K
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jump off into never-never land
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jupitervt.
[IRC] To kill anIRCbotor user and then take its place by adopting itsnickso that it cannot reconnect. Named after a particular IRC user who did this to NickServ, the robot in charge of preventing people from inadvertently using a nick claimed by another user. Now commonly shortened to `jupe'.
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The Jargon Lexicon
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K
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K&R
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jupiter
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K/K/ n.
[fromkilo-] A kilobyte. Used both as a spoken word and a written suffix (likemegandgigfor megabyte and gigabyte). Seequantifiers.
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K&R
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k-
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K
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K&R[Kernighan and Ritchie] n.
Brian Kernighan and Dennis Ritchie's book "The C Programming Language", esp. the classic and influential first edition (Prentice-Hall 1978; ISBN 0-13-110163-3). Syn.White Book,Old Testament. See alsoNew Testament.
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k-
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kahuna
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K&R
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k-pref.
[rare; poss fr. `kilo-' prefix] Extremely. Rare among hackers, but quite common among crackers andwarez d00dzin compounds such as `k-kool' /K'kool'/, `k-rad' /K'rad'/, and `k-awesome' /K'aw`sm/. Also used to intensify negatives; thus, `k-evil', `k-lame', `k-screwed', and `k-annoying'. Overuse of this prefix, or use in more formal or technical contexts, is considered an indicator oflamerstatus.
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kahuna
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kamikaze packet
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k-
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kahuna/k*-hoo'n*/ n.
[IBM: from the Hawaiian title for a shaman] Synonym forwizard,guru.
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kamikaze packet
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kangaroo code
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kahuna
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kamikaze packetn.
The `official' jargon for what is more commonly called aChristmas tree packet.RFC-1025, "TCP and IP Bake Off" says:
10 points for correctly being able to process a "Kamikaze" packet (AKA nastygram, christmas tree packet, lamp test segment, et al.). That is, correctly handle a segment with the maximum combination of features at once (e.g., a SYN URG PUSH FIN segment with options and data).
See alsoChernobyl packet.
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kangaroo code
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ken
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kamikaze packet
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kangaroo coden.
Syn.spaghetti code.
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ken
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kernel-of-the-week club
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kangaroo code
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ken/ken/ n.
1. [Unix] Ken Thompson, principal inventor of Unix. In the early days he used to hand-cut distribution tapes, often with a note that read "Love, ken". Old-timers still use his first name (sometimes uncapitalized, because it's a login name and mail address) in third-person reference; it is widely understood (on Usenet, in particular) that without a last name `Ken' refers only to Ken Thompson. Similarly, Dennis without last name means Dennis Ritchie (and he is often known asdmr). See alsodemigod,Unix. 2. A flaming user. This was originated by the Software Support group at Symbolics because the two greatest flamers in the user community were both named Ken.
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kernel-of-the-week club
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kgbvax
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ken
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kernel-of-the-week club
The fictional society thatBSDbigots claim [Linux] users belong to, alluding to the release-early-release-often style preferred by the kernel maintainers. Seebazaar. This was almost certainly inspired by the earlierbug-of-the-month club.
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kgbvax
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KIBO
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kernel-of-the-week club
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kgbvax/K-G-B'vaks/ n.
Seekremvax.
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KIBO
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kiboze
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kgbvax
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KIBO/ki:'boh/
1. [acronym] Knowledge In, Bullshit Out. A summary of what
happens whenever valid data is passed through an organization (or
person) that deliberately or accidentally disregards or ignores
its significance. Consider, for example, what an advertising
campaign can do with a product's actual specifications. CompareGIGO; see alsoSNAFU principle. 2. James Parry
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kiboze
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kibozo
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KIBO
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kibozev.
[Usenet] Togrepthe Usenet news for a string, especially with the intention of posting a follow-up. This activity was popularised by Kibo (seeKIBO, sense 2).
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kibozo
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kick
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kiboze
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kibozo/ki:-boh'zoh/ n.
[Usenet] One whokibozes but is not Kibo (seeKIBO, sense 2).
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kick
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kill file
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kickv.
