= W =
=====

   :wabbit: /wab'it/ n.  [almost certainly from Elmer Fudd's
immortal line "You wascawwy wabbit!"] 1. A legendary early hack
reported on a System/360 at RPI and elsewhere around 1978; this may
have descended (if only by inspiration) from a hack called RABBITS
reported from 1969 on a Burroughs 5500 at the University of
Washington Computer Center.  The program would make two copies of
itself every time it was run, eventually crashing the system.     2. By
extension, any hack that includes infinite self-replication    but is
not a {virus} or {worm}.  See {fork bomb} and    {rabbit job}, see also
{cookie monster}.

   :WAITS:: /wayts/ n.  The mutant cousin of {{TOPS-10}} used    on a
handful of systems at {{SAIL}} up to 1990.  There was never    an
`official' expansion of WAITS (the name itself having been    arrived
at by a rather sideways process), but it was frequently    glossed as
`West-coast Alternative to ITS'.  Though WAITS was less    visible than
ITS, there was frequent exchange of people and ideas    between the two
communities, and innovations pioneered at WAITS    exerted enormous
indirect influence.  The early screen modes of    {EMACS}, for example,
were directly inspired by WAITS's `E'    editor -- one of a family of
editors that were the first to do    `real-time editing', in which the
editing commands were invisible    and where one typed text at the
point of insertion/overwriting.     The modern style of multi-region
windowing is said to have    originated there, and WAITS alumni at
XEROX PARC and elsewhere    played major roles in the developments that
led to the XEROX Star,    the Macintosh, and the Sun workstations.
Also invented there were    {bucky bits} -- thus, the ALT key on every
IBM PC is a WAITS    legacy.  One WAITS feature very notable in pre-Web
days was    a news-wire interface that allowed WAITS hackers to read,
store,    and filter AP and UPI dispatches from their terminals; the
system    also featured a still-unusual level of support for what is now
  called `multimedia' computing, allowing analog audio and video
signals to be switched to programming terminals.

   :waldo: /wol'doh/ n.  [From Robert A. Heinlein's story    "Waldo"]
1. A mechanical agent, such as a gripper arm,    controlled by a human
limb.  When these were developed for the    nuclear industry in the
mid-1940s they were named after the    invention described by Heinlein
in the story, which he wrote in    1942.  Now known by the more generic
term `telefactoring', this    technology is of intense interest to NASA
for tasks like space    station maintenance.  2. At Harvard
(particularly by Tom Cheatham    and students), this is used instead of
{foobar} as a    metasyntactic variable and general nonsense word.  See
{foo},    {bar}, {foobar}, {quux}.

   :walk: n.,vt.  Traversal of a data structure, especially an    array
or linked-list data structure in {core}.  See also    {codewalker},
{silly walk}, {clobber}.

   :walk off the end of: vt.  To run past the end of an array,    list,
or medium after stepping through it -- a good way to land in
trouble.  Often the result of an {off-by-one error}.  Compare
{clobber}, {roach}, {smash the stack}.

   :walking drives: n.  An occasional failure mode of    magnetic-disk
drives back in the days when they were huge, clunky    {washing
machine}s.  Those old {dinosaur} parts carried    terrific angular
momentum; the combination of a misaligned spindle    or worn bearings
and stick-slip interactions with the floor could    cause them to
`walk' across a room, lurching alternate corners    forward a couple of
millimeters at a time.  There is a legend about    a drive that walked
over to the only door to the computer room and    jammed it shut; the
staff had to cut a hole in the wall in order to    get at it!  Walking
could also be induced by certain patterns of    drive access (a fast
seek across the whole width of the disk,    followed by a slow seek in
the other direction).  Some bands of    old-time hackers figured out
how to induce disk-accessing patterns    that would do this to
particular drive models and held disk-drive    races.

   :wall: interj.  [WPI] 1. An indication of confusion, usually spoken
 with a quizzical tone: "Wall??"  2. A request for further
explication.  Compare {octal forty}.  3. [Unix, from `write    all'] v.
To send a message to everyone currently logged in,    esp. with the
wall(8) utility.

   It is said that sense 1 came from the idiom `like talking to a
blank wall'.  It was originally used in situations where, after you
had carefully answered a question, the questioner stared at you
blankly, clearly having understood nothing that was explained.  You
would then throw out a "Hello, wall?" to elicit some sort of
response from the questioner.  Later, confused questioners began
voicing "Wall?" themselves.

