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= D =
DAEMON (day'mun, dee'mun) [archaic form of "demon", which has slightly
different connotations (q.v.)] n. A program which is not invoked
explicitly, but which lays dormant waiting for some condition(s) to
occur. The idea is that the perpetrator of the condition need not
be aware that a daemon is lurking (though often a program will
commit an action only because it knows that it will implicitly
invoke a daemon). For example, writing a file on the lpt spooler's
directory will invoke the spooling daemon, which prints the file.
The advantage is that programs which want (in this example) files
printed need not compete for access to the lpt. They simply enter
their implicit requests and let the daemon decide what to do with
them. Daemons are usually spawned automatically by the system, and
may either live forever or be regenerated at intervals. Usage:
DAEMON and DEMON (q.v.) are often used interchangeably, but seem to
have distinct connotations. DAEMON was introduced to computing by
CTSS people (who pronounced it dee'mon) and used it to refer to
what is now called a DRAGON or PHANTOM (q.v.). The meaning and
pronunciation have drifted, and we think this glossary reflects
current usage.
DAY MODE (day mohd) See PHASE (of people).
DD (dee-dee) [from archaic UNIX dd(1)] v. Equivalent to CAT or BLT.
Very rare outside UNIX sites and now nearly obsolescent even there,
as dd(1) has been DEPRECATED for a long time. Replaced by BLT or
simple English `copy'.
DEADLOCK (ded'lok) n. A situation wherein two or more processes are
unable to proceed because each is waiting for another to do
something. A common example is a program communicating to a PTY or
STY, which may find itself waiting for output from the PTY/STY
before sending anything more to it, while the PTY/STY is similarly
waiting for more input from the controlling program before
outputting anything. (This particular flavor of deadlock is called
"starvation". Another common flavor is "constipation", where each
process is trying to send stuff to the other, but all buffers are
full because nobody is reading anything.) See DEADLY EMBRACE, RACE
CONDITION.
DEADLY EMBRACE (ded'lee em-brays') n. Same as DEADLOCK (q.v.), though
usually used only when exactly two processes are involved. DEADLY
EMBRACE is the more popular term in Europe; DEADLOCK in the United
States.
DEFENESTRATION (dee-fen-uh-stray'shn) [from the traditional
Czechoslovak method of assassinating prime ministers, via ESR and
SF fandom] n. Proper karmic retribution for an incorrigible
punster. "Oh, ghod, that was *awful*!" "Quick! Defenestrate him!"
See also H INFIX.
DEEP SPACE (deep spays) 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. 2. Also, 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.
DEMENTED (dee-men't@d) 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 (de'mi-god) 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 (dee'mun) n. 1. [MIT] A portion of a program which is not invoked
explicitly, but which lays 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 under UNIX where the the latter
spelling and pronunciation is considered mildly archaic.
DEPRECATED (de'pre-kay-t@d) [from UNIX documentation] 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 (dee rez) [from the movie TRON] v. 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.
DEVO (dee'vo) [orig. in-house slang at Symbolics] n. A person in a
development group. See also DOCO and MANGO.
DICKLESS WORKSTATION (dik'less werk'sta-shn) 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 (di'dl) v. To work with in a not particularly serious manner.
"I diddled with a copy of ADVENT so it didn't double-space all the
time." "Let's diddle this piece of code and see if the problem
goes away." See TWEAK and TWIDDLE.
DIKE (diek) [from "diagonal cutters"] v. To remove a module or disable
it. "When in doubt, dike it out."
DING (ding) n.,v. Synonym for FEEP (q.v.). Usage: rare among hackers,
but commoner in THE REAL WORLD.
DINOSAUR (die'n@-sor) 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 (die'n@-sor 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. 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 partisans
of Eris and a malevolent secret society called the Illuminati. See
Appendix C and HA HA ONLY SERIOUS.
DISPLAY HACK (dis-play' hak) 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.
DOCO (do'ko) [orig. in-house slang at Symbolics] n. A documentation
writer. See also DEVO and MANGO.
DO PROTOCOL (doo proh'toh-kahl) [from network protocol programming] v.
