|
|
|
|
|
|
|
and loathing). Also mess-loss, messy-dos, mess-dog, mess-dross, mush-dos, and various combinations thereof. In Ireland and the U.K. it is even sometimes called 'Domestos' after a brand of toilet cleanser. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
meta /me't / or /may't/ or (Commonwealth) /mee't/ adj.,pref. [from analytic philosophy] One level of description up. A metasyntactic variable is a variable in notation used to describe syntax, and meta-language is language used to describe language. This is difficult to explain briefly, but much hacker humor turns on deliberate confusion between meta-levels. See hacker humor. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
meta bit n. The top bit of an 8-bit character, which is on in character values 128255. Also called high bit, alt bit, or hobbit. Some terminals and consoles (see space-cadet keyboard) have a META shift key. Others (including, mirabile dictu, keyboards on IBM PC-class machines) have an ALT key. See also bucky bits. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Historical note: although in modern usage shaped by a universe of 8-bit bytes the meta bit is invariably hex 80 (octal 0200), things were different on earlier machines with 36-bit words and 9-bit bytes. The MIT and Stanford keyboards (see space-cadet keyboard) generated hex 100 (octal 400) from their meta keys. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
metasyntactic variable n. A name used in examples and understood to stand for whatever thing is under discussion, or any random member of a class of things under discussion. The word foo is the canonical example. To avoid confusion, hackers never (well, hardly ever) use 'foo' or other words like it as permanent names for anything. In filenames, a common convention is that any filename beginning with a metasyntactic-variable name is a scratch file that may be deleted at any time. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
To some extent, the list of one's preferred metasyntactic variables is a cultural signature. They occur both in series (used for related groups of variables or objects) and as singletons. Here are a few common signatures: |
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
MIT/Stanford usage, now found everywhere |
|
|
|
| | |
|
|
|
|
(thanks largely to early versions of this lexicon!). At MIT (but not at Stanford), baz dropped out of use for a while in the 1970s and '80s. A common recent mutation of this sequence inserts qux before quux. |
|
|
|
| | |
|
|
|
|
Stanford (from mid-'70s on). |
|
|
|
|
|
|