1. [IRC] To cause somebody to be removed from aIRCchannel, an option only available to channel ops. This is an extreme measure, often used to combat extremeflamageorflooding, but sometimes used at theCHOP's whim. Comparegun. 2. To reboot a machine or kill a running process. "The server's down, let me go kick it."
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kill file
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killer app
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kick
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kill filen.
[Usenet; very common] (alt. `KILL file') Per-user file(s) used by someUsenetreading programs (originally Larry Wall'srn(1)) to discard summarily (without presenting for reading) articles matching some particularly uninteresting (or unwanted) patterns of subject, author, or other header lines. Thus to add a person (or subject) to one's kill file is to arrange for that person to be ignored by one's newsreader in future. By extension, it may be used for a decision to ignore the person or subject in other media. See alsoplonk.
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killer app
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killer micro
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kill file
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killer app
The application that actually makes a sustaining market for a promising but under-utilized technology. First used in the mid-1980s to describe Lotus 1-2-3 once it became evident that demand for that product had been the major driver of the early business market for IBM PCs. The term was then restrospectively applied to VisiCalc, which had played a similar role in the success of the Apple II. After 1994 it became commonplace to describe the World Wide Web as the Internet's killer app. One of the standard questions asked about each new personal-computer technology as it emerges has become "what's the killer app?"
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killer micro
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killer poke
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killer micron.
[popularized by Eugene Brooks] A microprocessor-based machine that infringes on mini, mainframe, or supercomputer performance turf. Often heard in "No one will survive the attack of the killer micros!", the battle cry of the downsizers. Used esp. of RISC architectures.
The popularity of the phrase `attack of the killer micros' is doubtless reinforced by the title of the movie "Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes" (one of thecanonicalexamples of so-bad-it's-wonderful among hackers). This has even moreflavornow that killer micros have gone on the offensive not just individually (in workstations) but in hordes (within massively parallel computers).
[1996 update: Eugene Brooks was right. Since this term first entered the Jargon File in 1990, the minicomputer has effectively vanished, themainframesector is in deep and apparently terminal decline (with IBM but a shadow of its former self), and even the supercomputer business has contracted into a smaller niche. It's networked killer micros as far as the eye can see. --ESR]
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killer poke
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kilo-
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killer poken.
A recipe for inducing hardware damage on a machine via insertion of invalid values (seepoke) into a memory-mapped control register; used esp. of various fairly well-known tricks onbitty boxes without hardware memory management (such as the IBM PC and Commodore PET) that can overload and trash analog electronics in the monitor. See alsoHCF.
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kilo-
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KIPS
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killer poke
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kilo-pref.
[SI] Seequantifiers.
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KIPS
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KISS Principle
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kilo-
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KIPS/kips/ n.
[abbreviation, by analogy withMIPSusingK] Thousands (not1024s) of Instructions Per Second. Usage: rare.
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KISS Principle
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kit
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KIPS
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KISS Principle/kis' prin'si-pl/ n.
"Keep It Simple, Stupid". A maxim often invoked when discussing design to fend offcreeping featurismand control development complexity. Possibly related to themarketroidmaxim on sales presentations, "Keep It Short and Simple".
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kit
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klone
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KISS Principle
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kitn.
[Usenet; poss. fr.DECslang for a full software distribution, as opposed to a patch or upgrade] A source software distribution that has been packaged in such a way that it can (theoretically) be unpacked and installed according to a series of steps using only standard Unix tools, and entirely documented by some reasonable chain of references from the top-levelREADME file. The more general termdistributionmay imply that special tools or more stringent conditions on the host environment are required.
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klone
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kludge
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kit
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klone/klohn/ n.
Seeclone, sense 4.
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kludge
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kluge
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klone
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kludge1. /klooj/ n.
Incorrect (though regrettably common) spelling ofkluge(US). These two words have been confused in American usage since the early 1960s, and widely confounded in Great Britain since the end of World War II. 2. [TMRC] Acrockthat works. (A long-ago "Datamation" article by Jackson Granholme similarly said: "An ill-assorted collection of poorly matching parts, forming a distressing whole.") 3. v. To use a kludge to get around a problem. "I've kludged around it for now, but I'll fix it up properly later."
