ADA: Something you need to know the name of to be an Expert in Computing. Useful in sentences like, "We had better develop an ADA awareness." AGED PACKET A packet that has exceeded the maximum number of visits or one that has passed its mid-life crisis. APL (Another Programming Language), Just another programming language BAR CHART A map of places to go for happy hour. BASIC 1) A programming language. Related to certain social diseases in that those who have it will not admit it in polite company. BETA TEST To voluntarily entrust one's data, one's livelihood and one's sanity to hardware or software intended to destroy all three. In earlier days, virgins were often selected to beta test volcanos. BIT A unit of measure applied to color. Twenty-four-bit color refers to expensive $3 color as opposed to the cheaper 25 cent, or two-bit, color that use to be available a few years ago. BUBBLE MEMORY A derogatory term referring to a person's intelligence. See also Vacuum tube. BUG 1) An aspect of a computer program which exists because the PROGRAMMER was thinking about Jumbo Jacks or stock options when s/he wrote the program. Fortunately, the second-to-last bug has just been fixed. 2) An elusive creature living in a program that makes it incorrect. The activity of "debugging," or removing bugs from a program, ends when people get tired of doing it, not when the bugs are removed. BUSINESS GRAPHICS Popular with managers who understand neither decimals, fractions, percentages, nor pi, but have more than a passing knowledge of pie amdebars. BUZZWORD The fly in the ointment of computer literacy. BYTE A mouthful, such as "How many bytes in a big Mac?" C A programming language that is sort of like Pascal except more like assembly except that it isn't very much like either one, or anything else. It is either the best language available to the art today, or it isn't. CACHE A very expensive part of the memory system of a computer that no one is supposed to know is there. CALTRANS A programming language related to FORTRAN. Also, an inside joke for Californians. CHARACTER DENSITY The number of computer nerds in your office. CHIP Small crunchy objects usually served with onion dip. CLONE 1. An exact duplicate, as in "our product is a clone of their product." 2. A shoddy, spurious copy, as in "their product is a clone of our product." CODE Usually lasts five days and is accompanied by a sore throat and runny nose. COMMAND A statement presented by a human and accepted by a computer in such a way as to make the human feel as if he's in control. COMMENT A superfluous element of a source program included to the programmer can remember what the hell he was doing six months later. Only the weak-minded need them, according to those who think they aren't. COMPUTER An electronic entity which performs sequences of useful steps in a totally understandable, rigorously logical manner. If you believe this, see me about a bridge I have for sale in Manhattan. COMPUTER JOURNALIST 1) A data processing manager who can't write a coherent sentence in English, French, German or any language. 2) A writer who can provide a definitive opinion on a product after spending an hour with its manual. 3) A person with an insatiable lust for free hardware and software. CONNECTOR A physical interface with male or female components. Make sure you have your connector gender straight as there are no gay or bisexual connectors. COPY PROTECTION 1) A clever method of preventing incompetent pirates from stealing software and legitimate users from using it. 2) A means of distinquishing the honest users from theives by preventing larceny by the former but not from the latter. CRASH A sudden, unexpected cessation of activity by the computer, accompanied by a sudden, unexpected increase in activity by the system administrator. Caused by someone running their huge, unimportant program just as your small, critical program is about to finish. CURRENT RELEASE What works today that didn't work yesterday. DATABASE MANAGER A program that allows the user to manipulate date in every conceivable way except the essential one a person conceives of the day after entering 20 megabytes of information. DEBUG The act of placing show leather against small creeping insects. DESIGN What you regret not doing later on. DOCUMENTATION 1) A perplexing linen bound accessory resorted to only in situations of dire need when friends and dealers are unavailable, usually employed as decorative bookends. 2) Instructions translated from Swedish by Japanese for English speaking persons. DOWNTIME The period of time when a device is not working and users are going crazy. EASY TO USE Hard to learn. EASY TO LEARN AND USE Won't do what *you* need it to. EASY TO LEARN Hard to use. ECONOMIES OF SCALE The notion that bigger is better. In particular, that if you want a certain amount of computer power, it is much better to buy one biggie than a bunch of smallies. Accepted as an article of faith by people who love big machines and all that complexity. Rejected as an article of faith by those who love small machines and all those limitations. ENGINEER A human (?) entity who is responsible for all the problems of PROGRAMMERS. ENHANCE To tamper with an image, usually to its detriment. FEATURE A bug as described by the marketing department. FIGMO Fuck it, got my orders. (see FOO) FOO 1. [from Yiddish "feh" or the Anglo-Saxon "fooey!"] interj. Term of disgust. 