Chapter D: C. Power Lab n (5)

[Usenet] The unit of analogical bogosity. According to its originator, the standard for one gilley was "the act of bogotoficiously comparing the shutting down of 1000 machines for a day with the killing of one person". The milligilley has been found to suffice for most normal conversational exchanges.

Node:gillion, Next:ginger, Previous:gilley, Up:= G =

gillion /gil'y*n/ or /jil'y*n/ n.

[formed from giga- by analogy with mega/million and tera/trillion] 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'.

Node:ginger, Next:GIPS, Previous:gillion, Up:= G =

ginger n.

See saga.

Node:GIPS, Next:glark, Previous:ginger, Up:= G =

GIPS /gips/ or /jips/ n.

[analogy with MIPS] 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.

Node:glark, Next:glass, Previous:GIPS, Up:= G =

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 hacker usage mutated the verb to `glark' because glork was already an established jargon term (some hackers do report using the original term). Compare grok, zen.

Node:glass, Next:glass tty, Previous:glark, Up:= G =

glass n.

[IBM] Synonym for silicon.

Node:glass tty, Next:glassfet, Previous:glass, Up:= G =

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; compare dumb terminal, smart terminal. See "TV Typewriters" (Appendix A) for an interesting true story about a glass tty.

Node:glassfet, Next:glitch, Previous:glass tty, Up:= G =

glassfet /glas'fet/ n.

[by analogy with MOSFET, the acronym for `Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor Field-Effect Transistor'] Syn. firebottle, a humorous way to refer to a vacuum tube.

Node:glitch, Next:glob, Previous:glassfet, Up:= G =

glitch /glich/

[very common; from German `glitschig' 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' (also power hit), 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 in the electronic hardware world, where it is now techspeak. A glitch can occur when 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. If another circuit inspects the output at just the wrong time, reading the random value, the results can be very wrong and very hard to debug (a glitch is one of many causes of electronic heisenbugs).

Node:glob, Next:glork, Previous:glitch, Up:= G =

glob /glob/, not /glohb/ v.,n.

[Unix; common] 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 single 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. Note that glob patterns are similar, but not identical, to those used in regexps.

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.

Node:glork, Next:glue, Previous:glob, Up:= G =

glork /glork/

1. interj. Term of mild surprise, usually tinged with outrage, as when one attempts to save the results of two 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." 4. Syn. for glark, which see.

Node:glue, Next:gnarly, Previous:glork, Up:= G =

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'.

Node:gnarly, Next:GNU, Previous:glue, Up:= G =

gnarly /nar'lee/ adj.

Both obscure and hairy (sense 1). "Yow! -- the tuned assembler implementation of BitBlt is really gnarly!" From a similar but less specific usage in surfer slang.

Node:GNU, Next:gnubie, Previous:gnarly, Up:= G =

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. 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. The GNU project has a web page at http://www.gnu.org. See EMACS, copyleft, General Public Virus, Linux. 2. Noted Unix hacker John Gilmore, founder of Usenet's anarchic alt.* hierarchy.

Node:gnubie, Next:GNUMACS, Previous:GNU, Up:= G =

gnubie /noo'bee/ n.

Written-only variant of newbie in common use on IRC channels, which implies specifically someone who is new to the Linux/open source/free software world.

Node:GNUMACS, Next:go flatline, Previous:gnubie, Up:= G =

GNUMACS /gnoo'maks/ n.

[contraction of `GNU EMACS'] Often-heard abbreviated name for the GNU project's flagship tool, EMACS. Used esp. in contrast with GOSMACS.

Node:go flatline, Next:go root, Previous:GNUMACS, Up:= G =

go flatline v.

[from cyberpunk SF, refers to flattening of EEG traces upon brain-death] (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 about. 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.

Node:go root, Next:go-faster stripes, Previous:go flatline, Up:= G =

go root vi.

[Unix; common] To temporarily enter root mode in order to perform a privileged operation. This use is deprecated in Australia, where v. `root' is a synonym for "fuck".

Node:go-faster stripes, Next:GoAT, Previous:go root, Up:= G =

go-faster stripes n.

[UK] Syn. chrome. Mainstream in some parts of UK.

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GoAT //

[Usenet] Abbreviation: "Go Away, Troll". See troll.

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gobble vt.

1. To consume, usu. used with `up'. "The output spy gobbles characters out of a tty output buffer." 2. To obtain, usu. used with `down'. "I guess I'll gobble down a copy of the documentation tomorrow." See also snarf.

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Godwin's Law prov.

[Usenet] "As a Usenet discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one." There is a tradition in many groups that, once this occurs, that thread is over, and whoever mentioned the Nazis has automatically lost whatever argument was in progress. Godwin's Law thus practically guarantees the existence of an upper bound on thread length in those groups. However there is also a widely- recognized codicil that any intentional triggering of Godwin's Law in order to invoke its thread-ending effects will be unsuccessful.