This word appears to have derived from Scots `kludge' or `kludgie' for a common toilet, via British military slang. It apparently became confused with U.S.klugeduring or after World War II; some Britons from that era use both words in definably different ways, butklugeis now uncommon in Great Britain. `Kludge' in Commonwealth hackish differs in meaning from `kluge' in that it lacks the positive senses; a kludge is something no Commonwealth hacker wants to be associated too closely with. Also, `kludge' is more widely known in British mainstream slang than `kluge' is in the U.S.
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kluge
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kluge around
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kluge/klooj/
[from the German `klug', clever; poss. related to Polish `klucz' (a key, a hint, a main point)] 1. n. A Rube Goldberg (or Heath Robinson) device, whether in hardware or software. 2. n. A clever programming trick intended to solve a particular nasty case in an expedient, if not clear, manner. Often used to repair bugs. Often involvesad-hockeryand verges on being acrock. 3. n. Something that works for the wrong reason. 4. vt. To insert a kluge into a program. "I've kluged this routine to get around that weird bug, but there's probably a better way." 5. [WPI] n. A feature that is implemented in arudemanner.
Nowadays this term is often encountered in the variant spelling `kludge'. Reports fromold farts are consistent that `kluge' was the original spelling, reported around computers as far back as the mid-1950s and, at that time, used exclusively ofhardwarekluges. In 1947, the "New York Folklore Quarterly" reported a classic shaggy-dog story `Murgatroyd the Kluge Maker' then current in the Armed Forces, in which a `kluge' was a complex and puzzling artifact with a trivial function. Other sources report that `kluge' was common Navy slang in the WWII era for any piece of electronics that worked well on shore but consistently failed at sea.
However, there is reason to believe this slang use may be a decade older. Several respondents have connected it to the brand name of a device called a "Kluge paper feeder", an adjunct to mechanical printing presses. Legend has it that the Kluge feeder was designed before small, cheap electric motors and control electronics; it relied on a fiendishly complex assortment of cams, belts, and linkages to both power and synchronize all its operations from one motive driveshaft. It was accordingly temperamental, subject to frequent breakdowns, and devilishly difficult to repair -- but oh, so clever! People who tell this story also aver that `Kluge' was the name of a design engineer.
There is in fact a Brandtjen & Kluge Inc., an old family business that manufactures printing equipment - interestingly, their name is pronounced /kloo'gee/! Henry Brandtjen, president of the firm, told me (ESR, 1994) that his company was co-founded by his father and an engineer named Kluge /kloo'gee/, who built and co-designed the original Kluge automatic feeder in 1919. Mr. Brandtjen claims, however, that this was asimpledevice (with only four cams); he says he has no idea how the myth of its complexity took hold.
TMRCand the MIT hacker culture of the early '60s seems to have developed in a milieu that remembered and still used some WWII military slang (see alsofoobar). It seems likely that `kluge' came to MIT via alumni of the many military electronics projects that had been located in Cambridge (many in MIT's venerable Building 20, in whichTMRCis also located) during the war.
The variant `kludge' was apparently popularized by theDatamationarticle mentioned above; it was titled "How to Design a Kludge" (February 1962, pp. 30, 31). This spelling was probably imported from Great Britain, wherekludgehas an independent history (though this fact was largely unknown to hackers on either side of the Atlantic before a mid-1993 debate in the Usenet groupalt.folklore.computersover the First and Second Edition versions of this entry; everybody used to thinkkludgewas just a mutation ofkluge). It now appears that the British, having forgotten the etymology of their own `kludge' when `kluge' crossed the Atlantic, repaid the U.S. by lobbing the `kludge' orthography in the other direction and confusing their American cousins' spelling!
The result of this history is a tangle. Many younger U.S. hackers pronounce the word as /klooj/ but spell it, incorrectly for its meaning and pronunciation, as `kludge'. (Phonetically, consider huge, refuge, centrifuge, and deluge as opposed to sludge, judge, budge, and fudge. Whatever its failings in other areas, English spelling is perfectly consistent about this distinction.) British hackers mostly learned /kluhj/ orally, use it in a restricted negative sense and are at least consistent. European hackers have mostly learned the word from written American sources and tend to pronounce it /kluhj/ but use the wider American meaning!
Some observers consider this mess appropriate in view of the word's meaning.