   :wall follower: n.  A person or algorithm that compensates for
lack of sophistication or native stupidity by efficiently following
some simple procedure shown to have been effective in the past.
Used of an algorithm, this is not necessarily pejorative; it    recalls
`Harvey Wallbanger', the winning robot in an early AI    contest
(named, of course, after the cocktail).  Harvey    successfully solved
mazes by keeping a `finger' on one wall and    running till it came out
the other end.  This was inelegant, but it    was mathematically
guaranteed to work on simply-connected mazes --    and, in fact, Harvey
outperformed more sophisticated robots that    tried to `learn' each
maze by building an internal    representation of it.  Used of humans,
the term _is_    pejorative and implies an uncreative, bureaucratic,
by-the-book    mentality.  See also {code grinder}; compare {droid}.

   :wall time: n.  (also `wall clock time') 1. `Real world'    time
(what the clock on the wall shows), as opposed to the system    clock's
idea of time.  2. The real running time of a program, as    opposed to
the number of {tick}s required to execute it (on a    timesharing
system these always differ, as no one program gets all    the ticks,
and on multiprocessor systems with good thread support    one may get
more processor time than real time).

   :wall wart: n.  A small power-supply brick with integral    male
plug, designed to plug directly into a wall outlet.  These are
frequently associated with modems and other small electronic    devices
which would become unacceptably bulky or hot if they had    power
supplies on board (there are other reasons as well having    to do with
the cost of UL certification).

   :wallpaper: n.  1. A file containing a listing (e.g., assembly
listing) or a transcript, esp. a file containing a transcript of    all
or part of a login session.  (The idea was that the paper for    such
listings was essentially good only for wallpaper, as evidenced    at
Stanford, where it was used to cover windows.)  Now rare, esp.
since other systems have developed other terms for it (e.g., PHOTO
on TWENEX).  However, the Unix world doesn't have an equivalent
term, so perhaps {wallpaper} will take hold there.  The term
probably originated on ITS, where the commands to begin and end
transcript files were `:WALBEG' and `:WALEND', with    default file
`WALL PAPER' (the space was a path delimiter).     2. The background
pattern used on graphical workstations (this is    techspeak under the
`Windows' graphical user interface to    MS-DOS).  3. `wallpaper file'
n. The file that contains the    wallpaper information before it is
actually printed on paper.     (Even if you don't intend ever to
produce a real paper copy of the    file, it is still called a
wallpaper file.)

   :wango: /wang'goh/ n.  Random bit-level {grovel}ling    going on in
a system during some unspecified operation.  Often used    in
combination with {mumble}.  For example: "You start with the    `.o'
file, run it through this postprocessor that does mumble-wango    --
and it comes out a snazzy object-oriented executable."

   :wank: /wangk/ n.,v.,adj.  [Columbia University: prob. by
mutation from Commonwealth slang v. `wank', to masturbate] Used    much
as {hack} is elsewhere, as a noun denoting a clever    technique or
person or the result of such cleverness.  May describe    (negatively)
the act of hacking for hacking's sake ("Quit wanking,    let's go get
supper!") or (more positively) a {wizard}.  Adj.     `wanky' describes
something particularly clever (a person,    program, or algorithm).
Conversations can also get wanky when    there are too many wanks
involved.  This excess wankiness is    signalled by an overload of the
`wankometer' (compare    {bogometer}).  When the wankometer overloads,
the conversation's    subject must be changed, or all non-wanks will
leave.  Compare    `neep-neeping' (under {neep-neep}).  Usage: U.S.
only.  In    Britain and the Commonwealth this word is _extremely_ rude
and    is best avoided unless one intends to give offense.

   :wannabee: /won'*-bee/ n.  (also, more plausibly, spelled
`wannabe') [from a term recently used to describe Madonna fans    who
dress, talk, and act like their idol; prob. originally from    biker
slang] A would-be {hacker}.  The connotations of this term    differ
sharply depending on the age and exposure of the subject.     Used of a
person who is in or might be entering {larval stage},    it is
semi-approving; such wannabees can be annoying but most    hackers
remember that they, too, were once such creatures.  When    used of any
professional programmer, CS academic, writer, or    {suit}, it is
derogatory, implying that said person is trying to    cuddle up to the
hacker mystique but doesn't, fundamentally, have a    prayer of
understanding what it is all about.  Overuse of terms    from this
lexicon is often an indication of the {wannabee}    nature.  Compare
{newbie}.