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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 is an IP datagram whose destination IP address is [255.255.255.255]. Fortunately, few gateways are foolish enough to attempt to implement this case! 2. A network packet of maximum size. An IP Godzillagram has 65,536 octets. Compare super source quench, Christmas tree packet, martian.

Node:golden, Next:golf-ball printer, Previous:Godzillagram, Up:= G =

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.

Node:golf-ball printer, Next:gonk, Previous:golden, Up:= G =

golf-ball printer n. obs.

The IBM 2741, a slow but letter-quality printing device and terminal based on the IBM Selectric typewriter. The `golf ball' was a little spherical frob bearing reversed embossed images of 88 different characters arranged on four parallels of latitude; one could change the font by swapping in a different golf ball. The print element spun and jerked alarmingly in action and when in motion was sometimes described as an `infuriated 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.

Node:gonk, Next:gonkulator, Previous:golf-ball printer, Up:= G =

gonk /gonk/ vi.,n.

1. To prevaricate or to embellish the truth beyond any reasonable recognition. 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 mich" (You're pulling my leg). See also gonkulator. 2. [British] To grab some sleep at an odd time; compare gronk out.

Node:gonkulator, Next:gonzo, Previous:gonk, Up:= G =

gonkulator /gon'kyoo-lay-tr/ n.

[common; from the 1960s "Hogan's Heroes" TV series] 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.

Node:gonzo, Next:Good Thing, Previous:gonkulator, Up:= G =

gonzo /gon'zoh/ adj.

[from Hunter S. Thompson] 1. With total commitment, total concentration, and a mad sort of panache. (Thompson's original sense.) 2. More loosely: 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.

Node:Good Thing, Next:gopher, Previous:gonzo, Up:= G =

Good Thing n.,adj.

[very common; often capitalized; always pronounced as if capitalized.] 1. Self-evidently wonderful to anyone in a position to notice: "A language that manages dynamic memory automatically for you is a Good Thing." 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.

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gopher n.

A type of Internet service first floated around 1991 and obsolesced around 1995 by the World Wide Web. Gopher presents a menuing interface to a tree or graph of links; the links can be to documents, runnable programs, or other gopher menus arbitrarily far across the net.

Some claim that the gopher software, which was originally developed at the University of Minnesota, was named after the Minnesota Gophers (a sports team). Others claim the word derives from American slang `gofer' (from "go for", dialectal "go fer"), one whose job is to run and fetch things. Finally, observe that gophers dig long tunnels, and the idea of tunneling through the net to find information was a defining metaphor for the developers. Probably all three things were true, but with the first two coming first and the gopher-tunnel metaphor serendipitously adding flavor and impetus to the project as it developed out of its concept stage.

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gopher hole n.

1. Any access to a gopher. 2. [Amateur Packet Radio] The terrestrial analog of a wormhole (sense 2), from which this term was coined. A gopher hole links two amateur packet relays through some non-ham radio medium.

Node:gorets, Next:gorilla arm, Previous:gopher hole, Up:= G =

gorets /gor'ets/ n.

The unknown ur-noun, fill in your own meaning. Found esp. on the Usenet newsgroup _alt.gorets_, which seems to be a running contest to redefine the word by implication in the funniest and most peculiar way, with the understanding that no definition is ever final. [A correspondent from the Former Soviet Union informs me that `gorets' is Russian for `mountain dweller'. Another from France informs me that `goret' is archaic French for a young pig --ESR] Compare frink.

Node:gorilla arm, Next:gorp, Previous:gorets, Up:= G =

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 -- the operator looks like a gorilla while using the touch screen and feels like one afterwards. 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?".

Node:gorp, Next:GOSMACS, Previous:gorilla arm, Up:= G =

gorp /gorp/ n.

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

Node:GOSMACS, Next:Gosperism, Previous:gorp, Up:= G =

GOSMACS /goz'maks/ n.

[contraction of `Gosling EMACS'] The first EMACS-in-C implementation, predating but now largely eclipsed by GNUMACS. Originally freeware; a commercial version was modestly popular as `UniPress EMACS' during the 1980s. The author, James Gosling, went on to invent NeWS and the programming language Java; the latter earned him demigod status.

Node:Gosperism, Next:gotcha, Previous:GOSMACS, Up:= G =

Gosperism /gos'p*r-izm/ n.

A hack, invention, or saying due to elder days 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.

Node:gotcha, Next:GPL, Previous:Gosperism, Up:= G =

gotcha n.

A misfeature of a system, especially a programming language or environment, that tends to breed bugs or mistakes because it both enticingly easy to invoke and completely unexpected and/or unreasonable in its outcome. 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.

Node:GPL, Next:GPV, Previous:gotcha, Up:= G =

GPL /G-P-L/ n.