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.
DOGWASH (dog'wahsh) [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."] v.,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 (dohnt doo dhat, dhen) 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 a practical
failure, as users disliked tyng up a serial port this way. 2. By
extension, any physical electronic key or transferable ID required
for a program to function. See DONGLE DISK.
DONGLE-DISK (don'g@l 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".
DOORSTOP (dor-stop) 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 (dot fiel) [UNIX] n. A file that is invisible to normal
directory-browsing tools (on UNIX, files named beginning with a dot
are invisible).
DOWN (down) 1. adj. Not working. "The up escalator is down." 2. TAKE
DOWN, BRING DOWN: v. To deactivate, usually for repair work. See
UP.
DOWNLOAD (down'lohd) v. 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.
DRAGON (dra'gn) n. [MIT] A program similar to a "daemon" (q.v.),
except that it is not invoked at all, but is instead used by the
system to perform various secondary tasks. A typical example would
be an accounting program, which keeps track of who is logged in,
accumulates load- average statistics, etc. 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 is generated by the
"NAME DRAGON". See PHANTOM. Usage: rare outside MIT -- under UNIX
and most other OSs this would be called a `background DEMON' or
`DAEMON' (q.v).
DRAGON BOOK, THE (dra'gn buk, dh@) n. Aho, Sethi and Ullman's classic
compilers text _Compilers:_Principles,_Techniques,_and_Tools_, so
called because of the cover design depicting a knight slaying a
dragon labelled "compiler complexity".
DRAIN (drayn) [IBM] v. Syn. for FLUSH (sense 4).
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).
DROOL-PROOF PAPER (drool-proof pay'per) 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".
DROP ON THE FLOOR (drop on dh@ flor) vt. To discard silently.
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.
DRUGGED (druhgd) adj., also ON DRUGS. Conspicuously stupid, heading
towards BRAIN DAMAGE. Often accompanied by a pantomime of toking a
joint.
DRUNK MOUSE SYNDROME (druhnk mows sin'drohm) 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.
DUSTY DECKS (duhs'tee deks) [a holdover from card-punch days] n. Old
software (especially applications) with which one is obliged to
remain compatible. 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.
A related term, more often seen as a verb, is DTRT (Do The Right
Thing). 2. n. The INTERLISP function that attempts to accomplish
this feat by correcting many of the more common errors. See HAIRY.
= E =
EASTER EGGING (ees'tr e'g@ng) [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.
EARTHQUAKE (erth'kwayk) [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 Q&A at
its California plants.
EIGHTY-COLUMN MIND (ay'tee kol'@m miend) [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 will be buried `9-EDGE-FORWARD-FACE-DOWN'. [These
people are thought by most hackers to dominate IBM's customer base,
and its thinking -- ESR].
ELEGANT (e'l@-gnt) [from mathematical usage] adj. Said of an
algorithm, program, or system that combines simplicity, power, and
a certain ineffable grace of design. Higher praise than `clever',
`winning' or even CUSPY.
ELEPHANTINE (el'@-fn-teen) adj. Used of programs or systems which are
both conspicuous HOGs (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
SYNDROME.
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.
EMAIL (ee-mayl) v.,n. Electronic mail. Contrast SNAIL-MAIL.
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), aka 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.
EMPIRE (em'pier) 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.
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."
EPOCH, THE (ee'p@k, dh@) [UNIX] n. Syn. for ERA.
EPSILON (ep'si-lahn) [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.
ERA, THE (ee'ra, dh@) [from UNIX] n. The time and date corresponding
to zero in an operating system's clock and timestamp values. Under
most UNIX versions, midnight of January 1st 1970. System time is
measured in TICKS past the era. Syn. with EPOCH. See TICKS, WALL
TIME.
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.
ESSENTIALS (e-sen'tiuhls) 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."
EXCL (eks'kl) n. Abbreviation for "exclamation point". See BANG,
SHRIEK, WOW.
EXE (ex'ee) An executable binary file. Some operating systems use the
extension .EXE to mark such files. This usage is also found among
UNIX programmers even though UNIX executables don't have any
required extension.
