• Jargon Lexicon

    Search the Jargon File, a comprehensive compendium of hacker slang illuminating many aspects of hackish tradition, folklore, and humor.

    Search term:

    Alternatively, browse terms starting with:

    0 A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
  • Meat for the hacker's diet

    The Jargon File is great by itself, but it also has plenty of references to invaluable resources, born from the quintessence of the hacker community. For your convenience we have compiled the list of all books that have been mentioned throughout the Jargon File. Here's a random example:

    Applied Cryptography

    Applied Cryptography

    Bruce Schneier; 2nd ed., 1996, John Wiley & Sons, ISBN 0-471-11709-9.

    Cryptographic techniques have applications far beyond the obvious uses of encoding and decoding information. For Internet developers who need to know about capabilities, such as digital signatures, that depend on cryptographic techniques, there's no better overview than Applied Cryptography, the definitive book on the subject. Bruce Schneier covers general classes of cryptographic protocols and then specific techniques, detailing the inner workings of real-world cryptographic algorithms including the Data Encryption Standard and RSA public-key cryptosystems. The book includes source-code listings and extensive advice on the practical aspects of cryptography implementation, such as the importance of generating truly random numbers and of keeping keys secure.

    This book has been mentioned in the following pages of the Jargon File: Alice and Bob.



  • Random terms

    choke

    choke v.

    [common] To reject input, often ungracefully. “NULs make System V's lpr(1) choke.” “I tried building an EMACS binary to use X, but cpp(1) choked on all those #defines.” See barf, vi.

    pseudosuit

    pseudosuit /soo´doh·s[y]oot`/ n.

    A 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 lobotomy.

    bogon

    bogon /boh´gon/ n.

    [very common; by analogy with proton/electron/neutron, but doubtless reinforced after 1980 by the similarity to Douglas Adams's ‘Vogons’; see the Bibliography in Appendix C and note that Arthur Dent actually mispronounces ‘Vogons’ as ‘Bogons’ at one point]

    1. The elementary particle of bogosity (see quantum bogodynamics). For instance, “the Ethernet is emitting bogons again” means that it is broken or acting in an erratic or bogus fashion.