Abbreviation for `General Public License' in widespread use; see copyleft, General Public Virus. Often mis-expanded as `GNU Public License'.

Node:GPV, Next:grault, Previous:GPL, Up:= G =

GPV /G-P-V/ n.

Abbrev. for General Public Virus in widespread use.

Node:grault, Next:gray goo, Previous:GPV, Up:= G =

grault /grawlt/ n.

Yet another metasyntactic variable, invented by Mike Gallaher and propagated by the GOSMACS documentation. See corge.

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gray goo n.

A hypothetical substance composed of sagans 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.

Node:Great Renaming, Next:Great Runes, Previous:gray goo, Up:= G =

Great Renaming n.

The flag day in 1987 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. Used esp. in discussing the history of newsgroup names. "The oldest sources group is _comp.sources.misc_; before the Great Renaming, it was _net.sources_." There is a Great Renaming FAQ on the Web.

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Great Runes n.

Uppercase-only text or display messages. Some archaic operating systems still emit these. See also runes, smash case, fold case.

There is a widespread legend (repeated by earlier versions of this entry, though tagged as folklore) that the uppercase-only support of various old character codes and I/O equipment was chosen by a religious person in a position of power at the Teletype Company because supporting both upper and lower cases was too expensive and supporting lower case only would have made it impossible to spell `God' correctly. Not true; the upper-case interpretation of teleprinter codes was well established by 1870, long before Teletype was even founded.

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Great Worm n.

The 1988 Internet worm perpetrated by RTM. This is a play on Tolkien (compare elvish, elder days). In the fantasy history of his Middle Earth books, there were dragons powerful enough to lay waste to entire regions; two of these (Scatha and Glaurung) were known as "the Great Worms". This usage expresses the connotation that the RTM crack was a sort of devastating watershed event in hacker history; certainly it did more to make non-hackers nervous about the Internet than anything before or since.

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great-wall vi.,n.

[from SF fandom] 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.

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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, and the White Book (sense 2). 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", which 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 issued by the CCITT's tenth plenary assembly. These include, among other things, the X.400 email standard and the Group 1 through 4 fax standards. See also book titles.

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green bytes n.

(also `green words') 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).

Node:green card, Next:green lightning, Previous:green bytes, Up:= G =

green card n.

[after the "IBM System/360 Reference Data" card] A summary of an assembly language, even if the color is not green and not a card. 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."

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.

In fall 2000 it was reported from Electronic Data Systems that the green card for 370 machines has been a blue-green booklet since 1989.

Node:green lightning, Next:green machine, Previous:green card, Up:= G =

green lightning n.

[IBM] 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 (sense 6).

Node:green machine, Next:Green's Theorem, Previous:green lightning, Up:= G =

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.

Node:Green's Theorem, Next:greenbar, Previous:green machine, Up:= G =

Green's Theorem prov.

[TMRC] For any story, in any group of people there will be at least one person who has not heard the story. A refinement of the theorem states that there will be exactly one person (if there were more than one, it wouldn't be as bad to re-tell the story). [The name of this theorem is a play on a fundamental theorem in calculus. --ESR]

Node:greenbar, Next:grep, Previous:Green's Theorem, Up:= G =

greenbar n.

A style of fanfolded continuous-feed paper with alternating green and white bars on it, especially used in old-style line printers. This slang almost certainly dates way back to mainframe days.

Node:grep, Next:gribble, Previous:greenbar, Up:= G =

grep /grep/ vi.

[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)] To rapidly scan a file or set of files looking for a particular string or pattern (when browsing through a large set of files, one may speak of `grepping around'). By extension, to look for something by pattern. "Grep the bulletin board for the system backup schedule, would you?" See also vgrep.

[It has also been alleged that the source is from the title of a paper "A General Regular Expression Parser" -ESR]

Node:gribble, Next:grilf, Previous:grep, Up:= G =

gribble n.

Random binary data rendered as unreadable text. Noise characters in a data stream are displayed as gribble. Modems with mismatched bitrates usually generate gribble (more specifically, baud barf). Dumping a binary file to the screen is an excellent source of gribble, and (if the bell/speaker is active) headaches.

Node:grilf, Next:grind, Previous:gribble, Up:= G =

grilf // n.

Girlfriend. Like newsfroup and filk, a typo reincarnated as a new word. Seems to have originated sometime in 1992 on Usenet. [A friend tells me there was a Lloyd Biggle SF novel "Watchers Of The Dark", in which alien species after species goes insane and begins to chant "Grilf! Grilf!". A human detective eventually determines that the word means "Liar!" I hope this has nothing to do with the popularity of the Usenet term. --ESR]

Node:grind, Next:grind crank, Previous:grilf, Up:= G =

grind vt.

