Dictionaries & Language/Dictionaries and Language (Chestnut CD-ROM) (1993).iso/gloss/jargn298/jargon-g.txt

Text File | 1991-09-07 | 37.7 KB | 724 lines

= G =
=====

G: [SI] pref.,suff. See {{quantifiers}}.

gabriel: /gay'bree-*l/ [for Dick Gabriel, SAIL LISP hacker and
   volleyball fanatic] n. An unnecessary (in the opinion of the
   opponent) stalling tactic, e.g., tying one's shoelaces or combing one's hair
   repeatedly, asking the time, etc.  Also used to refer to the
   perpetrator of such tactics.  Also, `pulling a Gabriel',
   `Gabriel mode'.

gag: vi. Equivalent to {choke}, but connotes more disgust. "Hey,
   this is FORTRAN code.  No wonder the C compiler gagged."  See also
   {barf}.

gang bang: n. The use of large numbers of loosely coupled
   programmers in an attempt to wedge a great many features into a
   product in a short time.  Though there have been memorable gang
   bangs (e.g., that over-the-weekend assembler port mentioned in
   Steven Levy's `Hackers'), most are perpetrated by large
   companies trying to meet deadlines and produce enormous buggy
   masses of code entirely lacking in {orthogonal}ity.  When
   market-driven managers make a list of all the features the
   competition has and assign one programmer to implement each, they
   often miss the importance of maintaining a coherent design.  See
   also {firefighting}, {Mongolian Hordes technique},
   {Conway's Law}.

garbage collect: vi. (also `garbage collection', n.) See {GC}.

garply: /gar'plee/ [Stanford] n. Another meta-syntactic variable (see
   {foo}); once popular among SAIL hackers.

gas: [as in `gas chamber'] 1. interj. 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. interj. A
   suggestion that someone or something ought to be flushed out of
   mercy.  "The system's getting {wedged} every few minutes.
   Gas!"  3. vt.  To {flush} (sense 1).  "You should gas that old
   crufty software."  4. [IBM] n. Dead space in nonsequentially
   organized files that was occupied by data that has been deleted;
   the compression operation that removes it is called `degassing' (by
   analogy, perhaps, with the use of the same term in vacuum
   technology). 5. [IBM] n.  Empty space on a disk that has been
   clandestinely allocated against future need.

gaseous: adj. Deserving of being {gas}sed.  Disseminated by
   Geoff Goodfellow while at SRI; became particularly popular after
   the Moscone-Milk killings in San Francisco, when it was learned
   that the defendant Dan White (a politician who had supported
   Proposition 7) would get the gas chamber under Proposition 7 if
   convicted of first-degree murder (he was eventually convicted of
   manslaughter).

GC: /G-C/ [from LISP terminology; `Garbage Collect']
   1. vt. To clean up and throw away useless things.  "I think I'll
   GC the top of my desk today."  When said of files, this is
   equivalent to {GFR}.  2. vt. To recycle, reclaim, or put to
   another use.  3. n. An instantiation of the garbage collector
   process.

   `Garbage collection' is computer-science jargon for a particular
   class of strategies for dynamically reallocating computer memory.
   One such strategy involves periodically scanning all the data in
   memory and determining what is no longer accessible; useless data
   items are then discarded so that the memory they occupy can be
   recycled and used for another purpose.  Implementations of the LISP
   language usually use garbage collection.

   In jargon, the full phrase is sometimes heard but the {abbrev} is
   more frequently used because it is shorter.  Note that there is an
   ambiguity in usage that has to be resolved by context: "I'm going
   to garbage-collect my desk" usually means to clean out the
   drawers, but it could also mean to throw away or recycle the desk
   itself.

