted; complex; gaudy; verging on X excessive. Said of hardware or (esp.) software designs, this has X many of the connotations of or but is X less extreme and not pejorative in itself. X X /bawd barf/ n. The garbage one gets on the monitor when X using a modem connection with some protocol setting (esp. line X speed) incorrect, or when someone picks up a voice extension on the X same line, or when really bad line noise disrupts the connection. X Baud barf is not completely , by the way; hackers with a X lot of serial-line experience can usually tell whether the device X at the other end is expecting a higher or lower speed than the X terminal is set to. *Really* experienced ones can identify X particular speeds. X X /baz/ 1. The third metasyntactic variable, after and X and before . "Suppose we have three functions FOO, BAR, and X BAZ. FOO calls BAR, which calls BAZ..." 2. interj. Term of mild X annoyance. In this usage the term is often drawn out for two or X three seconds, producing an effect not unlike the bleating of a X sheep; /baaaaaaz/. 3. Occasionally appended to to produce X FOOBAZ. X X [from Star Trek Classic's "Beam me up, Scotty!"] vt. To X transfer of a file electronically; most often in X combining forms such as "beam me a copy" or "beam that over to X his site". Compare , , . X X n.,v. Syn. . This term seems to be preferred among micro X hobbyists. X X [by analogy with steam calliopes] n. Features X added to a program or system to make it more from a X hacker's point of view, without necessarily adding to its utility X for its primary function. Distinguished from which is X intended to attract users. "Now that we've got the basic program X working, let's go back and add some bells and whistles." However, X no one seems to know what distinguishes a bell from a whistle. X X n. An inaccurate measure of computer performance. "In X the computer industry, there are three kinds of lies: lies, damn X lies, and benchmarks." Well known ones include Dhrystone, X Whetstone, Rhealstone (see ) and LINPACK. See also X , . X X /ber'kliks/ n.,adj. Contraction of Berkeley UNIX. See X . Not used at Berkeley itself. May be more common among X attempting to sound like cognoscenti than hackers, who X usually just say `BSD'. X X [from "berserk"] /b@r-zer'klee/ [from the name of a X now-deceased record label] n. Humorous, distortion of "Berkeley" X used esp. to refer to the practices or products of the UNIX X hackers. See , . X X /bay'-ta/ n. 1. In the software often goes through X two stages of testing: Alpha (in-house) and Beta (out-house?). X Software is said to be "in beta". 2. Beta software is X notoriously buggy, hence anything that is new and experimental is X "in beta". As in, "His girlfriend is in beta". X X n. See . X X n. As used by hackers, usually refers to one of a small number X of fundamental source books including or . X X /bif/ [USENET] n. The most famous , and the X prototypical . Articles from BIFF are characterized by all X upper case letters sprinkled liberally with bangs, typos, "cute" X misspellings (EVRY BUDY LUVS GOOD OLD BIFF CUZ HE"S A K00L DOOD AN X HE RITES REEL AWESUM THINGZ IN CAPITULL LETTRS LIKE THIS!!!), a X long (sometimes even a ), and unbounded X naivete. BIFF posts articles using his elder brother's VIC-20. X BIFF's location is a mystery, as his articles appear to come from a X variety of sites. However, BITNET seems to be the most frequent X origin. The theory that BIFF is a denizen of BITNET is supported X by BIFF's (unfortunately invalid) electronic mail address: X BIFF@BIT.NET. See also . X X v. To notify someone of incoming mail; from the BSD utility X `biff(1)' which was in turn named after the implementor's dog. X X [From Swift's `Gulliver's Travels' via a famous 1980 X paper `On Holy Wars and a Plea for Peace' by Danny Cohen] adj. X Describes a computer architecture in which, within a given 16- or X 32-bit word, lower byte addresses have higher significance (the X word is stored `big-end-first'). Most processors including the IBM X 370 family and the and Motorola microprocessor families X and most of the various RISC designs current in 1990 are X big-endian. See , , . X X n. What greets a user searching for X documentation. A full VMS kit comes on a pallet, the documentation X taking up around 15 feet of shelf space before adding layered X products such as compilers, databases, multivendor networking, X programming tools etc. Recent (since VMS V5) DEC documentation X comes with grey binders; under VMS V4 the binders were orange X ("big orange wall"), under V3 they were blue. See . X X n. Large, expensive, ultra-fast computers. Used generally X of number crunching supercomputers such as Crays, but can include X more conventional big commercial IBMish mainframes. Term of X approval; compare , oppose . X X [IBM] n. The power switch on a computer, esp. on an X IBM-PC where it really is large and red. "This !@%$% X is hung again, time to hit the big red switch." Sources at IBM X report that, in tune with the company's passion for s X this is often acronymized as "BRS". X X /big'num/ [orig. from MIT MACLISP; the name is said to derive X from a pun on the FORTRAN REAL type] n. 1. A multiple-precision X computer representation for very large integers. More generally, X any very large number. "Have you ever looked at the United States X Budget? There's bignums for you!" X X Most computer languages provide a kind of data called "integer", X but such computer integers are usually very limited in size; X usually they must be smaller than 2 ^ 31 (2147483648) or (on a X losing ) 2 ^ 15 (32767). If you want to work with X numbers larger than that, you have to use floating-point numbers, X which are usually only accurate to six or seven decimal places. X Computer languages that provide bignums can perform exact X calculations on very large numbers, such as 1000! (the factorial of X 1000, which