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From: don@opal.berkeley.edu (Don Curry)
Newsgroups: comp.misc
Subject: Re: History (origin of foobar)
Message-ID: <5194@jade.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: Tue, 22-Sep-87 13:22:24 EDT
Article-I.D.: jade.5194
Posted: Tue Sep 22 13:22:24 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 24-Sep-87 05:39:28 EDT
References: <1555@ingr.UUCP>
Sender: usenet@jade.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: don@opal.berkeley.edu (Don Curry)
Organization: Computer Facilities & Communications, UC-Berkeley
Lines: 44
Keywords: foobar origin

In article <1555@ingr.UUCP> myoung@ingr.UUCP (Mark Young) writes:
>the way I heard it a few years ago was that first there was:
>
>	fubar	: Fouled Up Beyond All Repair
>
>which some people diddled with to mean:
>
>	fubar	: F**ked Up Beyond All Repair
>
>so, to avoid the confusion, some people started using "oo" in place of
>"u".  Now, thanks to whoever, we have lotsa non-mnemonic variable names to
>use:
>	int foobar, foo, bar, foob, barfoo, foob;

Actually, foobar (a variant of fubar) much antedates its employment in
various computer mnemonics (and non-mnemonics).  To my certain knowledge,
it, as well as a series of variants listed below, were in common military
use as early as 1943 (by me, and by thousands of others):

	snafu (snafoo-var.)  -  Situation normal; all fucked up!
	tarfu (tarfoo-var.)  -  Things are really fucked up!
	fubar (foobar-var.)  -  Fucked up beyond all recognition!
	janfu (janfoo-var.)  -  Joint Army-Navy fuck-up! (Amphibious Operations)

There were literally hundreds of -fu (-foo) coinages, which, while in use by
restricted groups, did not come into the regular military vocabulary.  Some
that come to mind are:

	fafu -  Field artillery fuck-up
 	fofu -  Forward observer fuck-up

	[Useful after you have been shelled by your own artillery!] and

        acfu -  Air Corps fuck-up

        [After you have been bombed/strafed by your own planes!]

don@opal.berkeley.edu
         Don Curry
         Computer Facilities & Communications, 
         University of California, 
         Berkeley CA 94720  (415) 642-0587 

         "Dh' aindeoin co theireadh e!"