GCOS:: /jee'kohs/ n. A {quick-and-dirty} {clone} of
   System/360 DOS that emerged from GE around 1970; originally called
   GECOS (the General Electric Comprehensive Operating System).  Later
   kluged to support primitive timesharing and transaction processing.
   After the buyout of GE's computer division by Honeywell, the name
   was changed to General Comprehensive Operating System (GCOS).
   Other OS groups at Honeywell began referring to it as `God's Chosen
   Operating System', allegedly in reaction to the GCOS crowd's
   uninformed and snotty attitude about the superiority of their
   product.  All this might be of zero interest, except for two facts:
   (1) The GCOS people won the political war, and this led in the
   orphaning and eventual death of Honeywell {{Multics}}, and
   (2) GECOS/GCOS left one permanent mark on UNIX.  Some early UNIX
   systems at Bell Labs were GCOS machines for print spooling and
   various other services; the field added to `/etc/passwd' to
   carry GCOS ID information was called the `GECOS field' and
   survives today as the `pw_gecos' member used for the user's
   full name and other human-ID information.  GCOS later played a
   major role in keeping Honeywell a dismal also-ran in the mainframe
   market, and was itself ditched for UNIX in the late 1980s when
   Honeywell retired its aging {big iron} designs.

GECOS:: /jee'kohs/ n. See {{GCOS}}.

gedanken: /g*-don'kn/ adj. Ungrounded; impractical; not
   well-thought-out; untried; untested.  `Gedanken' is a German word
   for `thought'.  A thought experiment is one you carry out in your
   head.  In physics, the term `gedanken experiment' is used to
   refer to an experiment that is impractical to carry out, but useful
   to consider because you can reason about it theoretically.  (A
   classic gedanken experiment of relativity theory involves thinking
   about a man in an elevator accelerating through space.)  Gedanken
   experiments are very useful in physics, but you have to be careful.
   It's too easy to idealize away some important aspect of the real world
   in contructing your `apparatus'.

   Among hackers, accordingly, the word has a pejorative connotation.
   It is said of a project, especially one in artificial intelligence
   research, that is written up in grand detail (typically as a Ph.D.
   thesis) without ever being implemented to any great extent.  Such a
   project is 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 an algorithm.  See
   also {AI-complete}, {DWIM}.

geef: v. [ostensibly from `gefingerpoken'] vt. Syn. {mung}.  See
   also {blinkenlights}.

geek out: vi. To temporarily enter techno-nerd mode while in a
   non-hackish context, for example at parties held near computer
   equipment.  Especially used when you need to do something highly
   technical and don't have time to explain: "Pardon me while I geek
   out for a moment."  See {computer geek}.

gen: /jen/ n.,v. Short for {generate}, used frequently in both spoken
   and written contexts.

gender mender: n. A cable connector shell with either two male or two
   female connectors on it, used to correct the mismatches that result
   when some {loser} didn't understand the RS232C specification and
   the distinction between DTE and DCE.  Used esp. for RS-232C
   parts in either the original D-25 or the IBM PC's bogus D-9 format.
   Also called `gender bender', `gender blender', `sex
   changer', and even `homosexual adapter'; however, there appears
   to be some confusion as to whether a `male homosexual adapter' has
   pins on both sides (is male) or sockets on both sides (connects two
   males).

General Public Virus: n. Pejorative name for some versions of the
   {GNU} project {copyleft} or General Public License (GPL), which
   requires that any tools or {app}s incorporating copylefted code
   must be source-distributed on the same counter-commercial terms as
   GNU stuff.  Thus it is alleged that the copyleft `infects' software
   generated with GNU tools, which may in turn infect other software
   that reuses any of its code.  The Free Software Foundation's
   official position as of January 1991 is that copyright law limits
   the scope of the GPL to "programs textually incorporating
   significant amounts of GNU code", and that the `infection' is not
   passed on to third parties unless actual GNU source is transmitted
   (as in, for example, use of the Bison parser skeleton).
   Nevertheless, widespread suspicion that the {copyleft} language
   is `boobytrapped' has caused many developers to avoid using GNU
   tools and the GPL.  Recent (July 1991) changes in the language of
   the version 2.00 language may eliminate this problem.

generate: vt. 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.  "The guy is
   rational most of the time, but mention nuclear energy around him
   and he'll generate {infinite} flamage."

gensym: /jen'sim/ [from MacLISP for `generated symbol'] 1. v.
   To invent a new name for something temporary, in such a way that
   the name is almost certainly not in conflict with one already in
   use.  2. n.  The resulting name.  The canonical form of a gensym is
   `Gnnnn' where nnnn represents a number; any LISP hacker would
   recognize G0093 (for example) as a gensym.  3. A freshly generated
   data structure with a gensymmed name.  These are useful for storing
   or uniquely identifying crufties (see {cruft}).