is 1000 times 999 times 998 times ... times 2 times 1) X exactly. For example, this value for 1000! was computed by the X MACLISP system using bignums: X X 4023872600770937735437024339230039857193748642107146325437999104 X 2993851239862902059204420848696940480047998861019719605863166687 X 2994808558901323829669944590997424504087073759918823627727188732 X 5197795059509952761208749754624970436014182780946464962910563938 X 8743788648733711918104582578364784997701247663288983595573543251 X 3185323958463075557409114262417474349347553428646576611667797396 X 6688202912073791438537195882498081268678383745597317461360853795 X 3452422158659320192809087829730843139284440328123155861103697680 X 1357304216168747609675871348312025478589320767169132448426236131 X 4125087802080002616831510273418279777047846358681701643650241536 X 9139828126481021309276124489635992870511496497541990934222156683 X 2572080821333186116811553615836546984046708975602900950537616475 X 8477284218896796462449451607653534081989013854424879849599533191 X 0172335555660213945039973628075013783761530712776192684903435262 X 5200015888535147331611702103968175921510907788019393178114194545 X 2572238655414610628921879602238389714760885062768629671466746975 X 6291123408243920816015378088989396451826324367161676217916890977 X 9911903754031274622289988005195444414282012187361745992642956581 X 7466283029555702990243241531816172104658320367869061172601587835 X 2075151628422554026517048330422614397428693306169089796848259012 X 5458327168226458066526769958652682272807075781391858178889652208 X 1643483448259932660433676601769996128318607883861502794659551311 X 5655203609398818061213855860030143569452722420634463179746059468 X 2573103790084024432438465657245014402821885252470935190620929023 X 1364932734975655139587205596542287497740114133469627154228458623 X 7738753823048386568897646192738381490014076731044664025989949022 X 2221765904339901886018566526485061799702356193897017860040811889 X 7299183110211712298459016419210688843871218556461249607987229085 X 1929681937238864261483965738229112312502418664935314397013742853 X 1926649875337218940694281434118520158014123344828015051399694290 X 1534830776445690990731524332782882698646027898643211390835062170 X 9500259738986355427719674282224875758676575234422020757363056949 X 8825087968928162753848863396909959826280956121450994871701244516 X 4612603790293091208890869420285106401821543994571568059418727489 X 9809425474217358240106367740459574178516082923013535808184009699 X 6372524230560855903700624271243416909004153690105933983835777939 X 4109700277534720000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 X 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 X 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 X 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 X 00000000. X X 2. BIGNUMS [from Macsyma] n. In backgammon, large numbers on the X dice, especially a roll of double fives or double sixes. See also X . X X [from the unit of information] n. 1. The unit of information; X the amount of information obtained by asking a yes-or-no question X (this is straight technicalese). 2. A computational quantity that X can take on one of two values, such as true and false, or zero and X one. 3. A mental flag: a reminder that something should be done X eventually. Example: "I have a bit set for you." (I haven't seen X you for a while, and I'm supposed to tell or ask you something.) A X bit is said to be "set" if its value is true or one, and X "reset" or "clear" if its value is false or zero. One speaks X of setting and clearing bits. To "toggle" or "invert" a bit is X to change it, either from zero to one or from one to zero. X X n. Transmission of data on a serial line accomplished by X rapidly tweaking a single output bit at the appropriate times X (popular on certain early models of Prime computers, presumably X when UARTs were too expensive; and on archaic Z-80 micros with a X Zilog PIO but no SIO). The technique is a simple loop with eight X OUT, SHIFT, OUT etc. instructions for each byte. Input is more X interesting. And full duplex (doing input and output at the same X time) is one way to separate the real hackers from the wannabees. X X n. (also, "bit diddling" or "bit twiddling") Term X used to describe any of several kinds of low-level programming X characterized by manipulation of , , and other X smaller-than-character sized pieces of data: these include X low-level device control, encryption algorithms, checksum and X error-correcting codes, hash functions, some flavors of graphics X programming (see ), and assembler/compiler code generation. X May connote either tedium or a real technical challenge (more X usually the former)."The command decoding for the new tape driver X looks pretty solid but the bit-bashing for the control registers X still has bugs." See also . X X n. The great data sink in the sky (originally, the X mythical receptacle used to catch bits when they fall off the end X of a register during a shift instruction). Data that is discarded, X lost, or destroyed is said to "go to the bit bucket". On , X often used for . Sometimes amplified as "the Great Bit X Bucket in the Sky". This term is used purely in jest. It's based X on the fanciful notion that bits are objects that are not X destroyed, but only misplaced. See also . X X n. See . People with a physics background X tend to prefer this one for the analogy with particle decay. X X n. See . X X /bit'blit/ or /bit'belt/ n. [from , q.v.] 1. Any of a X closely related family of algorithms for moving and copying X rectangles of bits between main and display memory on a bit-mapped X device, or between two areas of either main or display memory (the X requirement to do the Right Thing in the case of overlapping source X and destination rectangles is what makes BitBlt tricky). 