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Historical note: Though this term is nowadays associated with C programming, it was already in use in a very similar sense in the Algol-60 and FORTRAN communities in the 1960s. |
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all-elbows adj. [MS-DOS] Of a TSR (terminate-and-stay-resident) IBM PC program, such as the N pop-up calendar and calculator utilities that circulate on BBS systems: unsociable. Used to describe a program that rudely steals the resources that it needs without considering that other TSRs may also be resident. One particularly common form of rudeness is lock-up due to programs fighting over the keyboard interrupt. See rude, also mess-dos. |
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alpha particles n. See bit rot. |
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alt /awlt/ 1. n. The alt shift key on an IBM PC or clone keyboard; see bucky bits, sense 2 (though typical PC usage does not simply set the 0200 bit). 2. n. The 'clover' or 'Command' key on a Macintosh; use of this term usually reveals that the speaker hacked PCs before coming to the Mac (see also feature key). Some Mac hackers, confusingly, reserve 'alt' for the Option key (and it is so labeled on some Mac II keyboards). 3. n., obs. [PDP-10; often capitalized to ALT] Alternate name for the ASCII ESC character (ASCII 0011011), after the keycap labeling on some older terminals; also altmode (/awlt'mohd/). This character was almost never pronounced 'escape' on an ITS system, in TECO, or under TOPS-10 always alt, as in "Type alt alt to end a TECO command" or "alt-U onto the system" (for "log onto the [ITS] system''). This usage probably arose because alt is more convenient to say than 'escape', especially when followed by another alt or a character (or another alt and a character, for that matter). 4. The alt hierarchy on Usenet, the tree of newsgroups created by users without a formal vote and approval procedure. There is a myth, not entirely implausible, that alt is acronymic for "anarchists, lunatics, and terrorists"; but in fact it is simply short for "alternative". |
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alt bit /awlt bit/ [from alternate] adj. See meta bit. |
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altmode n. Syn. alt sense 3. |
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Aluminum Book n. [MIT] Common LISP: The Language, by Guy L. Steele Jr. (Digital Press, first edition 1984, second edition 1990). Note that due to a technical screwup some printings of the second edition are actually of a color the author describes succinctly as "yucky green". See also book titles. |
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