EXEC 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.
= F =
FALL OVER (fol o'vr) [IBM] v. Yet another synonym for CRASH or
LOSE. `Fall over hard' equates to CRASH AND BURN.
FANDANGO ON CORE (fan-dang'go on kor) [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 SCREW, PRECEDENCE SCREW, SMASH THE STACK,
MEMORY LEAK, OVERRUN SCREW.
FASCISTIC (fa-shis'tik) 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.
FAULTY (fawl'tee) adj. Same denotation as "bagbiting", "bletcherous",
"losing", q.v., but the connotation is much milder.
FEAR AND LOATHING (feer @nd loh'thing) [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. "Ack.
They want PCs to be able to talk to the AI machine. Fear and
loathing time!" See also IBM.
FEATURE (fee'chr) n. 1. A surprising property of a program.
Occasionally documented. To call a property a feature sometimes
means the author of the program did not consider the particular
case, and the program makes an unexpected, although not strictly
speaking an incorrect response. See BUG. "That's not a bug,
that's a feature!" A bug can be changed to a feature by
documenting it. 2. A well-known and beloved property; a facility.
Sometimes features are planned, but are called crocks by others.
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. 2. v. To cause the display to make a feep sound.
TTY's do not have feeps. Alternate forms: BEEP, BLEEP, or just
about anything suitably onomatopoeic. The term BREEDLE was
sometimes heard at SAIL, where the terminal bleepers are not
particularly "soft" (they sound more like the musical equivalent of
sticking out one's tongue). The "feeper" on a VT-52 has been
compared to the sound of a '52 Chevy stripping its gears. See also
DING.
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.
FENCEPOST ERROR (fens'post eir'@r) n. The discrete equivalent of a
boundary condition. Often exhibited in programs by iterative
loops. From the following problem: "If you build a fence 100 feet
long with posts ten feet apart, how many posts do you need?"
(Either 9 or 11 is a better answer than the obvious 10.)
FIELD CIRCUS (feeld ser'k@s) 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 swapping 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 swapping tires to see which one is flat.
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.
FILM AT 11 (film at @-lev'n) [MIT, in imitation of TV network news
squibs.], interj. Used in conversation to announce ordinary
events, with a sarcastic implication that these events are
earth-shattering. This is hard to describe. Examples: "ITS
crashes; film at 11." "Bug found in scheduler; film at 11."
FILTER (fil'tr) [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, (q.v.).
FINE (fien) [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 (fing'gr) [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. v. To apply finger to a username. 3. v. By
extension, to check a human's current state by any means. "Foodp?"
"T!" "OK, finger Lisa and see if she's idle".
FIREBOTTLE (fier'bo`tl) 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.
FIREWALL MACHINE (fier'wal m:-sheen') 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
cluster of more loosely administered machines `hidden' behind it
from crackers. The typically `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.
FIRMWARE (ferm'weir) 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.
FLAG DAY (flag day) [from a bit of Multics history involving a change
in the ASCII character set originally scheduled for June 14, 1966]
n. A software change which is neither forward nor backward
compatible, and which is costly to make and costly to revert. "Can
we install that without causing a flag day for all users?"
FLAKEY (flay'kee) adj. Subject to frequent lossages. See LOSSAGE.
FLAMAGE (flaym'@j) n. High-noise, low-signal postings to USENET or
other electronic fora. Often in the phrase "the usual flamage".
FLAME (flaym) v. To speak incessantly and/or rabidly on some
relatively uninteresting subject or with a patently ridiculous
attitude. FLAME ON: v. To continue to flame. See RAVE, BURBLE.
FLAME WAR (flaym wor) n. Acrimonious dispute, especially when
conducted on a public electronic forum such as USENET.
FLAMER (flay'mr) v. One who habitually flames others. Said of
obnoxious USENET personalities.
FLAP (flap) v. To unload a DECtape (so it goes flap, flap, flap...).
Old hackers at MIT tell of the days when the disk was device 0 and
microtapes were 1, 2,... and attempting to flap device 0 would
instead start a motor banging inside a cabinet near the disk!