Get a life!: imp. Hacker-standard way of suggesting that the person
   to whom you are speaking has succumbed to terminal geekdom (see
   {computer geek}).  Often heard on {USENET}, esp. as a way of
   suggesting that the target is taking some obscure issue of
   {theology} too seriously.  This exhortation was popularized by
   William Shatner on a "Saturday Night Live" episode in a speech that
   ended "Get a *life*!", but some respondents believe it to
   have been in use before then.

Get a real computer!: imp. Typical hacker response to news that
   somebody is having trouble getting work done on a system that
   (a) is single-tasking, (b) has no hard disk, or (c) has an address
   space smaller than 4 megabytes.  This is as of mid-1991; 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
   generally considered `unreal' in a few years (GLS points out that
   they already are in some circles).  See {essentials}, {bitty
   box}, and {toy}.

GFR: /G-F-R/ vt. [ITS] From `Grim File Reaper', an ITS and Lisp
   Machine utility.  To remove a file or files according to some
   program-automated or semi-automatic manual procedure, especially
   one designed to reclaim mass storage space or reduce name-space
   clutter (the original GFR actually moved files to tape).  Often
   generalized to pieces of data below file level.  "I used to have
   his phone number, but I guess I {GFR}ed it."  See also
   {prowler}, {reaper}.  Compare {GC}, which discards only
   provably worthless stuff.

gig: /jig/ or /gig/ [SI] n. See {{quantifiers}}.

giga-: /ji'ga/ or /gi'ga/ [SI] pref. See {{quantifiers}}.

GIGO: /gi:'goh/ [acronym] 1. `Garbage In, Garbage Out' ---
   usually said in response to {luser}s 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.  2. `Garbage In, Gospel Out': this more recent
   expansion is a sardonic comment on the tendency human beings have
   to put excessive trust in `computerized' data.

gillion: /gil'y*n/ or /jil'y*n/ [formed from {giga-} by analogy
   with mega/million and tera/trillion] n. 10^9. Same as an
   American billion or a British `milliard'.  How one pronounces
   this depends on whether one speaks {giga-} with a hard or
   soft `g'.

GIPS: /gips/ or /jips/ [analogy with {MIPS}] n.
   Giga-Instructions per Second (also possibly `Gillions of
   Instructions per Second'; see {gillion}).  In 1991, this is used
   of only a handful of highly parallel machines, but this is expected
   to change.  Compare {KIPS}.

glark: /glark/ vt. To figure something out from context.  "The
   System III manuals are pretty poor, but you can generally glark the
   meaning from context."  Interestingly, the word was originally
   `glork'; the context was "This gubblick contains many nonsklarkish
   English flutzpahs, but the overall pluggandisp can be glorked [sic]
   from context" (David Moser, quoted by Douglas Hofstadter in his
   "Metamagical Themas" column in the January 1981 `Scientific
   American').  It is conjectured that hackish usage mutated the verb to
   `glark' because {glork} was already an established jargon
   term.  Compare {grok}, {zen}.

glass: [IBM] n. Synonym for {silicon}.

glass tty: /glas T-T-Y/ or /glas ti'tee/ n. A terminal that
   has a display screen but which, because of hardware or software
   limitations, behaves like a teletype or some other printing
   terminal, thereby combining the disadvantages of both: like a
   printing terminal, it can't do fancy display hacks, and like a
   display terminal, it doesn't produce hard copy.  An example is the
   early `dumb' version of Lear-Siegler ADM 3 (without cursor
   control).  See {tube}, {tty}.  See appendix A for an
   interesting true story about a glass tty.

glassfet: /glas'fet/ [by analogy with MOSFET, the acronym for
   `Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor Field-Effect Transistor'] n. Syn.
   {firebottle}, a humorous way to refer to a vacuum tube.

