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win => winnitude (a common exclamation)
loss => lossitude
cruft => cruftitude
lame => lameitude |
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Some hackers cheerfully reverse this transformation; they argue, for example, that the horizontal degree lines on a globe ought to be called 'lats' after all, they're measuring latitude! |
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Also, note that all nouns can be verbed. E.g.: "All nouns can be verbed", "I'll mouse it up", "Hang on while I clipboard it over", "I'm grepping the files". English as a whole is already heading in this direction (towards purepositional grammar like Chinese); hackers are simply a bit ahead of the curve. |
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However, hackers avoid the unimaginative verb-making techniques characteristic of marketroids, bean-counters, and the Pentagon; a hacker would never, for example, 'productize', 'prioritize', or 'securitize' things. Hackers have a strong aversion to bureaucratic bafflegab and regard those who use it with contempt. |
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Similarly, all verbs can be nouned. This is only a slight overgeneralization in modern English; in hackish, however, it is good form to mark them in some standard nonstandard way. Thus: |
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win => winnitude, winnage
disgust => disgustitude
hack => hackification |
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Further, note the prevalence of certain kinds of nonstandard plural forms. Some of these go back quite a ways; the TMRC Dictionary includes an entry which implies that the plural of 'mouse' is meeces, and notes that the defined plural of 'caboose' is 'cabeese'. This latter has apparently been standard (or at least a standard joke) among railfans (railroad enthusiasts) for many years. |
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On a similarly Anglo-Saxon note, almost anything ending in 'x' may form plurals in '-xen' (see VAXen and boxen in the main text). Even words ending in phonetic /k/ alone are sometimes treated this way; e.g., 'soxen' for a bunch of socks. Other funny plurals are 'frobbotzim' for the plural of 'frobbozz' (see frobnitz) and 'Unices' and 'Twenices' (rather than 'Unixes' and 'Twenexes'; see Unix, TWENEX in main text). But note that 'Unixen' and 'Twenexen' are never used; it has been suggested that this is because '-ix' and '-ex' are Latin singular endings that attract a Latinate plural. Finally, it |
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