FLAVOR (flay'vr) n. 1. Variety, type, kind. "DDT commands come in
two flavors." 2. The attribute of causing something to be
FLAVORFUL. "This convention yields additional flavor by allowing
one to..." See VANILLA.
FLAVORFUL (flay'vr-fl) adj. Aesthetically pleasing. See RANDOM and
LOSING for antonyms. See also the entries for TASTE and ELEGANCE.
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 (fluhsh) v. 1. To delete something, usually superfluous. "All
that nonsense has been flushed." Standard ITS terminology for
aborting an output operation. 2. To leave at the end of a day's
work (as opposed to leaving for a meal). "I'm going to flush now."
"Time to flush." 3. To exclude someone from an activity. 4.
[UNIX/C] To force buffered I/O to disk, as with an fflush(3) call.
UNIX hackers find the ITS usage confusing and vice versa.
FLYTRAP (flie'trap) n. See FIREWALL.
FOO (foo) 1. [from Yiddish "feh" or the Anglo-Saxon "fooey!"] interj.
Term of disgust. 2. [from FUBAR (Fucked Up Beyond All
Recognition), from WWII, often seen as FOOBAR] Name used for
temporary programs, or samples of three-letter names. Other
similar words are BAR, BAZ (Stanford corruption of BAR), and rarely
RAG. These have been used in Pogo as well. 3. Used very generally
as a sample name for absolutely anything. The old `Smokey Stover'
comic strips often included the word FOO, in particular on license
plates of cars. 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. [It is possible that hacker usage of FOO actually
springs from the title "FOO, Lampoons and Parody" of a comic book
first issued in September 1958; the byline read "C. Crumb" but my
source believes this was a sort-of pseudonym for noted weird-comix
artist Robert Crumb. The title FOO was featured in large letters
on the front cover -- ESR]
FOOL (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 (fut'print) 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').
FOREGROUND (for'grownd) [UNIX] adj.v. On a time-sharing system, a
task executing in foreground is one running at normal priority and
able to accept input from and return output to the user; oppose
BACKGROUND. There may be only one forground task per terminal (or
terminal window). By extension, "to foreground" a task is to bring
it to the top of one's PDL or STACK for immediate processing, and
in this sense hackers often use it for non-computer tasks.
FORTUNE COOKIE (for'chn ku'kee) [UNIX] n. A random quote, item of
trivia, joke or maxim printed to the user's tty at login time or
(more rarely) at logout time. Items from this jargon file have
often been used as fortune cookies.
FOSSIL (fohs'sl) 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-addressible
architectures. See DUSTY DECKS. 2. More restrictively, a feature
with past but no present utility. Example: the force-all-caps
(IUCLC/OLCUC) bits in the UNIX tty driver, designed for use with
monocase terminals.
FRED (fred) n. The personal name most frequently used as a
metasyntactic variable (see FOO). The reasons for this are obscure.
FREEWARE (free'weir) n. Free software, often written by enthusiasts
and usually distributed by electronic mail, local bulletin boards,
USENET, or other electronic media. See SHAREWARE.
FRIED (fried) adj. 1. Non-working due to hardware failure; burnt out.
2. Of people, exhausted. Said particularly of those who continue
to work in such a state. Often used as an explanation or excuse.
"Yeah, I know that fix destroyed the file system, but I was fried
when I put it in."
FROB (frob) 1. n. [MIT] The official Tech Model Railroad Club
definition is "FROB = protruding arm or trunnion", and by
metaphoric extension any somewhat small thing. See FROBNITZ. 2.
v. Abbreviated form of FROBNICATE.
FROBNICATE (frob'ni-kayt) v. To manipulate or adjust, to tweak.
Derived from FROBNITZ (q.v.). Usually abbreviated to FROB. Thus
one has the saying "to frob a frob". See TWEAK and TWIDDLE.
Usage: FROB, TWIDDLE, and TWEAK sometimes 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.
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') has also become very popular. These can
also be applied to nonphysical objects, such as data structures.