2. X Synonym for or X X n. 1. Information. Examples: "I need some bits about file X formats." ("I need to know about file formats.") Compare , sense #4. 2. Machine-readable representation of a document, X specifically as contrasted with paper. "I only have a photocopy X of the Jargon File; does anyone know where I can get the bits?". X See . 3. Also in n. A X person from whom (or a place from which) information may be X obtained. If you need to know about a program, a might be X the source of all good bits. The title is often applied to a X particularly competent secretary. X X /bit'ee boks/ n. 1. A computer sufficiently small, X primitive or incapable as to cause a hacker acute claustrophobia at X the thought of developing for it. Especially used of small, X obsolescent, single-tasking-only personal machines like the Atari X 800, Osborne, Sinclair, VIC-20, or TRS-80. 2. More generally, the X opposite of `real computer' (see ). X Pejorative. See also , , and . X X /biks'ee/ n. Synonym for used on BIX (the Byte X Information Exchange); BIXers believe (probably incorrectly) the X emoticon was invented there. X X n. A collection of arcane, unpublished, and (by X implication) mostly ad-hoc techniques developed for a particular X application or systems area. VLSI design and compiler code X optimization were (in their beginnings) considered classic examples X of black art; as theory developed they became , and X once standard textbooks had been written became merely . The huge proliferation of formal and informal channels X for spreading around new computer-related technologies during the X last twenty years has made both the term "black art" and what it X describes less common than formerly. See also . X X n. When a piece of email or netnews disappears X mysteriously between its origin and destination sites (that is, X without returning a ) it is commonly said to have X "fallen into a black hole". Similarly, one might say "I think X there's a black hole at foovax!" to convey suspicion that site X foovax has been dropping a lot of stuff on the floor lately (see X ). The implied metaphor of email as X interstellar travel is interesting in itself. X X vt.,n. Synonym for , used esp. for large data sends over X a network or comm line. Opposite of . Usage: uncommon. X The variant `blat' has been reported. 2. v. [HP/Apollo] Synonymous X with (sense #3). Sometimes the message "Unable to kill all X processes. Blast them (y/n)?" would appear in the command window X upon logout. X X n. Nickname for the Telebit Trailblazer, an expensive but X extremely reliable and effective high-speed modem, popular at UNIX X sites that pass large volumes of and news. X X /blech/ [from Yiddish/German "brechen", to vomit] 1. X interj. Term of disgust. X X /blech'@-rus/ adj. Disgusting in design or function; X aesthetically unappealing. This word is seldom used of people. X "This keyboard is bletcherous!" (Perhaps the keys don't work very X well, or are misplaced). See , , , X , and . applies to the aesthetics of X the thing so described; similarly for . By contrast, X something that is or may be failing to meet X objective criteria. See and , which have richer X and wider shades of meaning than any of the above. X X /blink'@n-lietz/ n. Front-panel diagnostic lights on X a mainframe CPU. Derives from the last word of the famous X blackletter-Gothic "ACHTUNG! ALLES LOOKENSPEEPERS!" notice in X mangled pseudo-German that once graced about half the computer X rooms in the English-speaking world. The sign in its entiretu ran: X X ACHTUNG! ALLES LOOKENSPEEPERS X Das computermachine ist nicht fur gefingerpoken und mittengrabben. X Ist easy schnappen der springenwerk, blowenfusen und poppencorken X mit spitzensparken. Ist nicht fur gewerken bei das dumpkopfen. X Das rubbernecken sichtseeren keepen hans in das pockets muss; X relaxen und watch das blinkenlichten. X X This silliness dates back at least as far as 1959 at Stanford X University and had already gone international by the early '60s, X when it was reported at London University's ATLAS computing site. X There are several variants of it in circulation, some of which X actually do end with the word `blinkenlights';. It is reported, by X the way, that an analogous travesty in mangled English is posted in X German computer laboratories. X X /blit/ vt. 1. To copy a large array of bits from one part of a X computer's memory to another part, particularly when the memory is X being used to determine what is shown on a display screen. "The X storage allocator picks through the table and copies the good parts X up into high memory, and at the end BLITs it all back down again." X See , ,
, , , . More X generally, to perform some operation (such as toggling) on a large X array of bits while moving them. 2. An early experimental X bit-mapped terminal designed by Rob Pike at Bell Labs, later X commercialized as the AT&T 5620. X X [From computer science usage] 1. vi. To delay while waiting X for something. "We're blocking until everyone gets here." 2. in X vt. To block, waiting for (something). "Lunch is X blocked on Phil's arrival." X X n. From the Dr. Who television series: X in the show, it referred to computations so fiendishly subtle and X complex that they could not be performed by machines. Used to X refer to any task that should be expressible as an algorithm in X theory, but isn't. X X vt. To remove files and directories from permanent storage X with extreme prejudice, generally by accident. Oppose . X X vi. Of software, to fail spectacularly; almost as serious X as . See . X X vi. To despite a safeguard. "The server blew X past the 5K reserve buffer." X X vi. [scientific computation] To become unstable. Suggests X that the computation is diverging so rapidly that it will soon X either overflow or at least go . X X /bee ell tee/ or (rarely) /belt/ n.,v. 1. Synonym for . X This is the original form of and the ancestor of . X In these versions the usage has outlasted the BLock X Transfer instruction for which derives; nowadays, the X assembler mnemonic almost always means `Branch if Less Than X Zero'. X X n. 1. Informal name for one of the three standard X references on the page-layout and graphics-control language X PostScript (`PostScript Language Tutorial and Cookbook', Adobe X Systems, Addison-Wesley 1985, QA76.73.P67P68, ISBN 0-201-10179-3); X the other two official guides are known as the and X . 