1. [MIT and Berkeley; now rare] To prettify hardcopy of code, especially LISP code, by reindenting lines, printing keywords and comments in distinct fonts (if available), etc. 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. 3. [common] 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!"

Node:grind crank, Next:gripenet, Previous:grind, Up:= G =

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.

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.

Node:gripenet, Next:gritch, Previous:grind crank, Up:= G =

gripenet n.

[IBM] A wry (and thoroughly unofficial) name for IBM's internal VNET system, deriving from its common use by IBMers to voice pointed criticism of IBM management that would be taboo in more formal channels.

Node:gritch, Next:grok, Previous:gripenet, Up:= G =

gritch /grich/

[MIT] 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).

Interestingly, this word seems to have a separate history from glitch, with which it is often confused. Back in the early 1960s, when `glitch' was strictly a hardware-tech's term of art, the Burton House dorm at M.I.T. maintained a "Gritch Book", a blank volume, into which the residents hand-wrote complaints, suggestions, and witticisms. Previous years' volumes of this tradition were maintained, dating back to antiquity. The word "gritch" was described as a portmanteau of "gripe" and "bitch". Thus, sense 3 above is at least historically incorrect.

Node:grok, Next:gronk, Previous:gritch, Up:= G =

grok /grok/, var. /grohk/ vt.

[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'] The emphatic form is `grok in fullness'. 1. To understand, usually in a global sense. Connotes intimate and exhaustive knowledge. Contrast zen, which is similar supernal understanding experienced 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."

Node:gronk, Next:gronk out, Previous:grok, Up:= G =

gronk /gronk/ vt.

[popularized by Johnny Hart's comic strip "B.C." but the word apparently predates that] 1. To clear the state of a wedged device and restart it. More severe than `to frob' (sense 2). 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".

Node:gronk out, Next:gronked, Previous:gronk, Up:= G =

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."

Node:gronked, Next:grovel, Previous:gronk out, Up:= G =

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.

Node:grovel, Next:grue, Previous:gronked, Up:= G =

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 /usr 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."

Node:grue, Next:grunge, Previous:grovel, Up:= G =

grue n.

[from archaic English verb for `shudder', as with fear] The grue was originated in the game Zork (Dave Lebling took the name from Jack Vance's "Dying Earth" fantasies) and used in several other Infocom games as a hint that you should perhaps look for a lamp, torch or some type of light source. Wandering into a dark area would cause the game to prompt you, "It is very dark. If you continue you are likely to be eaten by a grue." If you failed to locate a light source within the next couple of moves this would indeed be the case.

The grue, according to scholars of the Great Underground Empire, is a sinister, lurking presence in the dark places of the earth. Its favorite diet is either adventurers or enchanters, but its insatiable appetite is tempered by its extreme fear of light. No grues have ever been seen by the light of day, and only a few have been observed in their underground lairs. Of those who have seen grues, few have survived their fearsome jaws to tell the tale. Grues have sharp claws and fangs, and an uncontrollable tendency to slaver and gurgle. They are certainly the most evil-tempered of all creatures; to say they are touchy is a dangerous understatement. "Sour as a grue" is a common expression, even among themselves.

All this folklore is widely known among hackers.

Node:grunge, Next:gubbish, Previous:grue, Up:= G =

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.

Node:gubbish, Next:Guido, Previous:grunge, Up:= G =

gubbish /guhb'*sh/ n.

[a portmanteau of `garbage' and `rubbish'; may have originated with SF author Philip K. Dick] Garbage; crap; nonsense. "What is all this gubbish?" The opposite portmanteau `rubbage' is also reported; in fact, it was British slang during the 19th century and appears in Dickens.

Node:Guido, Next:guiltware, Previous:gubbish, Up:= G =

Guido /gwee'do/ or /khwee'do/

Without qualification, Guido van Rossum (author of Python). Note that Guido answers to English /gwee'do/ but in Dutch it's /khwee'do/.

Node:guiltware, Next:gumby, Previous:Guido, Up:= G =

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. A piece of shareware that works.

Node:gumby, Next:gun, Previous:guiltware, Up:= G =

gumby /guhm'bee/ n.

[from a class of Monty Python characters, poss. with some influence from the 1960s claymation character] 1. An act of minor but conspicuous stupidity, often in `gumby maneuver' or `pull a gumby'. 2. [NRL] n. A bureaucrat, or other technical incompetent who impedes the progress of real work. 3. adj. Relating to things typically associated with people in sense 2. (e.g. "Ran would be writing code, but Richard gave him gumby work that's due on Friday", or, "Dammit! Travel screwed up my plane tickets. I have to go out on gumby patrol.")

Node:gun, Next:gunch, Previous:gumby, Up:= G =

gun vt.

[ITS, now rare: from the :GUN command] 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." Usage: now rare. Compare can, blammo.