glitch: /glich/ [from German `glitschen' to slip, via Yiddish
   `glitshen', to slide or skid] 1. n. A sudden interruption in
   electric service, sanity, continuity, or program function.
   Sometimes recoverable.  An interruption in electric service is
   specifically called a `power glitch'.  This is of grave concern
   because it usually crashes all the computers.  In jargon, though, a
   hacker who got to the middle of a sentence and then forgot how he
   or she intended to complete it might say, "Sorry, I just
   glitched".  2. vi. To commit a glitch.  See {gritch}.  3. vt.
   [Stanford] To scroll a display screen, esp. several lines at a
   time.  {{WAITS}} terminals used to do this in order to avoid
   continuous scrolling, which is distracting to the eye.  4. obs.
   Same as {magic cookie}, sense 2.

   All these uses of `glitch' derive from the specific technical
   meaning the term has to hardware people.  If the inputs of a
   circuit change, and the outputs change to some {random} value for
   some very brief time before they settle down to the correct value,
   then that is called a glitch.  This may or may not be harmful,
   depending on what the circuit is connected to.  This term is
   techspeak, found in electronics texts.

glob: /glob/, *not* /glohb/ [UNIX] vt.,n. To expand special
   characters in a wildcarded name, or the act of so doing (the action
   is also called `globbing').  The UNIX conventions for filename
   wildcarding have become sufficiently pervasive that many hackers
   use some of them in written English, especially in email or news on
   technical topics.  Those commonly encountered include the following:

     *
          wildcard for any string (see also {UN*X})

     ?
          wildcard for any character (generally read this way only at the
          beginning or in the middle of a word)

     []
          delimits a wildcard matching any of the enclosed characters

     {}
          alternation of comma-separated alternatives; thus, `foo{baz,qux}'
          would be read as `foobaz' or `fooqux'

   Some examples: "He said his name was [KC]arl" (expresses
   ambiguity).  "I don't read talk.politics.*" (any of the
   talk.politics subgroups on {USENET}).  Other examples are given
   under the entry for {X}.  Compare {regexp}.

   Historical note: The jargon usage derives from `glob', the
   name of a subprogram that expanded wildcards in archaic pre-Bourne
   versions of the UNIX shell.

glork: /glork/ 1. interj. Term of mild surprise, usually tinged with
   outrage, as when one attempts to save the results of 2 hours of
   editing and finds that the system has just crashed.  2. Used as a
   name for just about anything.  See {foo}.  3. vt. Similar to
   {glitch}, but usually used reflexively.  "My program just glorked
   itself."  See also {glark}.

glue: n. Generic term for any interface logic or protocol that
   connects two component blocks.  For example,  {Blue
   Glue} is IBM's SNA protocol, and hardware designers call anything
   used to connect large VLSI's or circuit blocks `glue logic'.

gnarly: /nar'lee/ adj. Both {obscure} and {hairy} in the
   sense of complex.  "{Yow}! --- 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: `GNU's Not UNIX!',
   see {{recursive acronym}}] A UNIX-workalike development effort of
   the Free Software Foundation headed by Richard Stallman
   ([e-mail]).  GNU EMACS and the GNU C compiler, two tools
   designed for this project, have become very popular in hackerdom
   and elsewhere.  The GNU project was designed partly to proselytize
   for RMS's position that information is community property and all
   software source should be shared.  One of its slogans is "Help
   stamp out software hoarding!"  Though this remains controversial
   (because it implicitly denies any right of designers to own,
   assign, and sell the results of their labors), many hackers who
   disagree with RMS have nevertheless cooperated to produce large
   amounts of high-quality software for free redistribution under the
   Free Software Foundation's imprimatur.  See {EMACS},
   {copyleft}, {General Public Virus}.  2. Noted UNIX hacker
   John Gilmore ([e-mail]), founder of USENET's anarchic alt.*
   hierarchy.

