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frob/frob/ 1. n.
[MIT; very common] TheTMRCdefinition was "FROB = a protruding arm or trunnion"; by metaphoric extension, a `frob' is any random small thing; an object that you can comfortably hold in one hand; something you can frob (sense 2). Seefrobnitz. 2. vt. Abbreviated form offrobnicate. 3. [from theMUDworld] A command on some MUDs that changes a player's experience level (this can be used to make wizards); also, to requestwizardprivileges on the `professional courtesy' grounds that one is a wizard elsewhere. The command is actually `frobnicate' but is universally abbreviated to the shorter form.
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frobnicate/frob'ni-kayt/ vt.
[Poss. derived fromfrobnitz, and usually abbreviated tofrob, but `frobnicate' is recognized as the official full form.] To manipulate or adjust, to tweak. One frequently frobs bits or other 2-state devices. Thus: "Please frob the light switch" (that is, flip it), but also "Stop frobbing that clasp; you'll break it". One also sees the construction `to frob a frob'. Seetweakandtwiddle.
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. The variant `frobnosticate' has been recently reported.
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frobnitz/frob'nits/, pl. `frobnitzem' /frob'nit-zm/ or `frobni' /frob'ni:/ n.
[TMRC] An unspecified physical object, a widget. Also refers to electronic black boxes. This rare form is usually abbreviated to `frotz', or more commonly tofrob. Also used are `frobnule' (/frob'n[y]ool/) and `frobule' (/frob'yool/). Starting perhaps in 1979, `frobozz' /fr*-boz'/ (plural: `frobbotzim' /fr*-bot'zm/) has also become very popular, largely through its exposure as a name viaZork. These variants can also be applied to nonphysical objects, such as data structures.
Pete Samson, compiler of the originalTMRClexicon, adds, "Under the TMRC [railroad] layout were many storage boxes, managed (in 1958) by David R. Sawyer. Several had fanciful designations written on them, such as `Frobnitz Coil Oil'. Perhaps DRS intended Frobnitz to be a proper name, but the name was quickly taken for the thing". This was almost certainly the origin of the term.
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frogalt. `phrog'
1. interj. Term of disgust (we seem to have a lot of them). 2. Used as a name for just about anything. Seefoo. 3. n. Of things, a crock. 4. n. Of people, somewhere in between a turkey and a toad. 5. `froggy': adj. Similar tobagbiting, but milder. "This froggy program is taking forever to run!"
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frogging[University of Waterloo] v.
1. Partial corruption of a text file or input stream by some bug or consistent glitch, as opposed to random events like line noise or media failures. Might occur, for example, if one bit of each incoming character on a tty were stuck, so that some characters were correct and others were not. Seeterminakfor a historical example and comparedread high-bit disease. 2. By extension, accidental display of text in a mode where the output device emits special symbols or mnemonics rather than conventional ASCII. This often happens, for example, when using a terminal or comm program on a device like an IBM PC with a special `high-half' character set and with the bit-parity assumption wrong. A hacker sufficiently familiar with ASCII bit patterns might be able to read the display anyway.
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front endn.
1. An intermediary computer that does set-up and filtering for another (usually more powerful but less friendly) machine (a `back end'). 2. What you're talking to when you have a conversation with someone who is making replies without paying attention. "Look at the dancing elephants!" "Uh-huh." "Do you know what I just said?" "Sorry, you were talking to the front end." 3. Software that provides an interface to another program `behind' it, which may not be as user-friendly. Probably from analogy with hardware front-ends (see sense 1) that interfaced with mainframes.
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frotz/frots/
1. n. Seefrobnitz. 2. `mumble frotz': An interjection of mildest disgust.
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frotzed/frotst/ adj.
downbecause of hardware problems. Comparefried. A machine that is merely frotzed may be fixable without replacing parts, but a fried machine is more seriously damaged.
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frowneyn.
(alt. `frowney face') Seeemoticon.
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FRS// n.,obs.
Abbreviation for "Freely Redistributable Software" which entered general use on the Internet in 1995 after years of low-level confusion over what exactly to call software written to be passed around and shared (contending terms includingfreeware,shareware, and `sourceware' were never universally felt to be satisfactory for various subtle reasons). The first formal conference on freely redistributable software was held in Cambridge, Massachussetts, in February 1996 (sponsored by the Free Software Foundation). The conference organizers used the FRS abbreviation heavily in its calls for papers and other literature during 1995. The term was in steady though not common use until 1998 and the invention ofopen source.
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fry
1. vi. To fail. Said especially of smoke-producing hardware failures. More generally, to become non-working. Usage: never said of software, only of hardware and humans. Seefried,magic smoke. 2. vt. To cause to fail; toroach,toast, orhosea piece of hardware. Never used of software or humans, but comparefried.
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fscking/fus'-king/ or /eff'-seek-ing/ adj.
[Usenet; common] Fucking, in the expletive sense (it refers to the Unix filesystem-repair command fsck(1), of which it can be said that if you have to use it at all you are having a bad day). Originated onscary devil monasteryand thebofh.netnewsgroups, but became much more widespread following the passage ofCDA. Also occasionally seen in the variant "What the fsck?"