Node:gunch, Next:gunpowder chicken, Previous:gun, Up:= G =

gunch /guhnch/ vt.

[TMRC] To push, prod, or poke at a device that has almost (but not quite) produced the desired result. Implies a threat to mung.

Node:gunpowder chicken, Next:gurfle, Previous:gunch, Up:= G =

gunpowder chicken n.

Same as laser chicken.

Node:gurfle, Next:guru, Previous:gunpowder chicken, Up:= G =

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.

Node:guru, Next:guru meditation, Previous:gurfle, Up:= G =

guru n.

[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.

Node:guru meditation, Next:gweep, Previous:guru, Up:= G =

guru meditation n.

Amiga equivalent of `panic' in Unix (sometimes just called a `guru' or `guru event'). When the system crashes, a cryptic message of the form "GURU MEDITATION #XXXXXXXX.YYYYYYYY" may appear, indicating what the problem was. An Amiga guru can figure things out from the numbers. Sometimes a guru event must be followed by a Vulcan nerve pinch.

This term is (no surprise) an in-joke from the earliest days of the Amiga. An earlier product of the Amiga corporation was a device called a `Joyboard' which was basically a plastic board built onto a joystick-like device; it was sold with a skiing game cartridge for the Atari game machine. It is said that whenever the prototype OS crashed, the system programmer responsible would calm down by concentrating on a solution while sitting cross-legged on a Joyboard trying to keep the board in balance. This position resembled that of a meditating guru. Sadly, the joke was removed fairly early on (but there's a well-known patch to restore it in more recent versions).

Node:gweep, Next:h, Previous:guru meditation, Up:= G =

gweep /gweep/

[WPI] 1. v. To hack, usually at night. At WPI, from 1975 onwards, one who gweeped could often be found at the College Computing Center punching cards or crashing the PDP-10 or, later, the DEC-20. A correspondent who was there at the time opines that the term was originally onomatopoetic, describing the keyclick sound of the Datapoint terminals long connected to the PDP-10. The term has survived the demise of those technologies, however, and was still alive in early 1999. "I'm going to go gweep for a while. See you in the morning." "I gweep from 8 PM till 3 AM during the week." 2. n. One who habitually gweeps in sense 1; a hacker. "He's a hard-core gweep, mumbles code in his sleep."

Node:= H =, Next:= I =, Previous:= G =, Up:The Jargon Lexicon

= H =

h:

ha ha only serious:

hack:

hack attack:

hack mode:

hack on:

hack together:

hack up:

hack value:

hacked off:

hacked up:

hacker:

hacker ethic:

hacker humor:

Hackers (the movie):

hacking run:

Hacking X for Y:

Hackintosh:

hackish:

hackishness:

hackitude:

hair:

hairball:

hairy:

HAKMEM:

hakspek:

Halloween Documents:

hammer:

hamster:

HAND:

hand cruft:

hand-hacking:

handle:

handle:

hand-roll:

handshaking:

handwave:

hang:

Hanlon's Razor:

happily:

haque:

hard boot:

hardcoded:

hardwarily:

hardwired:

has the X nature:

hash bucket:

hash collision:

hat:

HCF:

heads down:

heartbeat:

heatseeker:

heavy metal:

heavy wizardry:

heavyweight:

heisenbug:

Helen Keller mode:

hello sailor!:

hello wall!:

hello world:

hex:

hexadecimal:

hexit:

HHOK:

HHOS:

hidden flag:

high bit:

high moby:

highly:

hing:

hired gun:

hirsute:

HLL:

hoarding:

hobbit:

hog:

hole:

hollised:

holy wars:

home box:

home machine:

home page:

honey pot:

hook:

hop:

hose:

hosed:

hot chat:

hot spot:

hotlink:

house wizard:

HP-SUX:

HTH:

huff:

humma:

hung:

hungry puppy:

hungus:

hyperspace:

hysterical reasons:

Node:h, Next:ha ha only serious, Previous:gweep, Up:= H =

h

[from SF fandom] A method of `marking' common words, i.e., calling attention to the fact that they are being used in a nonstandard, ironic, or humorous way. Originated in the fannish catchphrase "Bheer is the One True Ghod!" from decades ago. H-infix marking of `Ghod' and other words spread into the 1960s counterculture via underground comix, and into early hackerdom either from the counterculture or from SF fandom (the three overlapped heavily at the time). More recently, the h infix has become an expected feature of benchmark names (Dhrystone, Rhealstone, etc.); this is probably patterning on the original Whetstone (the name of a laboratory) but influenced by the fannish/counterculture h infix.

