The New Hacker's Dictionary
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Node:prowler, Next:[10676]pseudo, Previous:[10677]provocative maintenance, Up:[10678]= P =
prowler n.
[Unix] A [10679]daemon that is run periodically (typically once a week) to seek out and erase [10680]core files, truncate administrative logfiles, nuke lost+found directories, and otherwise clean up the [10681]cruft that tends to pile up in the corners of a file system. See also [10682]GFR, [10683]reaper, [10684]skulker.
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Node:pseudo, Next:[10685]pseudoprime, Previous:[10686]prowler,
Up:[10687]= P =
pseudo /soo'doh/ n.
[Usenet: truncation of `pseudonym'] 1. An electronic-mail or [10688]Usenet persona adopted by a human for amusement value or as a means of avoiding negative repercussions of one's net.behavior; a `nom de Usenet', often associated with forged postings designed to conceal message origins. Perhaps the best-known and funniest hoax of this type is [10689]B1FF. See also [10690]tentacle. 2. Notionally, a [10691]flamage-generating AI program simulating a Usenet user. Many flamers have been accused of actually being such entities, despite the fact that no AI program of the required sophistication yet exists. However, in 1989 there was a famous series of forged postings that used a phrase-frequency-based travesty generator to simulate the styles of several well-known flamers; it was based on large samples of their back postings (compare [10692]Dissociated Press). A significant number of people were fooled by the forgeries, and the debate over their authenticity was settled only when the perpetrator came forward to publicly admit the hoax.
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Node:pseudoprime, Next:[10693]pseudosuit, Previous:[10694]pseudo,
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pseudoprime n.
A backgammon prime (six consecutive occupied points) with one point missing. This term is an esoteric pun derived from number theory: a number that passes a certain kind of "primality test" may be called a `pseudoprime' (all primes pass any such test, but so do some composite numbers), and any number that passes several is, in some sense, almost certainly prime. The hacker backgammon usage stems from the idea that a pseudoprime is almost as good as a prime: it will do the same job unless you are unlucky.
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Node:pseudosuit, Next:[10696]psychedelicware,
Previous:[10697]pseudoprime, Up:[10698]= P =
pseudosuit /soo'doh-s[y]oot`/ n.
A [10699]suit wannabee; a hacker who has decided that he wants to be in management or administration and begins wearing ties, sport coats, and (shudder!) suits voluntarily. It's his funeral. See also [10700]lobotomy.
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Node:psychedelicware, Next:[10701]psyton, Previous:[10702]pseudosuit,
Up:[10703]= P =
psychedelicware /si:`k*-del'-ik-weir/ n.
[UK] Syn. [10704]display hack. See also [10705]smoking clover.
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Node:psyton, Next:[10706]pubic directory,
Previous:[10707]psychedelicware, Up:[10708]= P =
psyton /si:'ton/ n.
[TMRC] The elementary particle carrying the sinister force. The probability of a process losing is proportional to the number of psytons falling on it. Psytons are generated by observers, which is why demos are more likely to fail when lots of people are watching. [This term appears to have been largely superseded by [10709]bogon; see also [10710]quantum bogodynamics. --ESR]
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Node:pubic directory, Next:[10711]puff, Previous:[10712]psyton, Up:[10713]= P =
pubic directory /pyoob'ik d*-rek't*-ree/) n.
[NYU] (also `pube directory' /pyoob' d*-rek't*-ree/) The `pub' (public) directory on a machine that allows [10714]FTP access. So called because it is the default location for [10715]SEX (sense 1). "I'll have the source in the pube directory by Friday."
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Node:puff, Next:[10716]pumpkin holder, Previous:[10717]pubic directory, Up:[10718]= P =
puff vt.
To decompress data that has been crunched by Huffman coding. At least one widely distributed Huffman decoder program was actually named `PUFF', but these days it is usually packaged with the encoder. Oppose
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[10719]huff, see [10720]inflate.
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Node:pumpkin holder, Next:[10721]pumpking, Previous:[10722]puff, Up:[10723]= P =
pumpkin holder n.
See [10724]patch pumpkin.
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Node:pumpking, Next:[10725]punched card, Previous:[10726]pumpkin holder, Up:[10727]= P =
pumpking n.
Syn. for [10728]pumpkin holder; see [10729]patch pumpkin.
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Node:punched card, Next:[10730]punt, Previous:[10731]pumpking, Up:[10732]= P =
punched card n.obs.