GNUMACS: /gnoo'maks/ [contraction of `GNU EMACS'] Often-heard
   abbreviated name for the {GNU} project's flagship tool, {EMACS}.
   Used esp. in contrast with {GOSMACS}.

go flatline: [from cyberpunk SF, refers to flattening of EEG traces
   upon brain-death] vi., 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.  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. Of a video tube, to fail by
   losing vertical scan, so all one sees is a bright horizontal line
   bisecting the screen.

go root: [UNIX] vi. To temporarily enter {root mode} in order
   to perform a privileged operation.  This use is deprecated in
   Australia, where v. `root' refers to animal sex.

go-faster stripes: [UK] Syn. {chrome}.

gobble: vt. To consume or to obtain.  The phrase `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 also {snarf}.

Godzillagram: /god-zil'*-gram/ n. [from Japan's national hero]
   1. A network packet that in theory is a broadcast to every machine
   in the universe.  The typical case of this is an IP datagram whose
   destination IP address is [255.255.255.255].  Fortunately, few
   gateways are foolish enough to attempt to implement this!  2. A
   network packet of maximum size.  An IP Godzillagram has
   65,536 octets.

golden: adj. [prob. from folklore's `golden egg'] When used to
   describe a magnetic medium (e.g., `golden disk', `golden tape'),
   describes one containing a tested, up-to-spec, ready-to-ship
   software version.  Compare {platinum-iridium}.

golf-ball printer: n. The IBM 2741, a slow but letter-quality
   printing device and terminal based on the IBM Selectric typewriter.
   The `golf ball' was a round object bearing reversed embossed
   images of 88 different characters arranged on four meridians of
   latitude; one could change the font by swapping in a different golf
   ball.  This was the technology that enabled APL to use a
   non-EBCDIC, non-ASCII, and in fact completely non-standard
   character set.  This put it 10 years ahead of its time --- where it
   stayed, firmly rooted, for the next 20, until character displays
   gave way to programmable bit-mapped devices with the flexibility to
   support other character sets.

gonk: /gonk/ vt.,n. 1. To prevaricate or to embellish the truth
   beyond any reasonable recognition.  It is alleged that in German
   the term is (mythically) `gonken'; in Spanish the verb becomes
   `gonkar'.  "You're gonking me.  That story you just told me is a
   bunch of gonk."  In German, for example, "Du gonkst mir" (You're
   pulling my leg).  See also {gonkulator}.  2. [British] To grab some
   sleep at an odd time; compare {gronk out}.

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}.

gonzo: /gon'zoh/ [from Hunter S. Thompson] adj. Overwhelming;
   outrageous; over the top; very large, esp. used of collections of
   source code, source files, or individual functions.  Has some of the
   connotations of {moby} and {hairy}, but without the
   implication of obscurity or complexity.

Good Thing: n.,adj. Often capitalized; always pronounced as if
   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 that 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}.

gorilla arm: n. The side-effect that destroyed touch-screens as a
   mainstream input technology despite a promising start in the early
   1980s.  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 selections, the arm begins to feel sore, cramped, and
   oversized; hence `gorilla arm'.  This is now considered a classic
   cautionary tale to human-factors designers; "Remember the gorilla
   arm!" is shorthand for "How is this going to fly in *real*
   use?".

gorp: /gorp/ [CMU: perhaps from the canonical hiker's food, Good
   Old Raisins and Peanuts] Another metasyntactic variable, like
   {foo} and {bar}.

GOSMACS: /goz'maks/ [contraction of `Gosling EMACS'] n. The first
   {EMACS}-in-C implementation, predating but now largely eclipsed by
   {GNUMACS}.  Originally freeware; a commercial version is now
   modestly popular as `UniPress EMACS'.  The author (James Gosling)
   went on to invent {NeWS}.

Gosperism: /gos'p*r-izm/ A hack, invention, or saying by
   arch-hacker R. William (Bill) Gosper.  This notion merits its own
   term because there are so many of them.  Many of the entries in
   {HAKMEM} are Gosperisms; see also {life}.

gotcha: n. A {misfeature} of a system, especially a programming
   language or environment, that tends to breed bugs or mistakes because
   it behaves in an unexpected way.  For example, a classic gotcha in {C}
   is the fact that `if (a=b) {code;}' is syntactically valid
   and sometimes even correct.  It puts the value of `b' into `a'
   and then executes `code' if `a' is non-zero.  What the
   programmer probably meant was `if (a==b) {code;}',
   which executes `code' if `a' and `b' are equal.