Node:ha ha only serious, Next:hack, Previous:h, Up:= H =

ha ha only serious

[from SF fandom, orig. as mutation of HHOK, `Ha Ha Only Kidding'] A phrase (often seen abbreviated as HHOS) that aptly captures the flavor of much hacker discourse. Applied especially to parodies, absurdities, and ironic jokes that are both intended and perceived to contain a possibly disquieting amount of truth, or truths that are constructed on in-joke and self-parody. This lexicon contains many examples of ha-ha-only-serious in both form and content. Indeed, the entirety of hacker culture is often perceived as ha-ha-only-serious by hackers themselves; to take it either too lightly or too seriously marks a person as an outsider, a wannabee, or in larval stage. For further enlightenment on this subject, consult any Zen master. See also hacker humor, and AI koans.

Node:hack, Next:hack attack, Previous:ha ha only serious, Up:= H =

hack

[very common] 1. n. Originally, a quick job that produces what is needed, but not well. 2. n. An incredibly good, and perhaps very time-consuming, piece of work that produces exactly what is needed. 3. vt. To bear emotionally or physically. "I can't hack this heat!" 4. vt. To work on something (typically a program). In an immediate sense: "What are you doing?" "I'm hacking TECO." In a general (time-extended) sense: "What do you do around here?" "I hack TECO." More generally, "I hack `foo'" is roughly equivalent to "`foo' is my major interest (or project)". "I hack solid-state physics." See Hacking X for Y. 5. vt. To pull a prank on. See sense 2 and hacker (sense 5). 6. vi. To interact with a computer in a playful and exploratory rather than goal-directed way. "Whatcha up to?" "Oh, just hacking." 7. n. Short for hacker. 8. See nethack. 9. [MIT] v. To explore the basements, roof ledges, and steam tunnels of a large, institutional building, to the dismay of Physical Plant workers and (since this is usually performed at educational institutions) the Campus Police. This activity has been found to be eerily similar to playing adventure games such as Dungeons and Dragons and Zork. See also vadding.

Constructions on this term abound. They include `happy hacking' (a farewell), `how's hacking?' (a friendly greeting among hackers) and `hack, hack' (a fairly content-free but friendly comment, often used as a temporary farewell). For more on this totipotent term see "The Meaning of Hack". See also neat hack, real hack.

Node:hack attack, Next:hack mode, Previous:hack, Up:= H =

hack attack n.

[poss. by analogy with `Big Mac Attack' from ads for the McDonald's fast-food chain; the variant `big hack attack' is reported] Nearly synonymous with hacking run, though the latter more strongly implies an all-nighter.

Node:hack mode, Next:hack on, Previous:hack attack, Up:= H =

hack mode n.

1. What one is in when hacking, of course. 2. More specifically, a Zen-like state of total focus on The Problem that may be achieved when one is hacking (this is why every good hacker is part mystic). Ability to enter such concentration at will correlates strongly with wizardliness; it is one of the most important skills learned during larval stage. Sometimes amplified as `deep hack mode'.

Being yanked out of hack mode (see priority interrupt) may be experienced as a physical shock, and the sensation of being in hack mode is more than a little habituating. The intensity of this experience is probably by itself sufficient explanation for the existence of hackers, and explains why many resist being promoted out of positions where they can code. See also cyberspace (sense 2).

Some aspects of hacker etiquette will appear quite odd to an observer unaware of the high value placed on hack mode. For example, if someone appears at your door, it is perfectly okay to hold up a hand (without turning one's eyes away from the screen) to avoid being interrupted. One may read, type, and interact with the computer for quite some time before further acknowledging the other's presence (of course, he or she is reciprocally free to leave without a word). The understanding is that you might be in hack mode with a lot of delicate state (sense 2) in your head, and you dare not swap that context out until you have reached a good point to pause. See also juggling eggs.

Node:hack on, Next:hack together, Previous:hack mode, Up:= H =

hack on vt.

[very common] To hack; implies that the subject is some pre-existing hunk of code that one is evolving, as opposed to something one might hack up.

Node:hack together, Next:hack up, Previous:hack on, Up:= H =

hack together vt.

[common] To throw something together so it will work. Unlike `kluge together' or cruft together, this does not necessarily have negative connotations.

Node:hack up, Next:hack value, Previous:hack together, Up:= H =

hack up vt.

To hack, but generally implies that the result is a hack in sense 1 (a quick hack). Contrast this with hack on. To `hack up on' implies a quick-and-dirty modification to an existing system. Contrast hacked up; compare kluge up, monkey up, cruft together.

Node:hack value, Next:hacked off, Previous:hack up, Up:= H =

hack value n.

Often adduced as the reason or motivation for expending effort toward a seemingly useless goal, the point being that the accomplished goal is a hack. For example, MacLISP had features for reading and printing Roman numerals, which were installed purely for hack value. See display hack for one method of computing hack value, but this cannot really be explained, only experienced. As Louis Armstrong once said when asked to explain jazz: "Man, if you gotta ask you'll never know." (Feminists please note Fats Waller's explanation of rhythm: "Lady, if you got to ask, you ain't got it.")