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FSF/F-S-F/ abbrev.
Common abbreviation (both spoken and written) for the name of the Free Software Foundation, a nonprofit educational association formed to support theGNUproject.
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FTP/F-T-P/,not/fit'ip/
1. [techspeak] n. The File Transfer Protocol for transmitting files between systems on the Internet. 2. vt. Tobeama file using the File Transfer Protocol. 3. Sometimes used as a generic even for file transfers not usingFTP. "Lemme get a copy of "Wuthering Heights" ftp'd from uunet."
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-fu
[common; generalized from `kung-fu'] Combining form denoting expert practice of a skill. "That's going to take some serious code-fu." First sighted in connection with the GIMP's remote-scripting facility, script-fu, in 1998.
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FUBARn.
The Failed UniBus Address Register in a VAX. A good example of how jargon can occasionally be snuck past thesuits; seefoobar, andfoofor a fuller etymology.
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fuck me harderexcl.
Sometimes uttered in response to egregious misbehavior, esp. in software, and esp. of misbehaviors which seem unfairly persistent (as though designed in by the imp of the perverse). Often theatrically elaborated: "Aiighhh! Fuck me with a piledriver and 16 feet of curare-tipped wrought-iron fenceand no lubricants!" The phrase is sometimes heard abbreviated `FMH' in polite company.
[This entry is an extreme example of the hackish habit of coining elaborate and evocative terms for lossage. Here we see a quite self-conscious parody of mainstream expletives that has become a running gag in part of the hacker culture; it illustrates the hackish tendency to turn any situation, even one of extreme frustration, into an intellectual game (the point being, in this case, to creatively produce a long-winded description of the most anatomically absurd mental image possible -- the short forms implicitly allude to all the ridiculous long forms ever spoken). Scatological language is actually relatively uncommon among hackers, and there was some controversy over whether this entry ought to be included at all. As it reflects a live usage recognizably peculiar to the hacker culture, we feel it is in the hackish spirit of truthfulness and opposition to all forms of censorship to record it here. --ESR & GLS]
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FUD/fuhd/ n.
Defined by Gene Amdahl after he left IBM to found his own company: "FUD is the fear, uncertainty, and doubt that IBM sales people instill in the minds of potential customers who might be considering [Amdahl] products." The idea, of course, was to persuade them to go with safe IBM gear rather than with competitors' equipment. This implicit coercion was traditionally accomplished by promising that Good Things would happen to people who stuck with IBM, but Dark Shadows loomed over the future of competitors' equipment or software. SeeIBM. After 1990 the term FUD was associated increasingly frequently withMicrosoft, and has become generalized to refer to any kind of disinformation used as a competitive weapon.
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FUD wars/fuhd worz/ n.
[fromFUD] Political posturing engaged in by hardware and software vendors ostensibly committed to standardization but actually willing to fragment the market to protect their own shares. The Unix International vs. OSF conflict about Unix standards was one outstanding example; Microsoft vs. Netscape vs. W3C about HTML standards is another.
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fudge
1. vt. 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 -- I'll fix it later." 2. n. The resulting code.
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fudge factorn.
[common] A value or parameter that is varied in an ad hoc way to produce the desired result. The terms `tolerance' andslopare also used, though these usually indicate a one-sided leeway, such as a buffer that 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. A good example is the `fuzz' typically allowed in floating-point calculations: two numbers being compared for equality must be allowed to differ by a small amount; if that amount is too small, a computation may never terminate, while if it is too large, results will be needlessly inaccurate. Fudge factors are frequently adjusted incorrectly by programmers who don't fully understand their import. See alsocoefficient of X.
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fuel upvi.
To eat or drink hurriedly in order to get back to hacking. "Food-p?" "Yeah, let's fuel up." "Time for agreat-wall!" See alsooriental food.
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Full Montyn.
Seemonty, sense 2.
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fumn.
[XEROX PARC] At PARC, often the third of the standardmetasyntactic variables (afterfooandbar). Competes withbaz, which is more common outside PARC.
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functinon.
[uncommon, U.K.; originally a serendipitous typo in 1994] A pointer to a function in C and C++. By association with sub-atomic particles such as the neutrino, it accurately conveys an impression of smallness (one pointer is four bytes on most systems) and speed (hackers can and do use arrays of functinos to replace a switch() statement).
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funkyadj.
Said of something that 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.TECOand 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."
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funny moneyn.
1. Notional `dollar' units of computing time and/or storage handed to students at the beginning of a computer course; also called `play money' or `purple money' (in implicit opposition to real or `green' money). In New Zealand and Germany the odd usage `paper money' has been recorded; in Germany, the particularly amusing synonym `transfer ruble' commemmorates the funny money used for trade between COMECON countries back when the Soviet Bloc still existed. When your funny money ran out, your account froze and you needed to go to a professor to get more. Fortunately, the plunging cost of timesharing cycles has made this less common. The amounts allocated were almost invariably too small, even for the non-hackers who wanted to slide by with minimum work. In extreme cases, the practice led to small-scale black markets in bootlegged computer accounts. 2. By extension, phantom money or quantity tickets of any kind used as a resource-allocation hack within a system. Antonym: `real money'.