2. [from FUBAR (Fucked Up Beyond All Recognition), from British troops in North Africa during WWII, often seen as FOOBAR] Name used for temporary programs, or samples of three-letter names. FORMAT To prepare disks to accept data. You truly understand meaning of this word after you type on your computer: FORMAT C: FORTRAN A mature (see MATURE) programming language whose name means FOR TRANsmogrification (of the desired functionality). FUBB Fucked up beyond all belief. (see FOO) FUMTU Fucked up more than usual. (see FOO) GENLOCK Why he stays in the bottle. GFU General fuck-up. (see FOO) GLITCH The scientific term for the little balls of fuzz that collect in navels. GOTO A programming tool that exists to allow structured programmers to complain about unstructured programmers. GURU A computer owner who can read the manual. HANDSHAKING PROTOCOL A process employed by hostile hardware devices to initate a terse but civil dialogue, which, in turn, is characterized by occasional misunderstanding, sulking, and name-calling. HARD DRIVE A device designed to allow naive users to destroy vast quantities of data with simple nmemonic commands. See FORMAT. HARDWARE The parts of a computer system that can be kicked. INFINITE LOOP See LOOP. INFORMATION CENTER A room staffed by professional computer people whose job it is to tell you why you cannot have the information you require. INFORMATION PROCESSING What you call data processing when people are so disgusted with it they won't let it be discussed in their presence. INTERFACE The opposite of getouttamyface. ITALIC Slanted to the right to emphasize key phrases. Unique to Western alphabets; in Eastern languages, the same phrases are often slanted to the left. JANFU Joint army-navy fuckup. (see FOO) [When American troops get shelled by their own side, in this case involving both the army and the navy. Very popular in Viet-Nam. There are a whole slew of these involving the various combinations of services.] JAPAN A fictional place where elves, gnomes and economic imperialists create electronic equipment and computers using black magic. It is said that in the capital city of Akihabara, the streets are paved with gold and semiconductor chips grow on low bushes from which they are harvested by the happy natives. JUMP See GOTO KERN 1. To pack type together as tightly as the kernels on an ear of corn. 2. In parts of Brooklyn and Queens, N.Y., a small, metal object used as part of the monetary system. KERNEL A part of an operating system that preserves the medieval traditions of sorcery and black art. LAP-TOP Something useful for little more than a typewriter, but smaller and lighter than a secretary. LOOP To circle endlessly. See INFINITE LOOP MACHINE-INDEPENENT PROGRAM A program that will not run on any machine. MANUAL A unit of documentation. There are always three or more on a given item. One is on the shelf; someone has the others. The information you need in in the others. MATURE Adjective used to describe anything that nobody uses anymore. MEETING An assembly of computer experts coming together to decide what person or department not represented in the room must solve the problem. MEMORY A component of a computer that holds data. Sometimes it doesn't. Amount present in a given system is calculated in a manner similar to REGISTERS (see). MINICOMPUTER A computer that can be afforded on the budget of a middle-level manager. MTBF (Mean Time Between Failure) About one year or shortly after the warranty expires. MODEM 1) Up-to-date, new-fangled, as in "Thoroughly Modem Millie." An unfortunate byproduct of kerning. 2) A peripheral used in to get two computers to communicate with each other. As effective as giving an Chinese and an African a latin dictionary. 3) A contraction as in "Gimme some modem cookies." MOUSE a peripheral christened vermiform appendix because of its function resemblance, renamed for its apprpriateness as a cat toy. NETWORK An electronic means of allowing more than one person at a time to corrupt or otherwise cause permanent damage to valuable information. OFFICE AUTOMATION The use of computers to improve efficiency in the office by removing anyone you would want to talk with over coffee. ON-LINE The idea that a human being should always be accessible to a computer. PASCAL A programming language named after a man who would turn over in his grave if he knew about it. PERFORMANCE A statement of the speed at which a computer system works; or rather, might work under certain circumstances; or was rumored to be working over in Jersey about a month ago. PIXEL A mischievous, magical spirit associated with screen displays. The computer industry has frequently borrowed from mythology: Witness the sprites in computer graphics, the demons in artificial intelligence, and the trolls in the marketing department. PRIORITY A statement of the importance of a user or a program. Often expressed as a relative priority, indicating that the user doesn't care when the work is completed so long as he is treated less badly than someone else. PROGRAMMER See definition of ENGINEER; replace all occurrences of PROGRAMMER with ENGINEER. PROTOTYPE First stage in the life cycle of a computer product, followed by pre-alpha, alpha, beta, release version, corrected release version, upgrade, corrected upgrade, etc. Unlike its successors, the prototype is not expected to work. QUALITY CONTROL Assuring that the quality of a product does not get out of hand and add to the cost of its