The Jargon Lexicon

= X =
=====

X: /X/ n.  1. Used in various speech and writing contexts
   (also in lowercase) in roughly its algebraic sense of `unknown
   within a set defined by context' (compare {N}).  Thus, the
   abbreviation 680x0 stands for 68000, 68010, 68020, 68030, or 68040,
   and 80x86 stands for 80186, 80286 80386 or 80486 (note that a UNIX
   hacker might write these as 680[0-4]0 and 80[1-4]86 or 680?0 and
   80?86 respectively; see {glob}).  2. [after the name of an
   earlier window system called `W'] An over-sized, over-featured,
   over-engineered and incredibly over-complicated window system
   developed at MIT and widely used on UNIX systems.

XEROX PARC: /zee'roks park'/ n.  The famed Palo Alto
   Research Center.  For more than a decade, from the early 1970s into
   the mid-1980s, PARC yielded an astonishing volume of groundbreaking
   hardware and software innovations.  The modern mice, windows, and
   icons style of software interface was invented there.  So was the
   laser printer and the local-area network; and PARC's series of D
   machines anticipated the powerful personal computers of the 1980s
   by a decade.  Sadly, the prophets at PARC were without honor in
   their own company, so much so that it became a standard joke to
   describe PARC as a place that specialized in developing brilliant
   ideas for everyone else.

   The stunning shortsightedness and obtusity of XEROX's top-level
   {suit}s has been well anatomized in "Fumbling The Future:
   How XEROX Invented, Then Ignored, the First Personal Computer" by
   Douglas K. Smith and Robert C. Alexander (William Morrow & Co.,
   1988, ISBN 0-688-09511-9).

XOFF: /X-of/ n.  Syn. {control-S}.

XON: /X-on/ n.  Syn. {control-Q}.

xor: /X'or/, /kzor/ conj.  Exclusive or.  `A xor B' means
   `A or B, but not both'.  "I want to get cherry pie xor a banana
   split."  This derives from the technical use of the term as a
   function on truth-values that is true if exactly one of its two
   arguments is true.

xref: /X'ref/ vt.,n.  Hackish standard abbreviation for
   `cross-reference'.

XXX: /X-X-X/ n.  A marker that attention is needed.
   Commonly used in program comments to indicate areas that are kluged
   up or need to be.  Some hackers liken `XXX' to the notional
   heavy-porn movie rating.  Compare {FIXME}.

xyzzy: /X-Y-Z-Z-Y/, /X-Y-ziz'ee/, /ziz'ee/, or /ik-ziz'ee/
   adj.  [from the ADVENT game] The {canonical} `magic
   word'.  This comes from {ADVENT}, in which the idea is to
   explore an underground cave with many rooms and to collect the
   treasures you find there.  If you type `xyzzy' at the appropriate
   time, you can move instantly between two otherwise distant points.
   If, therefore, you encounter some bit of {magic}, you might
   remark on this quite succinctly by saying simply "Xyzzy!"
   "Ordinarily you can't look at someone else's screen if he has
   protected it, but if you type quadruple-bucky-clear the system will
   let you do it anyway."  "Xyzzy!"

   Xyzzy has actually been implemented as an undocumented no-op
   command on several OSes; in Data General's AOS/VS, for example, it
   would typically respond "Nothing happens", just as {ADVENT}
   did if the magic was invoked at the wrong spot or before a player
   had performed the action that enabled the word.  In more recent
   32-bit versions, by the way, AOS/VS responds "Twice as much
   happens".

   The popular `minesweeper' game under Microsoft Windows has a
   cheat mode triggered by the command `xyzzy'
   that turns the top-left pixel of the screen different colors
   depending on whether or not the cursor is over a bomb.