GPL: /G-P-L/ n. Abbrev. for `General Public License' in
   widespread use; see {copyleft}.

GPV: /G-P-V/ n. Abbrev. for {General Public Virus} in
   widespread use.

grault: /grawlt/ n. Yet another meta-syntactic variable, invented by
   Mike Gallaher and propagated by the {GOSMACS} documentation.  See
   {corge}.

gray goo: n. A hypothetical substance composed of {sagan}s of
   sub-micron-sized 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 the simplest of the
   {{nanotechnology}} disaster scenarios, easily refuted by arguments
   from energy requirements and elemental abundances.  Compare {blue
   goo}.

Great Renaming: n. The {flag day} on which all of the non-local
   groups on the {USENET} had their names changed from the net.-
   format to the current multiple-hierarchies scheme.

Great Runes: n. Uppercase-only text or display messages.  Some
   archaic operating systems still emit these.  See also {runes},
   {smash case}, {fold case}.

   Decades ago, back in the days when it was the sole supplier of
   long-distance hardcopy transmittal devices, the Teletype
   Corporation was faced with a major design choice.  To shorten code
   lengths and cut complexity in the printing mechanism, it had been
   decided that teletypes would use a monocase font, either ALL UPPER
   or all lower.  The question was, which one to choose.  A study was
   conducted on readability under various conditions of bad ribbon,
   worn print hammers, etc.  Lowercase won; it is less dense and has
   more distinctive letterforms, and is thus much easier to read both
   under ideal conditions and when the letters are mangled or partly
   obscured.  The results were filtered up through {management}.
   The chairman of Teletype killed the proposal because it failed one
   incredibly important criterion:

     "It would be impossible to spell the name of the Deity correctly."

   In this way (or so, at least, hacker folklore has it) superstition
   triumphed over utility.  Teletypes were the major input devices on
   most early computers, and terminal manufacturers looking for
   corners to cut naturally followed suit until well into the 1970s.
   Thus, that one bad call stuck us with Great Runes for thirty years.

great-wall: [from SF fandom] vi.,n. A mass expedition to an
   oriental restaurant, esp. one where food is served family-style
   and shared.  There is a common heuristic about the amount of food
   to order, expressed as "Get N - 1 entrees"; the value of N,
   which is the number of people in the group, can be inferred from
   context (see {N}).  See {{oriental food}}, {ravs},
   {stir-fried random}.

Green Book: n. 1. One of the three standard PostScript references:
   `PostScript Language Program Design', bylined `Adobe Systems'
   (Addison-Wesley, 1988; QA76.73.P67P66 ISBN; 0-201-14396-8); see
   also {Red Book}, {Blue Book}).  2. Informal name for one of
   the three standard references on SmallTalk: `Smalltalk-80:
   Bits of History, Words of Advice', by Glenn Krasner
   (Addison-Wesley, 1983; QA76.8.S635S58; ISBN 0-201-11669-3) (this,
   too, is associated with blue and red books).  3. The `X/Open
   Compatibility Guide'.  Defines an international standard {{UNIX}}
   environment that is a proper superset of POSIX/SVID; also includes
   descriptions of a standard utility toolkit, systems administrations
   features, and the like.  This grimoire is taken with particular
   seriousness in Europe.  See {Purple Book}.  4. The IEEE 1003.1
   POSIX Operating Systems Interface standard has been dubbed "The
   Ugly Green Book".  5. Any of the 1992 standards which will be
   issued by the CCITT's tenth plenary assembly.  Until now, these
   have changed color each review cycle (1984 was {Red Book}, 1988
   {Blue Book}); however, it is rumored that this convention is
   going to be dropped before 1992.  These include, among other
   things, the X.400 email standard and the Group 1 through 4 fax
   standards.  See also {{book titles}}.