manufacture or design. REGISTER A part of a computer's processor that holds information for a while. Number of registers in a given system is N-3 where N is the number needed to efficiently implement a function. REGRESSION ANALYSIS Mathematical techniques for trying to understand why things are getting worse. REVOLUTIONARY Repackaged. RS-232 An interface standard (what's that word you just said?) between computers, modems and stuff. Notable characteristics a universal uncertainty about switching pins 2 and 3. Uses bipolar signals; was probably designed by the CEO of a power supply manufacturer. Has signals nobody ever uses except the peripheral you just bought. SAMFU Self-adjusting military fuck-up. (see FOO) SAPFU Surpassing all previous fuck-ups. (see FOO) SNAFU Situation Normal: All Fucked Up. (see FOO) STACK A memory space used to entertain the programmers and management by overflowing or being subjected to mismatched PUSH/POPs. STRATEGY A long-range plan whose merit cannot be evaluated until sometime after those creating it have left the organization. SUBROUTINE A unit of software that makes tangled code look like it isn't. Opposite of GOTO (sort of). Useful for overflowing STACKs. SUSFU Situation unchanged, still fucked-up. (see FOO) SYSTEM ADMINISTRATOR: A person whose job it is to do everything that isn't his job. SYSTEMS PROGRAMMER A person in sandals who has been in the elevator with the senior vice president and is ultimately responsible for a phone call you are to receive from you boss. TARFU Things are Really Fucked Up. (see FOO) UNIX A computer operating system, once thought to be flabby and impotent, that now shows a surprising interest in making off with the workstation harem. USER FRIENDLY Supplied with a MOUSE so the user needn't bother with the tutorial, the manual or the program itself. When I went to college in the 1980's, I heard a lot of words like "data input" and "beta version". They confused me. I wanted desparately to know what people were talking about, what Big Secret resided in the computer industry. Now that I've worked for a computer company for the last few years, I've gained an insider's perspective. I decided to share my knowledge with the uninitiated by creating the following brief, handy glossary: Alpha. Software undergoes alpha testing as a first step in getting user feedback. Alpha is Latin for "doesn't work." Beta. Software undergoes beta testing shortly before it's released. Beta is Latin for "still doesn't work". Computer. Instrument of torture. The first computer was invented by Roger "Duffy" Billingsley, a British scientist. In a plot to overthrow Adolf Hitler, Duffy disguiesed himself as a German ally and offered his invention as a gift to the surly dictator. The plot worked. On April 8, 1945, Hitler became so enraged at the "Incompatible File Format" error message that he shot himself. The war ended soon after Hitler's death, and Duffy began working for IBM. CPU. Central propulsion unit. The CPU is the computer's engine. It consists of a hard drive, an interface card and a tiny spinning wheel that's powered by a running rodent - a gerbil if the machine is a 286, a ferret if it's a 386, and a ferret on speed if it's a 486. Default Directory. Black hole. Default directory is where all files that you need disappear to. Error message. Terse, baffling remark used by programmers to place blame on users for the program's shortcomings. File. A document that has been saved with an unidentifiable name. It helps to think of a file as something stored in a file cabinet - except when you try to remove the file, the cabinet gives you an electric shock and tells you the file format is unknown. Hardware. Collective term for any computer-related object that can be kicked or battered. Help. The feature that assists in generating more questions. When the help feature is used correctly, users are able to navigate through a series of Help screens and end up where they started from without learning anything. Input/Output. Information is input from the keyboard as intelligible data and output to the printer as unrecognizable junk. Interim Release. A programmer's feeble attempt at repentance. Memory. Of computer components, the most generous in terms of variety, and the skimpiest in terms of quantity. Printer. A joke in poor taste. A printer consists of three main parts: the case, the jammed paper tray and the blinking red light. Programmer. Computer avenger. Once a member of that group of high school nerds who wore tape on their glasses, played Dungeons and Dragons, and memorized Star Trek episodes; now millionaires who create "user-friendly" software to get revenge on whoever gave them noogies. Reference Manual. Object that raises the monitor to eye level. Also used to compensate for that short table leg. Scheduled Release Date. A carefully calculated date determined by estimating the actual shipping date and subtracting six months from it. User-Friendly. Of or pertaining to any feature, device or concept that makes perfect sense to a programmer. Users. Collective term for those who stare vacantly at a monitor. Users are divided into three types: novice, intermediate, and expert. -Novice users. People who are afraid that simply pressing a key might break their computer. -Intermediate Users. People who don't know how to fix their computer after they've just pressed a key that broke it. - Expert Users. People who break other people's computers.