   Historical note: The wannabee phenomenon has a slightly different
flavor now (1993) than it did ten or fifteen years ago.  When the
people who are now hackerdom's tribal elders were in {larval    stage},
the process of becoming a hacker was largely unconscious    and
unaffected by models known in popular culture -- communities    formed
spontaneously around people who, _as individuals_, felt    irresistibly
drawn to do hackerly things, and what wannabees    experienced was a
fairly pure, skill-focused desire to become    similarly wizardly.
Those days of innocence are gone forever;    society's adaptation to
the advent of the microcomputer after 1980    included the elevation of
the hacker as a new kind of folk hero,    and the result is that some
people semi-consciously set out to    _be hackers_ and borrow hackish
prestige by fitting the    popular image of hackers.  Fortunately, to
do this really well, one    has to actually become a wizard.
Nevertheless, old-time hackers    tend to share a poorly articulated
disquiet about the change; among    other things, it gives them mixed
feelings about the effects of    public compendia of lore like this
one.

   :war dialer: n.  A cracking tool, a program that calls a given
list or range of phone numbers and records those which answer with
handshake tones (and so might be entry points to computer or
telecommunications systems).  Some of these programs have become
quite sophisticated, and can now detect modem, fax, or PBX tones    and
log each one separately.  The war dialer is one of the most
important tools in the {phreaker}'s kit.  These programs evolved
from early {demon dialer}s.

   :warez: /weirz/ n.  Widely used in {cracker} subcultures    to
denote cracked version of commercial software, that is versions    from
which copy-protection has been stripped.  Hackers recognize    this
term but don't use it themselves.  See {warez d00dz}.

   :warez d00dz: /weirz doodz/ n.  A substantial subculture of
{cracker}s refer to themselves as `warez d00dz'; there is    evidently
some connection with {B1FF} here.  As `Ozone Pilot',    one former
warez d00d, wrote:

     Warez d00dz get illegal copies of copyrighted software.  If it has
     copy protection on it, they break the protection so the software
     can be copied.  Then they distribute it around the world via
     several gateways.  Warez d00dz form badass group names like RAZOR
     and the like.  They put up boards that distribute the latest ware,
     or pirate program.  The whole point of the Warez sub-culture is to
     get the pirate program released and distributed before any other
     group.  I know, I know.  But don't ask, and it won't hurt as much.
     This is how they prove their poweress [sic].  It gives them the
     right to say, "I released King's Quest IVXIX before you so
     obviously my testicles are larger." Again don't ask...

   The studly thing to do if one is a warez d00d, it appears, is emit
`0-day warez', that is copies of commercial software copied and
cracked on the same day as its retail release.  Warez d00ds also
hoard software in a big way, collecting untold megabytes of
arcade-style games, pornographic GIFs, and applications they'll
never use onto their hard disks.  As Ozone Pilot acutely observes:

     [BELONG] is the only word you will need to know.  Warez d00dz want
     to belong.  They have been shunned by everyone, and thus turn to
     cyberspace for acceptance.  That is why they always start groups
     like TGW, FLT, USA and the like.  Structure makes them happy. [...]
     Warez d00dz will never have a handle like "Pink Daisy" because
     warez d00dz are insecure.  Only someone who is very secure with a
     good dose of self-esteem can stand up to the cries of fag and
     girlie-man.  More likely you will find warez d00dz with handles
     like:  Doctor Death, Deranged Lunatic, Hellraiser, Mad Prince,
     Dreamdevil, The Unknown, Renegade Chemist, Terminator, and Twin
     Turbo.  They like to sound badass when they can hide behind their
     terminals.  More likely, if you were given a sample of 100 people,
     the person whose handle is Hellraiser is the last person you'd
     associate with the name.

   The contrast with Internet hackers is stark and instructive.  See
{cracker}, {wannabee}, {handle}, {elite}; compare    {weenie}, {spod}.

   :warez kiddies: n.  Even more derogatory way of referring    to
{warez d00dz}; refers to the fact that most warez d00dz are    around
the age of puberty. Compare {script kiddies}.