FROG alt. PHROG (frog) 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 (q.v.), but
milder. "This froggy program is taking forever to run!"
FROTZ (frotz) 1. n. See FROBNITZ. 2. MUMBLE FROTZ: An interjection
of very mild disgust.
FRY (frie) v. 1. To fail. Said especially of smoke-producing hardware
failures. 2. More generally, to become non-working. Usage: never
said of software, only of hardware and humans. See FRIED, MAGIC
SMOKE.
FTP (ef-tee-pee, NOT "fittip") 1. n. The File Transfer Protocol for
transmitting files between systems on the ARPAnet. 2. v. To
transfer a file using the File Transfer Program. "Lemme get this
copy of Wuthering Heights FTP'd from uunet."
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 (fuhj) 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 (fuhj faktr) 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. An example might be the
coefficients of an equation, where the coefficients are varied in
an attempt to make the equation fit certain criteria.
FUEL UP (fyool uhp) v. 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. 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 (fuhn'kee) 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.
FUZZ (fuhz) 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.
FUZZBALL (fuhz'bawl) [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 (gag) vi. Equivalent to CHOKE, but connotes more disgust. "Hey,
this is Fortran code. No wonder the C compiler gagged." See also
BARF.
GARBAGE COLLECT (gar'b@j k@-lekt') v., GARBAGE COLLECTION n. See GC.
GARPLY (gar'plee) n. [Stanford] Another meta-word popular among SAIL
hackers.
GAS (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. v.
FLUSH (q.v.). "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.
GATEWAY (gayt'way) n. 1. A computer or item of special-purpose
hardware that links two or more normally incompatible data networks
and does protocol translation between them. 2. On compatible or
common-carrier networks, a piece of software that translates
between normally incompatible data formats and addressing
conventions.
GC (jee-see) [from LISP terminology] 1. v. To clean up and throw away
useless things. "I think I'll GC the top of my desk today." 2. v.
To recycle, reclaim, or put to another use. 3. n. An instantiation
of the GC process.
GEDANKEN (g@-dahn'kn) [from Einstein's term "gedanken-experimenten",
such as the standard proof that E=mc^2] adj. An AI project which is
written up in grand detail without ever being implemented to any
great extent. Usually perpetrated by people who aren't very good
hackers or find programming distasteful or are just in a hurry. A
gedanken thesis is usually marked by an obvious lack of intuition
about what is programmable and what is not and about what does and
does not constitute a clear specification of a program-related
concept such as an algorithm.
GENDER MENDER (jen'dr-men'dr) n. (also GENDER BENDER) A cable
connector shell with either two male or two female connectors on
it, used for mating like-sexed cables. Used esp. for RS-232C parts
in either the original D-25 or the IBM PC's bogus D-9 format.
GENERATE (gen'@-rayt) v. 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.
GET A REAL COMPUTER (get uh reel kuhm'pyoo-tr) 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 less than a megabyte of DRAM. 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 five years. See BITTY BOX and TOY.
GIGO (gie'goh) [acronym] 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.
GLARK (glark) v. To figure something out from context, taken from an
old Scientific American "Mathematical Games" column, where the
phrase "glark the meaning from context" was used as an example...of
glarking something from context. "The System III manuals are pretty
poor, but you can generally glark the meaning from context".
GLASS (glas) [IBM] n. Synonym for SILICON.
GLASS TTY (glas tee-tee-wie, 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.
An example is the ADM-3 (without cursor control). A glass tty
can't do neat DISPLAY HACKs, and you can't save the output either.
See TUBE, TTY.
GLITCH (glich) [from the Yiddish "glitshen", to slide] 1. n. A sudden
interruption in electric service, sanity, or program function.
Sometimes recoverable. 2. v. To commit a glitch. See GRITCH. 3.
v. [Stanford] To scroll a display screen. 4. (obs.) Same as MAGIC
COOKIE, sense #2.
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. v. Similar to GLITCH
(q.v.), but usually used reflexively. "My program just glorked
itself."
GNARLY (nar'lee) 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 (aka RMS). GNU EMACS and the GNU C
compiler, two tools designed for this project, have become very
popular in hackerdom. See EMACS, COPYLEFT. 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. See RMS.