2. `Smalltalk-80: The Language and its X Implementation'. David Robson, Addison-Wesley 1983, QA76.8.S635G64, X ISBN 0-201-11371-63 (this is also associated with green and red X books). 3. Any of the 1988 standards issues by the CCIT 9th X plenary assembly. Until now, they have changed color each review X cycle (1984 was , 1992 would be ); however, X it is rumored that this convention is going to be dropped befor X 1992. These include, among other things, the X.400 email spec and X the Group 1 through 4 fax standards. See also , , , , , , X , , . X X [IBM] n. IBM's SNA (Systems Network Architecture) an X incredibly losing and bletcherous protocol suite widely favored at X commercial shops that don't know any better. See . It may not be irrelevant that is the trade X name of a 3M product that is commonly used to hold down the carpet X squares to the removable panel floors so common in computer X installations. A correspondent at U.Minn. reports that the CS dept X there has about 80 bottles of Blue Glue hanging about, so they X often refer to any messy work to be done `using the blue glue". X X n. Term for "police" s intended to prevent , denature hazardous waste, destroy pollution, put ozone back X into the stratosphere, prevent halitosis, and to promote truth, X justice, and the American way, etc., etc. See . X X /bee-en-ef/ n. 1. Acronym for `Backus-Naur Form', a X metasyntactic notation used to specify the syntax of programming X languages, command sets and the like. Widely used for language X descriptions but seldom documented anywhere, so that it must X usually be learned by osmosis from other hackers. Consider this X BNF for a postal address: X X ::= X X ::= [] X X ::= | "." X X ::= [] X X ::= "," X X This translates into English as: A postal-address consists of a X name-part, followed by a street-address part, followed by a X zip-code part. A name-part consists of a first-name followed by an X optional middle-part followed by a last-name. A middle-part X consists of either a middle name or a middle initial followed by a X dot. A street address consists of an optional apartment specifier X followed by a street number, followed by a street name. A zip-part X consts of a town-name, followed by a state code, followed by a zip X code. Note that many things such as the format of a first-name, X apartment specifier or zip-code are left unspecified. These are X presumed to be obvious from context or detailed in another part of X the specification the BNF is part of. See also . X X A major reason BNF is listed here is that the term is also used X loosely for any similar notation, possibly containing some or all X of the wildcards. X X 2. In BNF expands to `Big Name Fan' X (someone famous or notorious). Years ago a fan started handing out X black-on-green BNF buttons at SF conventions. This confused the X hacker contingent terribly. X X [IBM] n. Any one of the fat cables that lurk under the floor in X a . It is rumored within IBM that 370 channel cables X are limited to 200 feet because beyond that length the boas get X dangerous... X X n. Like but more severe, implies that the X offending hardware is irreversibly dead or useless. X X n. See . X X /boh'gon/ [by analogy with proton/electron/neutron, but X doubtless reinforced after 1980 by the similarity to Douglas X Adams's "Vogons", see Appendix C] n. 1. The elementary particle X of bogosity (see ). For instance, "the X ethernet is emitting bogons again", meaning that it is broken or X acting in an erratic or bogus fashion. 2. A query packet sent from X a TCP/IP domain resolver to a root server, having the reply bit set X instead of the query bit. 3. Any bogus or incorrectly formed X packet sent on a network. 4. By extension, used to refer X metasyntactically to any bogus thing, as in "I'd like to go to X lunch with you but I've got to go to the weekly staff bogon." 5. A X person who is bogus or who says bogus things. This was X historically the original usage, but has been overtaken by its X derivatives in 1-4. X X /boh'gon fil'tr/ n. Any device, software or hardware, X which limits or suppresses the flow and/or emission of bogons. X Example: "Engineering hacked a bogon filter between the Cray and X the VAXen and now we're getting fewer dropped packets." X X /boh-go's@-tee/ n. 1. The degree to which something is X . At CMU, bogosity is measured with a ; typical X use: in a seminar, when a speaker says something bogus, a listener X might raise his hand and say, "My bogometer just triggered". 2. X The potential field generated by a bogon flux; see . X X /boh-go't@-fie/ vt. To make or become bogus. A program X that has been changed so many times as to become completely X disorganized has become bogotified. If you tighten a nut too hard X and strip the threads on the bolt, the bolt has become bogotified X and you'd better not use it any more. This coinage led to the X notional (aw'to-boh-got'@-foh`bee-uh) n., X defined as the fear of becoming bogotified; but is not clear that X the latter has ever been `live' slang rather than a self-conscious X joke in jargon about jargon. X X /bohg owt/ vi. to becomes bogus, suddenly and X unexpectedly. "His talk was relatively sane until somebody asked X him a trick question, then he bogued out and did nothing but X afterwards." X X [WPI, Yale, Stanford] adj. 1. Non-functional. "Your patches X are bogus." 2. Useless. "OPCON is a bogus program." 3. X False. "Your arguments are bogus." 