   :warlording: v.  [from the Usenet group alt.fan.warlord]    The act
of excoriating a bloated, ugly, or derivative {sig    block}.  Common
grounds for warlording include the presence of a    signature rendered
in a {BUAF}, over-used or cliched {sig    quote}s, ugly {ASCII art}, or
simply excessive size.  The    original `Warlord' was a {B1FF}-like
{newbie} c.1991 who    featured in his sig a particularly large and
obnoxious ASCII    graphic resembling the sword of Conan the Barbarian
in the 1981    John Milius movie; the group name alt.fan.warlord was
sarcasm,    and the characteristic mode of warlording is devastatingly
 sarcastic praise.

   :warm boot: n.  See {boot}.

   :wart: n.  A small, {crock}y {feature} that sticks out    of an
otherwise {clean} design.  Something conspicuous for    localized
ugliness, especially a special-case exception to a    general rule.
For example, in some versions of `csh(1)',    single quotes literalize
every character inside them except    `!'.  In ANSI C, the `??' syntax
used for obtaining ASCII    characters in a foreign environment is a
wart.  See also    {miswart}.

   :washing machine: n.  1. Old-style 14-inch hard disks in
floor-standing cabinets.  So called because of the size of the
cabinet and the `top-loading' access to the media packs -- and, of
course, they were always set on `spin cycle'.  The    washing-machine
idiom transcends language barriers; it is even used    in Russian
hacker jargon.  See also {walking drives}.  The thick    channel cables
connecting these were called `bit hoses' (see    {hose}, sense 3).  2.
[CMU] A machine used exclusively for    {washing software}.  CMU has
clusters of these.

   :washing software: n.  The process of recompiling a software
distribution (used more often when the recompilation is occuring
from scratch) to pick up and merge together all of the various
changes that have been made to the source.

   :water MIPS: n.  (see {MIPS}, sense 2) Large, water-cooled
machines of either today's ECL-supercomputer flavor or yesterday's
traditional {mainframe} type.

   :wave a dead chicken: v.  To perform a ritual in the direction    of
crashed software or hardware that one believes to be futile but    is
nevertheless necessary so that others are satisfied that an
appropriate degree of effort has been expended.  "I'll wave a dead
chicken over the source code, but I really think we've run into an
OS bug."  Compare {voodoo programming}, {rain dance}; see    also
{casting the runes}.

   :weasel: n.  [Cambridge] A naive user, one who deliberately or
accidentally does things that are stupid or ill-advised.  Roughly
synonymous with {loser}.

   :web pointer: n.  A World Wide Web {URL}. See also    {hotlink},
which has slightly different connotations.

   :web toaster: n.  A small specialized computer, shipped    with no
monitor or keyboard or any other external peripherals,
pre-configured to be controlled through an Ethernet port and
function as a WWW server.  Products of this kind (for example the
Cobalt Qube) are often about the size of a toaster. See    {toaster};
compare {video toaster}.

   :webify: n.  [MIT] To put a piece of (possibly already    existing)
material on the WWW.  Frequently used for papers ("Why    don't you
webify all your publications?") or for demos ("They    webified their
6.866 final project").

   :webmaster: n.  [WWW: from {postmaster}] The person at a    site
providing World Wide Web information who is responsible for
maintaining the public pages and keeping the Web server running and
properly configured.

   :wedged: adj.  1. To be stuck, incapable of proceeding    without
help.  This is different from having crashed.  If the    system has
crashed, it has become totally non-functioning.  If the    system is
wedged, it is trying to do something but cannot make    progress; it
may be capable of doing a few things, but not be fully    operational.
For example, a process may become wedged if it    {deadlock}s with
another (but not all instances of wedging are    deadlocks).  See also
{gronk}, {locked up}, {hosed},    {hung} (wedged is more severe than
{hung}).  2. Often refers    to humans suffering misconceptions.  "He's
totally wedged -- he's    convinced that he can levitate through
meditation."  3. [Unix]    Specifically used to describe the state of a
TTY left in a losing    state by abort of a screen-oriented program or
one that has messed    with the line discipline in some obscure way.

   There is some dispute over the origin of this term.  It is usually
thought to derive from a common description of recto-cranial
inversion; however, it may actually have originated with older
`hot-press' printing technology in which physical type elements    were
locked into type frames with wedges driven in by mallets.     Once this
had been done, no changes in the typesetting for that    page could be
made.

   :wedgie: n.  [Fairchild] A bug.  Prob. related to {wedged}.