green bytes: n. 1. Meta-information embedded in a file, such as
   the length of the file or its name; as opposed to keeping such
   information in a separate description file or record.  The term
   comes from an IBM user's group meeting (ca. 1962) at which these
   two approaches were being debated and the diagram of the file on
   the blackboard had the `green bytes' drawn in green.  2. By
   extension, the non-data bits in any self-describing format.  "A
   GIF file contains, among other things, green bytes describing the
   packing method for the image." Compare {out-of-band},
   {zigamorph}, {fence} (sense 1).

green card: n. [after the `IBM System/360 Reference Data'
   card] This is used for any summary of an assembly language, even if
   the color is not green.  Less frequently used now because of the
   decrease in the use of assembly language.  "I'll go get my green
   card so I can check the addressing mode for that instruction."
   Some green cards are actually booklets.

   The original green card became a yellow card when the System/370
   was introduced, and later a yellow booklet.  An anecdote from IBM
   refers to a scene that took place in a programmers' terminal room
   at Yorktown in 1978.  A luser overheard one of the programmers ask
   another "Do you have a green card?"  The other grunted and
   passed the first a thick yellow booklet.  At this point the luser
   turned a delicate shade of olive and rapidly left the room, never
   to return.  See also {card}.

green lightning: [IBM] n. 1. Apparently random flashing streaks on
   the face of 3278-9 terminals while a new symbol set is being
   downloaded.  This hardware bug was left deliberately unfixed, as
   some genius within IBM suggested it would let the user know that
   `something is happening'.  That, it certainly does.  Later
   microprocessor-driven IBM color graphics displays were actually
   *programmed* to produce green lightning!  2. [proposed] Any
   bug perverted into an alleged feature by adroit rationalization or
   marketing.  "Motorola calls the CISC cruft in the 88000
   architecture `compatibility logic', but I call it green
   lightning".  See also {feature}.

green machine: n. A computer or peripheral device that has been
   designed and built to military specifications for field equipment
   (that is, to withstand mechanical shock, extremes of temperature
   and humidity, and so forth).  Comes from the olive-drab `uniform'
   paint used for military equipment.

Green's Theorem: [TMRC] prov. For any story, in any group of people
   there will be at least one person who has not heard the story.
   [The name of this theorem is a play on a fundamental theorem in
   calculus. --- ESR]

grep: /grep/ [from the qed/ed editor idiom g/re/p , where
   re stands for a regular expression, to Globally search for the
   Regular Expression and Print the lines containing matches to it,
   via {{UNIX}} `grep(1)'] vt. 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?"  See also {vgrep}.

grind: vt. 1. [MIT and Berkeley] To format code, especially LISP
   code, by indenting lines so that it looks pretty.  This usage was
   associated with the MacLISP community and is now rare;
   {prettyprint} was and is the generic term for such
   operations.  2. [UNIX] To generate the formatted version of a
   document from the nroff, troff, TeX, or Scribe source.  The BSD
   program `vgrind(1)' grinds code for printing on a Versatec
   bitmapped printer.  3. To run seemingly interminably, esp. (but
   not necessarily) if performing some tedious and inherently useless
   task.  Similar to {crunch} or {grovel}.  Grinding has a
   connotation of using a lot of CPU time, but it is possible to grind
   a disk, network, etc.  See also {hog}.  4. To make the whole
   system slow.  "Troff really grinds a PDP-11."  5. `grind grind'
   excl. Roughly, "Isn't the machine slow today!"

grind 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} and {wugga wugga}.