4. Incorrect. "That X algorithm is bogus." 5. Unbelievable. "You claim to have solved X the halting problem for Turing Machines? That's totally bogus." X 6. Silly. "Stop writing those bogus sagas." Astrology is bogus. X So is a bolt that is obviously about to break. So is someone who X makes blatantly false claims to have solved a scientific problem. X (This word seems to have some, but not all, of the connotations of X .) X X [Etymological note: "Bogus" was originally used in the hackish X sense at Princeton, in the late 60s. It was used not particularly X in the CS department, but all over campus. It came to Yale, where X one of us (Lehman) was an undergraduate, and (we assume) elsewhere X through the efforts of Princeton alumni who brought the word with X them from their alma mater. In the Yale case, the alumnus is X Michael Shamos, who was a graduate student at Yale and is now a X faculty member here. A glossary of bogus words was compiled at X Yale when the word was first popularized (see X under ). By the mid-1980s it was also current in X something like the hackish sense in West Coast teen slang] X X Further note: A correspondent at Cambridge claims these uses of X bogus grate on British nerves; in Britain the word means rather X specifically `counterfeit' as in "a bogus pound note". X X /bohr buhg/ [from quantum physics] n. A repeatable ; X one which manifests reliably under a possibly unknown but X well-defined set of conditions. Antonym of . X X /boynk/ [USENET] 1. To have sex with; compare , sense X #3. In Commonwealth English this the variant "bonk" is more X common. 2. After the original Peter Korn "Boinkon" X parties, used for almost any net social gathering, e.g. Miniboink, X a small boink held by Nancy Gillett in 1988; Minniboink, a Boinkcon X in Minnesota in 1989; Humpdayboinks, Wednesday get-togethers held X in the San Francisco Bay Area. Compare <@-party>. X X vi. 1. General synonym for , esp. used of software or OS X failures. "Don't run Empire with less than 32K stack, it'll bomb X out" 2. Atari ST and Macintosh equivalents of or X (sense 2), where icons of little black-powder bombs or mushroom X clouds are displayed indicating the system has died. On the Mac X this may be accompanied by a hexadecimal number indicating what X went wrong, similar to the Amiga GURU MEDITION number. X machines tend to get in this situation. X X A language such as Pascal, APL, or X Prolog that, though ostensibly general-purpose, is designed so as X to enforce an author's theory of "right programming" even though X said theory is demonstrably inadequate for systems or even vanilla X general-purpose programming. Often abbreviated "B&D"; thus, one X may speak of things "having the B&D nature" etc. See . X X interj. On some versions, a `:bonk' command allows X one to express pique or censure; you give it a target name, and the X message everyone sees is of the form `Foo bonks bar'. There is a X convention that one should acknowledge a bonk by saying `oif!' and X a myth to the effect that failing to do so upsets the cosmic X bonk/oif balance, causing much trouble in the universe. See also X . X X [from "by one's bootstraps"] vi.,n. To load and initialize X the operating system on a machine. This usage is no longer slang X (having become jargon in the strict sense), but it is sometimes X used of human thought processes, as in the following exchange: X "You've lost me." "O.K., reboot. Here's the theory...". Also X found in the variants "cold boot" (from power-off condition) and X "warm boot" (with the CPU and all devices already powered up, as X after a hardware reset or software crash). X X adj. 1. Used by hackers specifically to describe hardware X under which performance is usually limited by contention for one X particular resource (such as disk, memory or processor ); X the opposite condition is called `balanced', which is more jargon X in the strict sense and may be found in technical dictionaries. 2. X Less often, applied to the software analogue of sense #1, a slow X code section or algorithm through which all computation must pass X (see also ). X X v. 1. [UNIX, perhaps from "to bounce a check"] An X electronic mail message which is undeliverable and returns an error X notification to the sender is said to `bounce'. See also . 2. [Stanford] To play volleyball. At one time there was X a volleyball court next to the computer laboratory. From 5:00 PM X to 7:00 PM was the scheduled maintenance time for the computer, so X every afternoon at 5:00 the computer would become unavailable, and X over the intercom a voice would cry , "Bounce, bounce!" 3. To X engage in sexual intercourse; prob. fr. the expression "bouncing X the mattress", but influenced by Piglet's psychosexually-loaded X "Bounce on me too, Tigger!" from the Winnie the Pooh books. 4. X To casually reboot a system in order to clear up a transient X problem. Reported primarily among users. X X [UNIX] n. Notification message returned to sender by X a site unable to relay to the intended X recipient or the next link in a (see ). X Reasons might include a nonexistent or misspelled username or a X down relay site. Bounce messages can themselves fail, with X occasionally ugly results; see . X X [within IBM] n. Without qualification but within an SNA-using X site, this refers specifically to an IBM front-end processor or X FEP. An FEP is a small computer necessary to enable an IBM X mainframe to communicate beyond the limits of the . X Typically used in expressions like the cry that goes up when an SNA X network goes down, "Looks like the has ." See X also , , . X X /bok'sn/ pl n. [by analogy with ] Fanciful plural of X `box' often encountered in the phrase `UNIX boxen', used to X describe commodity hardware. The implication is that any X two UNIX boxen are interchangeable. X X [generalization of "Honeywell Brain Damage" (HBD), a X theoretical disease invented to explain