   :wedgitude: /wedj'i-t[y]ood/ n.  The quality or state of    being
{wedged}.

   :weeble: /weeb'l/ interj.  [Cambridge] Used to denote
frustration, usually at amazing stupidity.  "I stuck the disk in
upside down."  "Weeble...." Compare {gurfle}.

   :weeds: n.  1. Refers to development projects or algorithms    that
have no possible relevance or practical application.  Comes    from
`off in the weeds'.  Used in phrases like "lexical analysis    for
microcode is serious weeds...." 2. At CDC/ETA before its    demise, the
phrase `go off in the weeds' was equivalent to IBM's    {branch to
Fishkill} and mainstream hackerdom's {jump off    into never-never
land}.

   :weenie: n.  1. [on BBSes] Any of a species of luser    resembling a
less amusing version of {B1FF} that infests many    {BBS} systems.  The
typical weenie is a teenage boy with poor    social skills travelling
under a grandiose {handle} derived from    fantasy or heavy-metal rock
lyrics.  Among sysops, `the weenie    problem' refers to the marginally
literate and profanity-laden    {flamage} weenies tend to spew all over
a newly-discovered BBS.     Compare {spod}, {computer geek}, {terminal
junkie},    {warez d00dz}.  2. [Among hackers] When used with a
qualifier    (for example, as in {Unix weenie}, VMS weenie, IBM weenie)
this    can be either an insult or a term of praise, depending on
context,    tone of voice, and whether or not it is applied by a person
who    considers him or herself to be the same sort of weenie.  Implies
  that the weenie has put a major investment of time, effort, and
concentration into the area indicated; whether this is good or bad
depends on the hearer's judgment of how the speaker feels about    that
area.  See also {bigot}.  3. The semicolon character,    `;' (ASCII
0111011).

   :Weenix: /wee'niks/ n.   1. [ITS] A derogatory term for    {{Unix}},
derived from {Unix weenie}.  According to one noted    ex-ITSer, it is
"the operating system preferred by Unix Weenies:    typified by poor
modularity, poor reliability, hard file deletion,    no file version
numbers, case sensitivity everywhere, and users who    believe that
these are all advantages".  (Some ITS fans behave as    though they
believe Unix stole a future that rightfully belonged to    them.  See
{{ITS}}, sense 2.)  2. [Brown University] A Unix-like    OS developed
for tutorial purposes at Brown University.  See
`http://www.cs.brown.edu/courses/cs167/weenix.html'.  Named
independently of the ITS usage.

   :well-behaved: adj.  1. [primarily {{MS-DOS}}] Said of    software
conforming to system interface guidelines and standards.
Well-behaved software uses the operating system to do chores such    as
keyboard input, allocating memory and drawing graphics.  Oppose
{ill-behaved}.  2. Software that does its job quietly and    without
counterintuitive effects.  Esp. said of software having    an interface
spec sufficiently simple and well-defined that it can    be used as a
{tool} by other software.  See {cat}.  3.  Said    of an algorithm that
doesn't {crash} or {blow up}, even when    given {pathological} input.
Implies that the stability of the    algorithm is intrinsic, which
makes this somewhat different from    {bulletproof}.

   :well-connected: adj.  Said of a computer installation,    asserts
that it has reliable email links with the network and/or    that it
relays a large fraction of available {Usenet}    newsgroups.
`Well-known' can be almost synonymous, but also    implies that the
site's name is familiar to many (due perhaps to an    archive service
or active Usenet users).

   :wetware: /wet'weir/ n.  [prob. from the novels of Rudy    Rucker]
1. The human nervous system, as opposed to computer    hardware or
software.  "Wetware has 7 plus or minus 2 temporary    registers."  2.
Human beings (programmers, operators,    administrators) attached to a
computer system, as opposed to the    system's hardware or software.
See {liveware}, {meatware}.

   :whack: v.  According to arch-hacker James Gosling (designer of
{NeWS}, {GOSMACS} and Java), to "...modify a program with no    idea
whatsoever how it works." (See {whacker}.)  It is actually    possible
to do this in nontrivial circumstances if the change is    small and
well-defined and you are very good at {glark}ing    things from
context.  As a trivial example, it is relatively easy    to change all
`stderr' writes to `stdout' writes in a    piece of C filter code which
remains otherwise mysterious.