Node:hacked off, Next:hacked up, Previous:hack value, Up:= H =

hacked off adj.

[analogous to `pissed off'] Said of system administrators who have become annoyed, upset, or touchy owing to suspicions that their sites have been or are going to be victimized by crackers, or used for inappropriate, technically illegal, or even overtly criminal activities. For example, having unreadable files in your home directory called `worm', `lockpick', or `goroot' would probably be an effective (as well as impressively obvious and stupid) way to get your sysadmin hacked off at you.

It has been pointed out that there is precedent for this usage in U.S. Navy slang, in which officers under discipline are sometimes said to be "in hack" and one may speak of "hacking off the C.O.".

Node:hacked up, Next:hacker, Previous:hacked off, Up:= H =

hacked up adj.

Sufficiently patched, kluged, and tweaked that the surgical scars are beginning to crowd out normal tissue (compare critical mass). Not all programs that are hacked become `hacked up'; if modifications are done with some eye to coherence and continued maintainability, the software may emerge better for the experience. Contrast hack up.

Node:hacker, Next:hacker ethic, Previous:hacked up, Up:= H =

hacker n.

[originally, someone who makes furniture with an axe] 1. A person who enjoys exploring the details of programmable systems and how to stretch their capabilities, as opposed to most users, who prefer to learn only the minimum necessary. 2. One who programs enthusiastically (even obsessively) or who enjoys programming rather than just theorizing about programming. 3. A person capable of appreciating hack value. 4. A person who is good at programming quickly. 5. An expert at a particular program, or one who frequently does work using it or on it; as in `a Unix hacker'. (Definitions 1 through 5 are correlated, and people who fit them congregate.) 6. An expert or enthusiast of any kind. One might be an astronomy hacker, for example. 7. One who enjoys the intellectual challenge of creatively overcoming or circumventing limitations. 8. [deprecated] A malicious meddler who tries to discover sensitive information by poking around. Hence `password hacker', `network hacker'. The correct term for this sense is cracker.

The term `hacker' also tends to connote membership in the global community defined by the net (see the network and Internet address). For discussion of some of the basics of this culture, see the How To Become A Hacker FAQ. It also implies that the person described is seen to subscribe to some version of the hacker ethic (see hacker ethic).

It is better to be described as a hacker by others than to describe oneself that way. Hackers consider themselves something of an elite (a meritocracy based on ability), though one to which new members are gladly welcome. There is thus a certain ego satisfaction to be had in identifying yourself as a hacker (but if you claim to be one and are not, you'll quickly be labeled bogus). See also wannabee.

This term seems to have been first adopted as a badge in the 1960s by the hacker culture surrounding TMRC and the MIT AI Lab. We have a report that it was used in a sense close to this entry's by teenage radio hams and electronics tinkerers in the mid-1950s.

Node:hacker ethic, Next:hacker humor, Previous:hacker, Up:= H =

hacker ethic n.

1. The belief that information-sharing is a powerful positive good, and that it is an ethical duty of hackers to share their expertise by writing open-source and facilitating access to information and to computing resources wherever possible. 2. The belief that system-cracking for fun and exploration is ethically OK as long as the cracker commits no theft, vandalism, or breach of confidentiality.

Both of these normative ethical principles are widely, but by no means universally, accepted among hackers. Most hackers subscribe to the hacker ethic in sense 1, and many act on it by writing and giving away open-source software. A few go further and assert that all information should be free and any proprietary control of it is bad; this is the philosophy behind the GNU project.

Sense 2 is more controversial: some people consider the act of cracking itself to be unethical, like breaking and entering. But the belief that `ethical' cracking excludes destruction at least moderates the behavior of people who see themselves as `benign' crackers (see also samurai). On this view, it may be one of the highest forms of hackerly courtesy to (a) break into a system, and then (b) explain to the sysop, preferably by email from a superuser account, exactly how it was done and how the hole can be plugged -- acting as an unpaid (and unsolicited) tiger team.

The most reliable manifestation of either version of the hacker ethic is that almost all hackers are actively willing to share technical tricks, software, and (where possible) computing resources with other hackers. Huge cooperative networks such as Usenet, FidoNet and Internet (see Internet address) can function without central control because of this trait; they both rely on and reinforce a sense of community that may be hackerdom's most valuable intangible asset.

Node:hacker humor, Next:Hackers (the movie), Previous:hacker ethic, Up:= H =

hacker humor

A distinctive style of shared intellectual humor found among hackers, having the following marked characteristics:

1. Fascination with form-vs.-content jokes, paradoxes, and humor having to do with confusion of metalevels (see meta). One way to make a hacker laugh: hold a red index card in front of him/her with "GREEN" written on it, or vice-versa (note, however, that this is funny only the first time).

