:Yet Another: adj. [From UNIX's `yacc(1)', `Yet Another
Compiler-Compiler', a LALR parser generator] 1. Of your own work: A
humorous allusion often used in titles to acknowledge that the
topic is not original, though the content is. As in `Yet Another
AI Group' or `Yet Another Simulated Annealing Algorithm'. 2. Of
others' work: Describes something of which there are already far
too many. See also {YA-}, {YABA}, {YAUN}.
File: jargon.info Node: YKYBHTL, Prev: Yet Another, Up: = Y =, Next: You are not expected to understand this
:YKYBHTL: An abbreviation of `You Know You've Been Hacking Too Long'
established on the USENET group alt.folklore.computers during
extended discussion of the indicated entry in the Jargon File.
File: jargon.info Node: You are not expected to understand this, Prev: YKYBHTL, Up: = Y =, Next: You know you've been hacking too long when@dots{}
:You are not expected to understand this: cav. [UNIX] The canonical
comment describing something {magic} or too complicated to
bother explaining properly. From an infamous comment in the
context-switching code of the V6 UNIX kernel.
File: jargon.info Node: You know you've been hacking too long when, Prev: You are not expected to understand this, Up: = Y =, Next: Your mileage may vary
:You know you've been hacking too long when...: The set-up line
for a genre of one-liners told by hackers about themselves. These
include the following:
* not only do you check your email more often than your paper
mail, but you remember your {network address} faster than your
postal one.
* your {SO} kisses you on the neck and the first thing you
think is "Uh, oh, {priority interrupt}."
* you go to balance your checkbook and discover that you're
doing it in octal.
* your computers have a higher street value than your car.
* in your universe, `round numbers' are powers of 2, not 10.
* more than once, you have woken up recalling a dream in
some programming language.
* you realize you have never seen half of your best friends.
[An early version of this entry said "All but one of these
have been reliably reported as hacker traits (some of them quite
often). Even hackers may have trouble spotting the ringer." The
ringer was balancing one's checkbook in octal, which I made up out
of whole cloth. Although more respondents picked that one
out as fiction than any of the others, I also received multiple
independent reports of its actually happening, including a report
that Grace Hopper used to tell such a story about herself. --- ESR]
File: jargon.info Node: Your mileage may vary, Prev: You know you've been hacking too long when, Up: = Y =, Next: Yow!
:Your mileage may vary: cav. [from the standard disclaimer attached
to EPA mileage ratings by American car manufacturers] 1. A ritual
warning often found in UNIX freeware distributions. Translates
roughly as "Hey, I tried to write this portably, but who
*knows* what'll happen on your system?" 2. A qualifier more
generally attached to advice. "I find that sending flowers works
well, but your mileage may vary."
File: jargon.info Node: Yow!, Prev: Your mileage may vary, Up: = Y =, Next: yoyo mode
:Yow!: /yow/ [from "Zippy the Pinhead" comix] interj. A favored hacker
expression of humorous surprise or emphasis. "Yow! Check out what
happens when you twiddle the foo option on this display hack!"
Compare {gurfle}.
File: jargon.info Node: yoyo mode, Prev: Yow!, Up: = Y =, Next: Yu-Shiang Whole Fish
:yoyo mode: n. The state in which the system is said to be when it
rapidly alternates several times between being up and being down.
Interestingly (and perhaps not by coincidence), many hardware
vendors give out free yoyos at Usenix exhibits.
Sun Microsystems gave out logoized yoyos at SIGPLAN '88. Tourists
staying at one of Atlanta's most respectable hotels were
subsequently treated to the sight of 200 of the country's top
computer scientists testing yo-yo algorithms in the lobby.