   :whack-a-mole: n.  [Usenet] The practice of repeatedly    causing
spammers' {throwaway account}s and drop boxes to be    terminated.
Named for the carnival game which involves quickly and    repeatedly
hitting the heads of mechanical moles with a mallet as    they pop up
from their holes.

   :whacker: n.  [University of Maryland: from {hacker}] 1. A
person, similar to a {hacker}, who enjoys exploring the details    of
programmable systems and how to stretch their capabilities.     Whereas
a hacker tends to produce great hacks, a whacker only ends    up
whacking the system or program in question.  Whackers are often
quite egotistical and eager to claim {wizard} status, regardless    of
the views of their peers.  2. A person who is good at    programming
quickly, though rather poorly and ineptly.

   :whales: n.  See {like kicking dead whales down the beach}.

   :whalesong: n.  The peculiar clicking and whooshing sounds    made
by a PEP modem such as the Telebit Trailblazer as it tries to
synchronize with another PEP modem for their special high-speed
mode.  This sound isn't anything like the normal two-tone handshake
between conventional V-series modems and is instantly recognizable
to anyone who has heard it more than once.  It sounds, in fact,    very
much like whale songs.  This noise is also called "the moose    call"
or "moose tones".

   :What's a spline?:  [XEROX PARC] This phrase expands to: "You
have just used a term that I've heard for a year and a half, and I
feel I should know, but don't.  My curiosity has finally overcome    my
guilt."  The PARC lexicon adds "Moral: don't hesitate to ask
questions, even if they seem obvious."

   :wheel: n.  [from slang `big wheel' for a powerful person] A
person who has an active {wheel bit}.  "We need to find a wheel    to
unwedge the hung tape drives."  (See {wedged}, sense 1.)     The
traditional name of security group zero in {BSD} (to which    the major
system-internal users like {root} belong) is    `wheel'.  Some vendors
have expanded on this usage, modifying    Unix so that only members of
group `wheel' can {go root}.

   :wheel bit: n.  A privilege bit that allows the possessor to
perform some restricted operation on a timesharing system, such as
read or write any file on the system regardless of protections,
change or look at any address in the running monitor, crash or
reload the system, and kill or create jobs and user accounts.  The
term was invented on the TENEX operating system, and carried over    to
TOPS-20, XEROX-IFS, and others.  The state of being in a    privileged
logon is sometimes called `wheel mode'.  This term    entered the Unix
culture from TWENEX in the mid-1980s and has been    gaining popularity
there (esp. at university sites).  See also    {root}.

   :wheel wars: n.  [Stanford University] A period in {larval    stage}
during which student hackers hassle each other by attempting    to log
each other out of the system, delete each other's files, and
otherwise wreak havoc, usually at the expense of the lesser users.

   :White Book: n.  1. Syn. {K&R}.  2. Adobe's fourth book in    the
PostScript series, describing the previously-secret format of    Type 1
fonts; "Adobe Type 1 Font Format, version 1.1",    (Addison-Wesley,
1990, ISBN 0-201-57044-0). See also {Red Book},    {Green Book}, {Blue
Book}.

   :whizzy: adj.  (alt. `wizzy') [Sun] Describes a {cuspy}    program;
one that is feature-rich and well presented.

   :wibble:  [UK] 1. n.,v. Commonly used to describe chatter,
content-free remarks or other essentially meaningless contributions
to threads in newsgroups. "Oh, rspence is wibbling again".     2. [UK
IRC] An explicit on-line no-op equivalent to {humma}.     3. One of the
preferred {metasyntactic variable}s in the UK,    forming a series with
`wobble', `wubble', and `flob'    (attributed to the hilarious
historical comedy    "Blackadder"). 4. A pronounciation of the letters
"www", as    seen in URLs; i.e., www.{foo}.com may be pronounced
"wibble dot foo    dot com".

   :WIBNI: // n.  [Bell Labs: Wouldn't It Be Nice If] What most
requirements documents and specifications consist entirely of.
Compare {IWBNI}.

   :widget: n.  1. A meta-thing.  Used to stand for a real object    in
didactic examples (especially database tutorials).  Legend has    it
that the original widgets were holders for buggy whips.  "But
suppose the parts list for a widget has 52 entries...."     2. [poss.
evoking `window gadget'] A user interface object in    {X} graphical
user interfaces.

