The New Hacker's Dictionary

The New Hacker's Dictionary
a.k.a.: The Jargon File, Version 4.2.2

By

4.4
(5 Reviews)
The New Hacker's Dictionary by Eric S. Raymond

Published:

1997

Pages:

1569

ISBN:

0262680920

Downloads:

23,810

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The New Hacker's Dictionary
a.k.a.: The Jargon File, Version 4.2.2

By

4.4
(5 Reviews)
This document is a collection of slang terms used by various subcultures of computer hackers. Though some technical material is included for background and flavor, it is not a technical dictionary; what we describe here is the language hackers use among themselves for fun, social communication, and technical debate.

Book Excerpt

effectively stopped growing and changing. Originally, this was due to a desire to freeze the file temporarily to facilitate the production of Steele-1983, but external conditions caused the `temporary' freeze to become permanent.

The AI Lab culture had been hit hard in the late 1970s by funding cuts and the resulting administrative decision to use vendor-supported hardware and software instead of homebrew whenever possible. At MIT, most AI work had turned to dedicated LISP Machines. At the same time, the commercialization of AI technology lured some of the AI Lab's best and brightest away to startups along the Route 128 strip in Massachusetts and out West in Silicon Valley. The startups built LISP machines for MIT; the central MIT-AI computer became a [45]TWENEX system rather than a host for the AI hackers' beloved [46]ITS.

The Stanford AI Lab had effectively ceased to exist by 1980, although the SAIL computer continued as a Computer Science Department resource until 1991. Stanford became a majo