GO FLATLINE (flat'lien) [from cyberpunk SF, refers to flattening of
EEG traces upon brain-death] v., 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 (go'bl) v. To consume or to obtain. GOBBLE UP tends to imply
"consume", while GOBBLE DOWN tends to imply "obtain". "The output
spy gobbles characters out of a TTY output buffer." "I guess I'll
gobble down a copy of the documentation tomorrow." See SNARF.
GONK (gonk) v.,n. To prevaricate or to embellish the truth beyond any
reasonable recognitions. In German the term is "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.
GONZO (gon'zo) [from Hunter S. Thompson] adj. Overwhelming; 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.
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.
GOOD THING (gud thing) adj. Always 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.
GORP (gorp) [CMU, perhaps from a brand of dried hiker's food?]
Another metasyntactic variable, like FOO and BAR.
GORILLA ARM (gor-il'uh 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?"
GREAT RENAMING (grayt ree-naym'ing) n. The FLAG DAY on which all of
the groups on the USENET had their names changed from the net.*
format to the current 7 hierarchies scheme.
GREAT-WALL (grayt-wahl) [from SF fandom] v.,n. a mass expedition to an
oriental restaurant. See ORIENTAL FOOD, CHINESE RAVS, STIR-FRIED
RANDOM.
GREEN LIGHTNING (green liet'ning) [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.
[generalization of #1 proposed by ESR] 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".
GRAULT (grawlt) n. Yet another meta-syntactic variable, invented by
Mike Galleher and propagated by the Gosmacs documentation. See
CORGE.
GRAY GOO (gray goo) n. A hypothetical substance composed of billions
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
most naive and easiest to demolish of the NANOTECHNOLOGY (q.v.)
disaster scenarios.
GREP (grep) [from the UNIX grep tool] v. 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 (griend) v. 1. [MIT and Berkeley] To format code, especially
LISP code, by indenting lines so that it looks pretty. Hence,
PRETTY PRINT, 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.
GRIND CRANK (griend 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, CHUNGA CHUNGA CHUNGA and WUGGA WUGGA.
GRITCH (grich) 1. n. A complaint (often caused by a GLITCH (q.v.)).
2. v. To complain. Often verb-doubled: "Gritch gritch". 3.
Glitch.
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"] v. To understand, usually in a
global sense. Connotes intimate and exhaustive knowledge.
GRONK (gronk) [popularized by the cartoon strip "B.C." by Johnny
Hart, but the word apparently predates that] v. 1. To clear the
state of a wedged device and restart it. More severe than "to
frob" (q.v.). 2. To break. "The teletype scanner was gronked, so
we took the system down." 3. GRONKED: adj. Of people, the
condition of feeling very tired or sick. 4. GRONK OUT: v. To cease
functioning. Of people, to go home and go to sleep. "I guess I'll
gronk out now; see you all tomorrow."
GROVEL (gruh'vl) v. To work interminably and without apparent
progress. Often used with "over". "The compiler grovelled over my
code." Compare GRIND and CRUNCH. Emphatic form: GROVEL OBSCENELY.
GRUNGY (gruhn'jee) adj. Incredibly dirty 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?"
GUILTWARE (gilt'weir) 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 shit if one does not immediately send the
poor suffering martyr gobs of money.
GUMBY (guhm'bee) [from the claymation character] n. An act of minor
but conspicuous stupidity, often in GUMBY MANEUVER or PULL A GUMBY.
GUN (guhn) [from the GUN command on ITS] v. To forcibly terminate a
program or job (computer, not career). "Some idiot left a
background process running soaking up half the cycles, so I gunned
it." 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!"
GURU (gur'oo) n. A UNIX 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".
= H =
H INFIX (aych in-fix) [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 benchark 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 (ha ha ohn'lee see'ree-us) [from SF fandom] A
phrase that aptly captures the flavor of much hacker discourse
(sometimes 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.