certain utter cretinisms in X Honeywell ] adj. Obviously wrong; ; X . There is an implication that the person responsible X must have suffered brain damage, because he should have known X better. Calling something brain-damaged is really bad; it also X implies it is unusable, and that its failure to work is due to poor X design rather than some accident. X X adj. Brain-damaged in the extreme. Not quite like X mainstream use, as it tends to imply terminal design failure rather X than malfunction or simple stupidity. X X [Sun] n. Comprehensive exchange of knowledge between X people. "Let's get together for a brain dump before you take X off." At Sun, this is also known as `TOI' (transfer of X information). X X /bray'no/ n. Syn. for . X X [IBM, from the location of one of their X facilities] n. Any unexpected jump in a program that produces X catastrophic or just plain weird results. See . X X v. 1. To cause to be broken (in any sense). "Your latest X patch to the editor broke the paragraph commands." 2. (of a X program) To stop temporarily, so that it may be examined for X debugging purposes. The place where it stops is a "breakpoint". X 3. To send an RS-232 "break" (125 msec. of line high) over a X serial comm line. 4. [UNIX] To strike whatever key currently causes X the tty driver to send SIGINT to the current process. Normally X "break" (sense 3) or delete does this. X X [IBM] n. The extra people that must be added to an X organization because its master plan has changed; used esp. of X software and hardware development teams. X X adj. Said of software that's functional but easily broken by X changes in operating environment or configuration. Often describes X the results of a research effort that were never intended to be X robust, but can be applied to commercially developed software. X Oppose . X X n. An incorrect packet broadcast on a network that X causes most hosts to respond all at once, typically with wrong X answers that start the process over again. Also called . See also . X X adj. 1. Not working properly (of programs). 2. Behaving X strangely; especially (of people), exhibiting extreme depression. X X /broh'k@t/ or /broh'ket/ [by analogy with "bracket": a X "broken bracket"] n. Either of the characters "<" and ">". X This word originated as a contraction of the phrase "broken X bracket", that is, a bracket that is bent in the middle. (At MIT, X and apparently in as well, these are usually called X .) X X adj. Describes a certain kind of primitive programming X style; broadly speaking, one which ignores scaling problems and X applies naive methods suited to small problems directly to large X ones. An example of a brute-force program is one that sorts a X thousand numbers by examining them all, picking the smallest one, X and saving it in another table; then examining all the numbers X again, and picking the smallest one except for the one it already X picked; and in general choosing the next number by examining all X one thousand numbers and choosing the smallest one that hasn't yet X been picked (as determined by examining all the ones already X picked). Yes, the program will produce the right answer, but it X will be much slower than a program that uses even a modicum of X cleverness to avoid most of the work. X X n. A popular design technique at many X software houses --- coding unrelieved by any X knowledge of how problems have been previously solved in elegant X ways. Dogmatic adherence to design methodologies tends to X encourage it. Characteristic of early programming; X unfortunately, many never outgrow it. Often abbreviated BFI, as X in: "Gak, they used a bubble sort! That's strictly from BFI." X (this comment might be used by a hacker to describe the example X given under above). Compare . X X /bee-ess-dee/ n. [acronym for Berkeley System Distribution] a X family of versions for the DEC developed by Bill Joy X and others at University of California at Berkeley starting around X 1980, incorporating TCP/IP networking enhancements and many other X features. The BSD versions (4.1, 4.2, and 4.3) and commercial X versions derived from them (SunOS and Mt. Xinu) held the technical X lead in the UNIX world until AT&T's successful standardization X efforts after about 1986, and are still widely popular. See X , . X X /buh'kee bits/ [primarily Stanford] n. The bits produced X by the CTRL and META shift keys, esp. on a Stanford (or Knight) X keyboard (see ). It is rumored that these X were in fact named for Buckminster Fuller during a period when he X was consulting at Stanford. Unfortunately, legend also has it that X "Bucky" was Niklaus Wirth's nickname when *he* was X consulting at Stanford and that he first suggested the idea of the X meta key, so its bit was named after him. See , X . X X n. What typically happens when an or X application is fed data faster than it can handle. Used X metaphorically of human mental processes. "Sorry, I got four phone X calls in three minutes last night and lost your message to a buffer X overflow." X X n. An unwanted and unintended property of a program or hardware, X esp. one which causes it to malfunction. Antonym of . X Examples: "There's a bug in the editor: it writes things out X backwards." "The system crashed because of a hardware bug." X "Fred is a winner, but he has a few bugs." (e.g. Fred is a good X guy, but he has a few personality problems.) X X Some have said this term came from telephone company usage: "bugs X in a telephone cable" were blamed for noisy lines, but this X appears to be an incorrect `folk etymology'. Admiral Grace Hopper X (an early computing pioneer better known for inventing COBOL) liked X to tell a story in which a technician solved a persistent glitch in X the Harvard Mark II machine by pulling an actual physical bug out X from between the contacts of one of its relays, and she X subsequently promulgated in its hackish sense as a