   Historical note: At least one real machine actually had a grind
   crank --- the R1, a research machine built toward the end of the
   days of the great vacuum tube computers, in 1959.  R1 (also known as
   `The Rice Institute Computer' (TRIC) and later as `The Rice
   University Computer' (TRUC)) had a single-step/free-run switch for
   use when debugging programs.  Since single-stepping through a large
   program was rather tedious, there was also a crank with a cam and
   gear arrangement that repeatedly pushed the single-step button.
   This allowed one to `crank' through a lot of code, then slow down
   to single-step for a bit when you got near the code of interest, poke
   at some registers using the console typewriter, and then keep on
   cranking.

gritch: /grich/ 1. n. A complaint (often caused by a {glitch}).
   2. vi. To complain.  Often verb-doubled: "Gritch gritch".  3. A
   synonym for {glitch} (as verb or noun).

grok: /grok/, var. /grohk/ [from the novel `Stranger in
   a Strange Land', by Robert A. Heinlein, where it is a Martian word
   meaning literally `to drink' and metaphorically `to be one
   with'] vt. 1. To understand, usually in a global sense.  Connotes
   intimate and exhaustive knowledge.  Contrast {zen}, similar
   supernal understanding as a single brief flash.  See also
   {glark}.  2. Used of programs, may connote merely sufficient
   understanding.  "Almost all C compilers grok the `void' type
   these days."

gronk: /gronk/ [popularized by Johnny Hart's comic strip
   "B.C." but the word apparently predates that] vt. 1. To
   clear the state of a wedged device and restart it.  More severe
   than `to {frob}'.  2. [TMRC] To cut, sever, smash, or
   similarly disable.  3. The sound made by many 3.5-inch diskette
   drives.  In particular, the microfloppies on a Commodore Amiga go
   "grink, gronk".

gronk out: vi. To cease functioning.  Of people, to go home and go
   to sleep.  "I guess I'll gronk out now; see you all tomorrow."

gronked: adj. 1. Broken.  "The teletype scanner was gronked, so
   we took the system down."  2. Of people, the condition of feeling
   very tired or (less commonly) sick.  "I've been chasing that bug
   for 17 hours now and I am thoroughly gronked!"  Compare
   {broken}, which means about the same as {gronk} used of
   hardware, but connotes depression or mental/emotional problems in
   people.

grovel: vi. 1. To work interminably and without apparent progress.
   Often used transitively with `over' or `through'.  "The file
   scavenger has been groveling through the file directories for 10
   minutes now."  Compare {grind} and {crunch}.  Emphatic form:
   `grovel obscenely'.  2. To examine minutely or in complete detail.
   "The compiler grovels over the entire source program before
   beginning to translate it."  "I grovelled through all the
   documentation, but I still couldn't find the command I wanted."

grunge: /gruhnj/ n. 1. That which is grungy, or that which makes
   it so.  2. [Cambridge] Code which is inaccessible due to changes in
   other parts of the program.  The preferred term in North America is
   {dead code}.

gubbish: /guhb'*sh/ [a portmanteau of `garbage' and `rubbish'?]
   n. Garbage; crap; nonsense.  "What is all this gubbish?"  The
   opposite portmanteau `rubbage' is also reported.

guiltware: /gilt'weir/ n. 1. A piece of {freeware} decorated
   with a message telling one how long and hard the author worked on
   it and intimating that one is a no-good freeloader if one does not
   immediately send the poor suffering martyr gobs of money.
   2. {Shareware} that works.

gumby: /guhm'bee/ [from a class of Monty Python characters, poss.
   themselves named after the 1960s claymation character] n. An act of
   minor but conspicuous stupidity, often in `gumby maneuver' or
   `pull a gumby'.

gun: [ITS: from the `:GUN' command] vt. 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}.

gunch: /guhnch/ [TMRC] vt. To push, prod, or poke at a device
   that has almost produced the desired result.  Implies a threat to
   {mung}.

gurfle: /ger'fl/ interj. An expression of shocked disbelief.  "He
   said we have to recode this thing in FORTRAN by next week.
   Gurfle!"  Compare {weeble}.

guru: n. 1. [UNIX] An expert.  Implies not only {wizard} skill
   but also 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'.  See {source of all good bits}.  2. Amiga
   equivalent of `panic' in UNIX.  When the system crashes, a
   cryptic message "GURU MEDITATION #XXXXXXXX.YYYYYYYY" appears,
   indicating what the problem was.  An Amiga guru can figure things
   out from the numbers.  Generally a {guru} event must be followed
   by a {Vulcan nerve pinch}.