[techspeak] (alt. `punch card') The signature medium of computing's [10733]Stone Age, now obsolescent outside of some IBM shops. The punched card actually predated computers considerably, originating in 1801 as a control device for mechanical looms. The version patented by Hollerith and used with mechanical tabulating machines in the 1890 U.S. Census was a piece of cardboard about 90 mm by 215 mm. There is a widespread myth that it was designed to fit in the currency trays used for that era's larger dollar bills, but recent investigations have falsified this.
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IBM (which originated as a tabulating-machine manufacturer) married the punched card to computers, encoding binary information as patterns of small rectangular holes; one character per column, 80 columns per card. Other coding schemes, sizes of card, and hole shapes were tried at various times.
The 80-column width of most character terminals is a legacy of the IBM punched card; so is the size of the quick-reference cards distributed with many varieties of computers even today. See [10734]chad, [10735]chad box, [10736]eighty-column mind, [10737]green card, [10738]dusty deck, [10739]lace card, [10740]card walloper.
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Node:punt, Next:[10741]Purple Book, Previous:[10742]punched card, Up:[10743]= P =
punt v.
[from the punch line of an old joke referring to American football: "Drop back 15 yards and punt!"] 1. To give up, typically without any intention of retrying. "Let's punt the movie tonight." "I was going to hack all night to get this feature in, but I decided to punt" may mean that you've decided not to stay up all night, and may also mean you're not ever even going to put in the feature. 2. More specifically, to give up on figuring out what the [10744]Right Thing is and resort to an inefficient hack. 3. A design decision to defer solving a problem, typically because one cannot define what is desirable sufficiently well to frame an algorithmic solution. "No way to know what the right form to dump the graph in is -- we'll punt that for now." 4. To hand a tricky implementation problem off to some other section of the design. "It's too hard to get the compiler to do that; let's punt to the runtime system." 5. To knock someone off an Internet or chat connection; a `punter' thus, is a person or program that does this.
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Node:Purple Book, Next:[10745]purple wire, Previous:[10746]punt, Up:[10747]= P =
Purple Book n.
1. The "System V Interface Definition". The covers of the first editions were an amazingly nauseating shade of off-lavender. 2. Syn. [10748]Wizard Book. Donald Lewine's "POSIX Programmer's Guide" (O'Reilly, 1991, ISBN 0-937175-73-0). See also [10749]book titles.
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Node:purple wire, Next:[10750]push, Previous:[10751]Purple Book, Up:[10752]= P =
purple wire n.
[IBM] Wire installed by Field Engineers to work around problems discovered during testing or debugging. These are called `purple wires' even when (as is frequently the case) their actual physical color is yellow....
Compare [10753]blue wire, [10754]yellow wire, and [10755]red wire.
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Node:push, Next:[10756]Python, Previous:[10757]purple wire, Up:[10758]= P =
push
[from the operation that puts the current information on a stack, and the fact that procedure return addresses are saved on a stack] (Also PUSH /push/ or PUSHJ /push'J/, the latter based on the PDP-10 procedure call instruction.) 1. To put something onto a [10759]stack or [10760]PDL. If one says that something has been pushed onto one's stack, it means that the Damoclean list of things hanging over ones's head has grown longer and heavier yet. This may also imply that one will deal with it before other pending items;
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otherwise one might say that the thing was `added to my queue'. 2. vi. To enter upon a digression, to save the current discussion for later. Antonym of [10761]pop; see also [10762]stack, [10763]PDL.
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Node:Python, Next:[10764]quad, Previous:[10765]push, Up:[10766]= P =
Python /pi:'thon/
In the words of its author, "the other scripting language" (other than [10767]Perl, that is). Python's design is notably clean, elegant, and well thought through; it tends to attract the sort of programmers who find Perl grubby and exiguous. Python's relationship with Perl is rather like the [10768]BSD community's relationship to [10769]Linux - it's the smaller party in a (usually friendly) rivalry, but the average quality of its developers is generally conceded to be rather higher than in the larger community it competes with. There's a Python resource page at [10770]http://www.python.org. See also [10771]Guido.