joke about X the incident (though, as she was careful to admit, she was not X there when it happened). For many years the logbook associated X with the incident and the actual bug in question (a moth) sat in a X display case at the Naval Surface Warfare Center, and now resides X in the Smithsonian. The entire story, with a picture of the X logbook and the moth taped into it, is recorded in the Annals of X the History of Computing (Volume 3, Number 3 (July 1981) on pages X 285 and 286. X X Interestingly, the text of the log entry, which is said to read X "First example of an actual computer `bug'." establishes that the X term was already in use at the time; and a similar incident is X alleged to have occurred on the original ENIAC machine. Indeed, X the use of "bug" to mean an industrial defect was already X established in Thomas Edison's time, and "bug" in the sense of an X annoyance goes back to Shakespeare! X X In any case, in hacker's slang the word almost never refers to X insects. Here is a plausible conversation that never actually X happened: X X "This ant-farm has a bug." X X "What do you mean? There aren't even any ants in it." X X "That's the bug." X X n. Said of a design or revision the design of which X has been badly compromised by a requirement to be compatible with X s or s in other programs or (esp.) previous X releases of itself. X X adj. Used of an algorithm or implementation considered X extremely ; lossage-resistant; capable of correctly X recovering from any imaginable exception condition. This is a rare X and valued quality. Syn. "armor-plated". X X 1. vt. To make highly efficient, either in time or space, often X at the expense of clarity. "I managed to bum three more X instructions out of that code." 2. n. A small change to an X algorithm, program, or hardware device to make it more efficient. X "This hardware bum makes the jump instruction faster." Usage: X now uncommon, largely superseded by . Note that both these X uses are rare in Commonwealth English, where "bum" is interpreted X as a rude synonym for "buttocks". X X vt. Synonym for increment. Has the same meaning as C's ++ X operator. Used esp. of counter variables, pointers and index X dummies in for, while, and do-until loops. X X vi. Like , but connotes that the source is truly X clueless and ineffectual (mere flamers can be competent). A term X of deep contempt. X X vi. To wait on an event by ning through a tight or X timed-delay loop that polls for the event on each pass, as opposed X to setting up an interrupt handler and continuing execution on X another part of the task. A wasteful technique, best avoided on X time-sharing systems where a busy-waiting program may hog the X processor. Syn. X X vi. 1. Of a program, to run with no indication of progress and X perhaps without guarantee of ever finishing; esp. said of programs X thought to be executing tight loops of code. The state of a X buzzing program resembles , but you never get out of X catatonia, while a buzzing loop may eventually end of its own X accord. Example: "The program buzzes for about ten seconds trying X to sort all the names into order." See . 2. [ETA Systems] X To test a wire or PCB trace for continuity by applying an AC signal X as opposed to applying a DC signal. Some wire faults will pass DC X tests but fail a buzz test. X X /bee duhb'l-yoo kyoo/ [IBM] n. Buzz Word Quotient. Usually X roughly proportional to . See . X X /biet-seks'u-@l/ adj. Said of hardware, denotes X willingness to compute or pass data in either or X format (depending, presumably, on a mode bit X somewhere). See also X X {= C =} X X n. 1. The third letter of the Latin alphabet. 2. The name of a X programming language designed by Dennis Ritchie during the early X 1970s and first used to implement . So called because many X features derived from an earlier interpreter named `B' in X commemoration of *its* parent, BCPL; before Bjarne Stroustrup X settled the question by designing C++, there was a humorous debate X over whether C's successor should be named `D' or `P'. C became X immensely popular outside Bell Labs after about 1980 and is now the X dominant language in systems and microcomputer applications X programming. See . X X vt. To abort a job on a time-sharing system. Used esp. when the X person doing the deed is an operator, as in "canned from the X console". Frequently used in an imperative sense, as in "Can X that print job, the LPT just popped a sprocket!". Synonymous with X . It is said that the ASCII character with mnemonic CAN X (0011000) was used as a kill-job character on some early OSs. X X [Cambridge] n. Syn. for . X X adj. The usual or standard state or manner of something. X This word has a somewhat more technical meaning in mathematics. X For example, one sometimes speaks of a formula as being in X canonical form. Two formulas such as "9 + x" and "x + 9" are X said to be equivalent because they mean the same thing, but the X second one is in canonical form because it is written in the usual X way, with the highest power of x first. Usually there are fixed X rules you can use to decide whether something is in canonical form. X The slang meaning is a relaxation of the technical meaning (this X generalization is actually not confined to hackers, and may be X found throughout academia). X X A true story: One Bob Sjoberg, new at the MIT AI Lab, expressed X some annoyance at the use of jargon. Over his loud objections, we X made a point of using jargon as much as possible in his presence, X and eventually it began to sink in. Finally, in one conversation, X he used the word "canonical" in jargon-like fashion without X thinking. Steele: "Aha! We've finally got you talking jargon X too!" Stallman: "What did he say?" Steele: "Bob just used X `canonical' in the canonical way." X X n. An EDP programmer who works on batch programs that X do stupid things like print people's