2. Elaborate deadpan parodies of large intellectual constructs, such as specifications (see write-only memory), standards documents, language descriptions (see INTERCAL), and even entire scientific theories (see quantum bogodynamics, computron).

3. Jokes that involve screwily precise reasoning from bizarre, ludicrous, or just grossly counter-intuitive premises.

4. Fascination with puns and wordplay.

5. A fondness for apparently mindless humor with subversive currents of intelligence in it -- for example, old Warner Brothers and Rocky & Bullwinkle cartoons, the Marx brothers, the early B-52s, and Monty Python's Flying Circus. Humor that combines this trait with elements of high camp and slapstick is especially favored.

6. References to the symbol-object antinomies and associated ideas in Zen Buddhism and (less often) Taoism. See has the X nature, Discordianism, zen, ha ha only serious, koan, AI koans.

See also filk, retrocomputing, and the Portrait of J. Random Hacker in Appendix B. If you have an itchy feeling that all six of these traits are really aspects of one thing that is incredibly difficult to talk about exactly, you are (a) correct and (b) responding like a hacker. These traits are also recognizable (though in a less marked form) throughout science-fiction fandom.

Node:Hackers (the movie), Next:hacking run, Previous:hacker humor, Up:= H =

Hackers (the movie) n.

A notable bomb from 1995. Should have been titled "Crackers", because cracking is what the movie was about. It's understandable that they didn't however; titles redolent of snack food are probably a tough sell in Hollywood.

Node:hacking run, Next:Hacking X for Y, Previous:Hackers (the movie), Up:= H =

hacking run n.

[analogy with `bombing run' or `speed run'] A hack session extended long outside normal working times, especially one longer than 12 hours. May cause you to `change phase the hard way' (see phase).

Node:Hacking X for Y, Next:Hackintosh, Previous:hacking run, Up:= H =

Hacking X for Y n.

[ITS] Ritual phrasing of part of the information which ITS made publicly available about each user. This information (the INQUIR record) was a sort of form in which the user could fill out various fields. On display, two of these fields were always combined into a project description of the form "Hacking X for Y" (e.g., "Hacking perceptrons for Minsky"). This form of description became traditional and has since been carried over to other systems with more general facilities for self-advertisement (such as Unix plan files).

Node:Hackintosh, Next:hackish, Previous:Hacking X for Y, Up:= H =

Hackintosh n.

1. An Apple Lisa that has been hacked into emulating a Macintosh (also called a `Mac XL'). 2. A Macintosh assembled from parts theoretically belonging to different models in the line.

Node:hackish, Next:hackishness, Previous:Hackintosh, Up:= H =

hackish /hak'ish/ adj.

(also hackishness n.) 1. Said of something that is or involves a hack. 2. Of or pertaining to hackers or the hacker subculture. See also true-hacker.

Node:hackishness, Next:hackitude, Previous:hackish, Up:= H =

hackishness n.

The quality of being or involving a hack. This term is considered mildly silly. Syn. hackitude.

Node:hackitude, Next:hair, Previous:hackishness, Up:= H =

hackitude n.

Syn. hackishness; this word is considered sillier.

Node:hair, Next:hairball, Previous:hackitude, Up:= H =

hair n.

[back-formation from hairy] The complications that make something hairy. "Decoding TECO commands requires a certain amount of hair." Often seen in the phrase `infinite hair', which connotes extreme complexity. Also in `hairiferous' (tending to promote hair growth): "GNUMACS elisp encourages lusers to write complex editing modes." "Yeah, it's pretty hairiferous all right." (or just: "Hair squared!")

Node:hairball, Next:hairy, Previous:hair, Up:= H =

hairball n.

1. [Fidonet] A large batch of messages that a store-and-forward network is failing to forward when it should. Often used in the phrase "Fido coughed up a hairball today", meaning that the stuck messages have just come unstuck, producing a flood of mail where there had previously been drought. 2. An unmanageably huge mass of source code. "JWZ thought the Mozilla effort bogged down because the code was a huge hairball." 3. Any large amount of garbage coming out suddenly. "Sendmail is coughing up a hairball, so expect some slowness accessing the Internet."

Node:hairy, Next:HAKMEM, Previous:hairball, Up:= H =

hairy adj.

1. Annoyingly complicated. "DWIM is incredibly hairy." 2. Incomprehensible. "DWIM is incredibly hairy." 3. Of people, high-powered, authoritative, rare, expert, and/or incomprehensible. Hard to explain except in context: "He knows this hairy lawyer who says there's nothing to worry about." See also hirsute.

A well-known result in topology called the Brouwer Fixed-Point Theorem states that any continuous transformation of a 2-sphere into itself has at least one fixed point. Mathematically literate hackers tend to associate the term `hairy' with the informal version of this theorem; "You can't comb a hairy ball smooth."