HACK (hack) n. 1. Originally a quick job that produces what is needed,
but not well. 2. The result of that job. 3. NEAT HACK: A clever
technique. Also, a brilliant 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). v. 5. With
"together", to throw something together so it will work. 6. To
bear emotionally or physically. "I can't hack this heat!" 7. To
work on something (typically a program). In specific sense: "What
are you doing?" "I'm hacking TECO." In general sense: "What do
you do around here?" "I hack TECO." (The former is
time-immediate, the latter time-extended.) More generally, "I hack
x" is roughly equivalent to "x is my bag". "I hack solid-state
physics." 8. To pull a prank on. See definition 3 and HACKER (def
#6). 9. v.i. To waste time (as opposed to TOOL). "Watcha up to?"
"Oh, just hacking." 10. HACK UP (ON): To hack, but generally
implies that the result is meanings 1-2. 11. HACK VALUE: Term used
as the reason or motivation for expending effort toward a seemingly
useless goal, the point being that the accomplished goal is a hack.
For example, MacLISP has features for reading and printing roman
numerals, which was installed purely for hack value. 12. [UNIX] A
dungeon game similar to ROGUE (q.v.) 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'.
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.
HACKER (hak'r) [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, or who enjoys programming rather than
just theorizing about programming. 3. A person capable of
appreciating HACK VALUE (q.v.). 4. A person who is good at
programming quickly. Not everything a hacker produces is a hack.
5. An expert at a particular program, or one who frequently does
work using it or on it; example: "A UNIX hacker". (Definitions 1
to 5 are correlated, and people who fit them congregate.) 6.
(deprecated) A malicious or inquisitive meddler who tries to
discover information by poking around. Hence "password hacker",
"network hacker". See CRACKER.
HACK MODE (hak mohd) 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 (hak'ing ruhn) [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.
HAIR (heir) 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."
HAIRY (heir'ee) 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.
HAND-HACKING (hand hak'ing) n. The practice of translating HOT SPOTS
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.
HANDWAVE (hand'wayv) 1. v. To gloss over a complex point; to distract
a listener; to support a (possibly actually valid) point with
blatantly faulty logic. 2. n. The act of 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.
HANLON'S RAZOR (han'lnz ray'zr) n. A "murphyism" parallel to Occam's
Razor that reads "Never attribute to malice that which can be
adequately explained by stupidity". 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.
HAS THE X NATURE (has dh@ eks nay'tyoor) [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. Ex: "Anyone who can't even use a program with on-screen
help embedded in it truly has the LOSER nature!"
HASH COLLISION (hash k@-li'zhn) [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."
HCF (aych-see-eff) n. Mnemonic for "Halt and Catch Fire", any of
several undocumented and semi-mythical instructions with
destructive side-effects, supposedly included for test purposes on
several well-known architectures going as far back as the IBM 360.
The MC68000 microprocessor was the first for which the HCF opcode
became widely known. The 68000 HCF causes 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.
HEARTBEAT (hart'beet) 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.
HEISENBUG (hie'sen-buhg) [from quantum physics] n. A bug which
disappears or alters its behavior when one attempts to probe or
isolate it. Antonym of BOHR BUG (q.v.). 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.
HELLO SAILOR! (he'lo say'lr) interj. Occsional West Coast equivalent
of `Hello, world!'. See HELLO WORLD.
HELLO WALL (he'lo wahl) See WALL.
HELLO WORLD! (he'lo werld) 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 his 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?"
HIGH BIT (hie bit) n. See META BIT
HIRSUTE (heer's[y]oot) 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 (hawg) n.,v. Favored term to describe programs 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.
HOOK (huk) n. An extraneous piece of software or hardware included in
order to simplify later additions or debug options. For instance,
a program might execute a location that is normally a JFCL, but by
changing the JFCL to a PUSHJ one can insert a debugging routine at
that point.
HOME BOX (hohm boks) n. A hacker's personal machine, especially one he
owns. "Yeah? Well, *my* home box runs a full 4.2BSD, so there!"
HOSE (hohz) 1. v. 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. Sometimes "bit hose".
HOSED (hohzd) adj. Same as DOWN. Used primarily by UNIX hackers.