paychecks. Compare . X X /cas'trz uhp mohd/ [IBM] n. Yet another synonym for X `broken' or `down'. X X n. The act of getting a to run a particular X program and type at it because it never works for anyone else; esp. X used when nobody can ever see what the guru is doing different from X J. Random Luser does. Compare , , . X X [from "cut and paste"] n. 1. The addition of a new X to an existing system by selecting the code from an X existing feature and pasting it in with minor changes. Common in X telephony circles because most operations in a telephone switch are X selected using case statements. Leads to . X X [from "concatenate" via `cat(1)'] vt. To spew an entire X (notionally, large) file to the screen or some other output sink X without pause; by extension, to dump large amounts of data at an X unprepared target or with no intention of browsing it carefully. X Usage: considered silly. Rare outside UNIX sites. See also
, X . X X n. A condition of suspended animation in which something X is so that it makes no response. For example, if you are X typing on a terminal and suddenly the computer doesn't even echo X the letters back to the screen as you type, let alone do what X you're asking it to do, then the computer is suffering from X catatonia (possibly because it has crashed). X X /ku'dr/ [from LISP] vt. To remove the first item from a list of X things. In the form "cdr down", to trace down a list of X elements. "Shall we cdr down the agenda?" Usage: silly. See X also . X X /chad/ n. 1. The perforated edge strips on printer paper, after X they have been separated from the printed portion. Also called X and . 2. obs. the confetti-like paper bits punched X out of cards or paper tape; this was also called `chaff', `computer X confetti', and `keypunch droppings'. X X Historical note: one correspondent believes `chad' (sense #1) X derives from the Chadless keypunch (named for its inventor), which X cut little u-shaped tabs in the card to make a hole when the tab X folded back, rather than punching out a circle/rectangle; it was X clear that if the `Chadless' keypunch didn't make them, then the X stuff that other keypunches made had to be `chad'. X X [orig. from BASIC's CHAIN statement] vi. When used of X programming languages, refers to a statement that allows a parent X executable to hand off execution to a child without going through X the command interpreter. The state of the parent program is X lost and there is no returning to it. Though this facility used to X be common on memory-limited micros and is still widely supported X for backward compatibility, the jargon usage is semi-obsolescent; X in particular most UNIX programmers will think of this as an X . Oppose the more modern . X X /keir/ or /char/; rarely, /kar/ n. Shorthand for `character'. X Esp. used by C programmers, as `char' is C's typename for X character data. X X 1. vi. To go through multiple levels of indirection, X as in traversing a linked list or graph structure. Used esp. by X programmers in C, where explicit pointers are a very common data X type. This is almost jargon in the strict sense, but remains slang X when used of human networks. "I'm chasing pointers. Bob said you X could tell me who to talk to about..." 2. [Cambridge] or : the process of going through a dump X (interactively or on a large piece of paper printed with hex X ) following dynamic data-structures. Only used in a X debugging context. X X [Cambridge University] n. Someone who wastes CPU time on X number-crunching when you'd far rather the CPU was doing something X more productive, such as working out anagrams of your name or X printing Snoopy calendars or running patterns. May or may X not refer to someone who actually studies chemistry. X X /cher-no'b@l pa'k@t/ n. An IP Ethergram with both X source and destination Ether and IP address set as the respective X broadcast address. So called because it induces . X X vt. To reject input, often ungracefully. "I tried building X , but cpp choked on all those #define's." See , , X . X X vt. To lose; to chew on something of which more was bitten off X than one can. Probably related to gnashing of teeth. See X . A hand gesture commonly accompanies this, consisting X of the four fingers held together as if in a mitten or hand puppet, X and the fingers and thumb open and close rapidly to illustrate a X biting action (much like what the PacMan does in the classic video X game, though this pantomime seems to predate that). The gesture X alone means "chomp chomp" (see Verb Doubling). The hand may be X pointed at the object of complaint, and for real emphasis you can X use both hands at once. For example, to do this to a person is X equivalent to saying "You chomper!" If you point the gesture at X yourself, it is a humble but humorous admission of some failure. X You might do this if someone told you that a program you had X written had failed in some surprising way and you felt dumb for not X having anticipated it. X X n. Someone or something that is chomping; a loser. See X , , . X X n. A kind of RS-232 line tester or breakout box X featuring rows of blinking red and green LEDs like Christmas X lights. X X n. A packet with every single option set for X whatever protocol is in use. X X [from automotive slang via wargaming] n. Showy features added X to attract users, but which contribute little or nothing to the X power of a system. "The 3D icons in Motif are just chrome!" X Distinguished from by the fact that the latter X are usually added to gratify developers' own desires for X featurefulness. X X n. A mutant offshoot of X launched in 1981 as a spoof of fundamentalist Christianity by the X "Rev." Ivan Stang, a brilliant satirist with a gift for X promotion. Popular among hackers as a rich source of bizarre SHAR_EOF chmod 0644 jsplit.ab || echo "restore of jsplit.ab fails" if [ $TOUCH = can ] then touch -am 0103154591 jsplit.ab fi exit 0