   :wiggles: n.  [scientific computation] In solving partial
differential equations by finite difference and similar methods,
wiggles are sawtooth (up-down-up-down) oscillations at the shortest
wavelength representable on the grid.  If an algorithm is unstable,
this is often the most unstable waveform, so it grows to dominate
the solution.  Alternatively, stable (though inaccurate) wiggles    can
be generated near a discontinuity by a Gibbs phenomenon.

   :WIMP environment: n.  [acronym: `Window, Icon, Menu, Pointing
device (or Pull-down menu)'] A graphical-user-interface environment
such as {X} or the Macintosh interface, esp. as described by a
hacker who prefers command-line interfaces for their superior
flexibility and extensibility.  However, it is also used without
negative connotations; one must pay attention to voice tone and
other signals to interpret correctly.  See {menuitis},
{user-obsequious}.

   :win:  [MIT] 1. vi. To succeed.  A program wins if no    unexpected
conditions arise, or (especially) if it sufficiently    {robust} to
take exceptions in stride.  2. n. Success, or a    specific instance
thereof.  A pleasing outcome.  "So it turned out    I could use a
{lexer} generator instead of hand-coding my own    pattern recognizer.
What a win!"  Emphatic forms: `moby win',    `super win', `hyper-win'
(often used interjectively as a    reply).  For some reason `suitable
win' is also common at MIT,    usually in reference to a satisfactory
solution to a problem.     Oppose {lose}; see also {big win}, which
isn't quite just an    intensification of `win'.

   :win big: vi.  To experience serendipity.  "I went shopping    and
won big; there was a 2-for-1 sale."  See {big win}.

   :win win: excl.  Expresses pleasure at a {win}.

   :Winchester:: n.  Informal generic term for    sealed-enclosure
magnetic-disk drives in which the read-write head    planes over the
disk surface on an air cushion.  There is a legend    that the name
arose because the original 1973 engineering prototype    for what later
became the IBM 3340 featured two 30-megabyte    volumes; 30-30 became
`Winchester' when somebody noticed the    similarity to the common term
for a famous Winchester rifle (in the    latter, the first 30 referred
to caliber and the second to the    grain weight of the charge).  (It
is sometimes incorrectly claimed    that Winchester was the laboratory
in which the technology was    developed.)

   :windoid: n.  In the Macintosh world, a style of window with    much
less adornment (smaller or missing title bar, zoom box, etc,    etc)
than a standard window.

   :window shopping: n.  [US Geological Survey] Among users of    {WIMP
environment}s like {X} or the Macintosh, extended    experimentation
with new window colors, fonts, and icon shapes.     This activity can
take up hours of what might otherwise have been    productive working
time.  "I spent the afternoon window shopping    until I found the
coolest shade of green for my active window    borders -- now they
perfectly match my medium slate blue    background."  Serious window
shoppers will spend their days with    bitmap editors, creating new and
different icons and background    patterns for all to see.  Also:
`window dressing', the act of    applying new fonts, colors, etc.  See
{fritterware}, compare    {macdink}.

   :Windoze: /win'dohz/ n.  See {Microsloth Windows}.

   :winged comments: n.  Comments set on the same line as code,    as
opposed to {boxed comments}.  In C, for example:

     d = sqrt(x*x + y*y);  /* distance from origin */

Generally these refer only to the action(s) taken on that line.

   :winkey: n.  (alt. `winkey face') See {emoticon}.

   :winnage: /win'*j/ n.  The situation when a lossage is    corrected,
or when something is winning.

   :winner:  1. n. An unexpectedly good situation, program,
programmer, or person.  2. `real winner': Often sarcastic, but    also
used as high praise (see also the note under {user}).     "He's a real
winner -- never reports a bug till he can duplicate    it and send in
an example."

   :winnitude: /win'*-t[y]ood/ n.  The quality of winning (as
opposed to {winnage}, which is the result of winning).  "Guess    what?
They tweaked the microcode and now the LISP interpreter runs    twice
as fast as it used to."  "That's really great!  Boy, what
winnitude!"  "Yup. I'll probably get a half-hour's winnage on the
next run of my program."  Perhaps curiously, the obvious antonym
`lossitude' is rare.

   :Wintel: n.  Microsoft Windows plus Intel - the tacit    alliance
that dominated desktop computing in the 1990s.  Now (1999)    possibly
on the verge of breaking up under pressure from    {Linux}; see
{Lintel}.

   :wired: n.  See {hardwired}.