Humorous: also implies a condition thought to be relatively easy to
reverse. Probably a back-formation from the Canadian slang `hoser'
popularized by the Bob and Doug skits on SCTV. See HOSE.
HOT SPOTS (hot spotz) [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 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.
HOUSE WIZARD (hows wi'zrd) [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.
HUMONGOUS (hyoo-mohng'gus) alt. HUMUNGOUS (hyoo-muhng'gus) See HUNGUS.
HUMOR, HACKER (hyoo'm@r, hak'r) n. A distinct 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 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.
See also FILK, COMPUTER; RETROCOMPUTING; and Appendix C. 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 (hung) [from "hung up"] adj. Equivalent to WEDGED, q.v. but more
common at UNIX/C sites. Not used of people.
HUNGUS (hung'ghis) [perhaps related to current slang "humongous";
which one came first (if either) is unclear] adj. Large, unwieldy,
usually unmanageable. "TCP is a hungus piece of code." "This is a
hungus set of modifications."
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. "Another core
dump...looks like the program jumped off to hyperspace somehow."
= I =
IBM (ie bee em) Inferior But Marketable; It's Better Manually;
Insidious Black Magic; Incontinent Bowel Movement; and a
near-INFINITE number of many even less complementary 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 is locked
up tight and programming tools are expensive, hard to find, and a
bitch 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 the jargon list 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 (ies) [from William Gibson's cyberpunk SF: notionally, "Intrusion
Countermeasure Electronics"] Security software. 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 (il-bee-hayvd') adj. 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 incompatible with other pieces of
software. In the IBM PC/MS-DOS world, where this term originated,
there is a folk theorem to the effect that (due to gross
inadequacies and performance penalties in the OS interface) all
interesting applications are ill-behaved. 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 someting in the wrong case can cause hard-to-detect
errors -- and they look too Pascalish anyhow."
INCANTATION (in-kan-tay'shn) 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.
INFINITE (in'fi-n@t) adj. Consisting of a large number of objects;
extreme. Used very loosely as in: "This program produces infinite
garbage."
INFANT MORTALITY (in'f:nt mor-tal':-tee) 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.
INTERCAL (in'tr-kal) [said by the authors to stand for "Compiler
Language With No Pronounceable Acronym"] n. The language has been
recently re-implemented as C-INTERCAL and is consequently enjoying
an unprecedented level of unpopularity.
INTERNET ADDRESS (in'ter-net @-dres') n. An `absolute' network address
of the form foo@bar.baz, where foo is a user name, bar is a site
name, and baz is a `domain' name, possibly including periods
itself. Contrasts with BANG PATH, q.v.; see also NETWORK. 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.
INTERRUPTS LOCKED OUT (in't@-ruptz lokt owt) 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 (iern) n. Hardware, especially older/larger hardware of mainframe
class with big metal cabinets relatively low-density electronics
(but also used of modern supercomputers). Often in the phrase BIG
IRON. Oppose SILICON. See also DINOSAUR.
IRON BOX (iern boks) [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.
IRONMONGER (iern'mohn-gr) [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. See Appendix B.
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 =
JAGGIES (jag'eez) n. The `stairstep' effect observable when an edge
(esp. a linear edge of slope far from 45 degrees) is rendered on a
pixel device (as opposed to a vector display).
JIFFY (jif'ee) n. 1. Interval of CPU time, commonly 1/60 second or 1
millisecond (see TICK). 2. Indeterminate time from a few seconds
to forever. "I'll do it in a jiffy" means certainly not now and
possibly never.
JOCK (jok) n. Programmer who is characterized by large and somewhat
brute force programs. The term is particularly well-suited for
systems programmers.
JOE CODE (joh kohd) [said to commemmorate a notoriously bad coder
named Joe at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory] n. Badly written,
possibly buggy source code. "Perl may be a handy program, but if
you look at the source, it's complete joe code."
J. RANDOM HACKER (jay rand'm hak'r) n. A mythical figure like the
Unknown Soldier; the archetypal hacker nerd. See RANDOM.