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Node:= Q =, Next:[10772]= R =, Previous:[10773]= P =, Up:[10774]The Jargon Lexicon
= Q =
*[10775]quad:
*[10776]quadruple bucky:
*[10777]quantifiers:
*[10778]quantum bogodynamics:
* [10779]quarter:
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*[10780]ques:
*[10781]quick-and-dirty:
*[10782]quine:
*[10783]quote chapter and verse:
*[10784]quotient:
*[10785]quux:
*[10786]qux:
*[10787]QWERTY:
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Node:quad, Next:[10788]quadruple bucky, Previous:[10789]Python, Up:[10790]= Q =
quad n.
1. Two bits; syn. for [10791]quarter, [10792]crumb, [10793]tayste. 2. A four-pack of anything (compare [10794]hex, sense 2). 3. The rectangle or box glyph used in the APL language for various arcane purposes mostly related to I/O. Former Ivy-Leaguers and Oxford types are said to associate it with nostalgic memories of dear old University.
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Node:quadruple bucky, Next:[10795]quantifiers, Previous:[10796]quad, Up:[10797]= Q =
quadruple bucky n. obs.
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1. On an MIT [10798]space-cadet keyboard, use of all four of the shifting keys (control, meta, hyper, and super) while typing a character key. 2. On a Stanford or MIT keyboard in [10799]raw mode, use of four shift keys while typing a fifth character, where the four shift keys are the control and meta keys on both sides of the keyboard. This was very difficult to do! One accepted technique was to press the left-control and left-meta keys with your left hand, the right-control and right-meta keys with your right hand, and the fifth key with your nose.
Quadruple-bucky combinations were very seldom used in practice, because when one invented a new command one usually assigned it to some character that was easier to type. If you want to imply that a program has ridiculously many commands or features, you can say something like: "Oh, the command that makes it spin the tapes while whistling Beethoven's Fifth Symphony is quadruple-bucky-cokebottle." See [10800]double bucky, [10801]bucky bits, [10802]cokebottle.
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Node:quantifiers, Next:[10803]quantum bogodynamics,
Previous:[10804]quadruple bucky, Up:[10805]= Q =
quantifiers
In techspeak and jargon, the standard metric prefixes used in the SI (Systme International) conventions for scientific measurement have dual uses. With units of time or things that come in powers of 10, such as money, they retain their usual meanings of multiplication by powers of 1000 = 10^3. But when used with bytes or other things that naturally come in powers of 2, they usually denote multiplication by powers of 1024 = 2^(10).
Here are the SI magnifying prefixes, along with the corresponding binary interpretations in common use: prefix decimal binary kilo1000^1 1024^1 = 2^10 = 1,024
mega1000^2 1024^2 = 2^20 = 1,048,576
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giga1000^3 1024^3 = 2^30 = 1,073,741,824
tera1000^4 1024^4 = 2^40 = 1,099,511,627,776
peta1000^5 1024^5 = 2^50 = 1,125,899,906,842,624
exa1000^6 1024^6 = 2^60 = 1,152,921,504,606,846,976
zetta1000^7 1024^7 = 2^70 = 1,180,591,620,717,411,303,424
yotta1000^8 1024^8 = 2^80 = 1,208,925,819,614,629,174,706,176
Here are the SI fractional prefixes: prefix decimal jargon usage milli- 1000^-1 (seldom used in jargon) micro- 1000^-2 small or human-scale (see [10806]micro-) nano- 1000^-3 even smaller (see [10807]nano-) pico- 1000^-4 even smaller yet (see [10808]pico-) femto- 1000^-5 (not used in jargon---yet) atto- 1000^-6 (not used in jargon---yet) zepto- 1000^-7 (not used in jargon---yet) yocto- 1000^-8 (not used in jargon---yet)
The prefixes zetta-, yotta-, zepto-, and yoctohave been included in these tables purely for completeness and giggle value; they were adopted in 1990 by the `19th Conference Generale des Poids et Mesures'. The binary petaand exaloadings, though well established, are not in jargon use either -- yet. The prefix milli-, denoting multiplication by 1/1000, has always been rare in jargon (there is, however, a standard joke about the `millihelen' -- notionally, the amount of beauty required to launch one ship). See the entries on [10809]micro-, [10810]pico-, and [10811]nanofor more information on connotative jargon use of these terms. `Femto' and `atto' (which, interestingly, derive not from Greek but from Danish) have not yet acquired jargon loadings, though it is easy to predict what those will be once computing technology enters the required realms of magnitude (however, see [10812]attoparsec).
There are, of course, some standard unit prefixes for powers of 10. In the following table, the `prefix' column is the international standard suffix for the appropriate power of ten; the `binary' column lists jargon abbreviations