   :wirehead: /wi:r'hed/ n.  [prob. from SF slang for an
electrical-brain-stimulation addict] 1. A hardware hacker,
especially one who concentrates on communications hardware.  2. An
expert in local-area networks.  A wirehead can be a network    software
wizard too, but will always have the ability to deal with    network
hardware, down to the smallest component.  Wireheads are    known for
their ability to lash up an Ethernet terminator from    spare
resistors, for example.

   :wirewater: n.  Syn. {programming fluid}.  This melds the
mainstream slang adjective `wired' (stimulated, up, hyperactive)
with `firewater'; however, it refers to caffeinacious rather than
alcoholic beverages.

   :wish list: n.  A list of desired features or bug fixes that
probably won't get done for a long time, usually because the person
responsible for the code is too busy or can't think of a clean way
to do it.  "OK, I'll add automatic filename completion to the wish
list for the new interface."  Compare {tick-list features}.

   :within delta of: adj.  See {delta}.

   :within epsilon of: adj.  See {epsilon}.

   :wizard: n.  1. A person who knows how a complex piece of
software or hardware works (that is, who {grok}s it); esp.     someone
who can find and fix bugs quickly in an emergency.  Someone    is a
{hacker} if he or she has general hacking ability, but is a    wizard
with respect to something only if he or she has specific    detailed
knowledge of that thing.  A good hacker could become a    wizard for
something given the time to study it.  2. A person who    is permitted
to do things forbidden to ordinary people; one who has    {wheel}
privileges on a system.  3. A Unix expert, esp. a Unix    systems
programmer.  This usage is well enough established that    `Unix
Wizard' is a recognized job title at some corporations and to    most
headhunters.  See {guru}, {lord high fixer}.  See also    {deep magic},
{heavy wizardry}, {incantation}, {magic},    {mutter}, {rain dance},
{voodoo programming}, {wave a    dead chicken}.

   :Wizard Book: n.  "Structure and Interpretation of    Computer
Programs" (Hal Abelson, Jerry Sussman and Julie Sussman;    MIT Press,
1984, 1996; ISBN 0-262-01153-0), an excellent computer science    text
used in introductory courses at MIT.  So called because of    the
wizard on the jacket.  One of the {bible}s of the    LISP/Scheme world.
Also, less commonly, known as the {Purple    Book}.

   :wizard mode: n.  [from {rogue}] A special access mode of a
program or system, usually passworded, that permits some users
godlike privileges.  Generally not used for operating systems
themselves (`root mode' or `wheel mode' would be used instead).
This term is often used with respect to games that have editable
state.

   :wizardly: adj.  Pertaining to wizards.  A wizardly    {feature} is
one that only a wizard could understand or use    properly.

   :wok-on-the-wall: n.  A small microwave dish antenna used for
cross-campus private network circuits, from the obvious resemblance
between a microwave dish and the Chinese culinary utensil.

   :womb box: n.  1. [TMRC] Storage space for equipment.     2.
[proposed] A variety of hard-shell equipment case with heavy
interior padding and/or shaped carrier cutouts in a foam-rubber
matrix; mundanely called a `flight case'.  Used for delicate test
equipment, electronics, and musical instruments.

   :WOMBAT: /wom'bat/ adj.  [acronym: Waste Of Money,    Brains, And
Time] Applied to problems which are both profoundly    {uninteresting}
in themselves and unlikely to benefit anyone    interesting even if
solved.  Often used in fanciful constructions    such as `wrestling
with a wombat'.  See also {crawling    horror}, {SMOP}.  Also note the
rather different usage as a    metasyntactic variable in {{Commonwealth
Hackish}}.

   Users of the PDP-11 database program DATATRIEVE adopted the wombat
as their notional mascot; the program's help file responded to
"HELP WOMBAT" with factual information about Real World    wombats.

   :womble: n.  [Unisys UK: from British cartoon characters]    A user
who has great difficulty in communicating their requirements    and/or
in using the resulting software. Extreme case of {luser}. An
especially senior or high-ranking womble is referred to as
Great-Uncle Bulgaria.

   :wonky: /wong'kee/ adj.  [from Australian slang] Yet another
approximate synonym for {broken}.  Specifically connotes a
malfunction that produces behavior seen as crazy, humorous, or
amusingly perverse.  "That was the day the printer's font logic    went
wonky and everybody's listings came out in Tengwar."  Also in
`wonked out'.  See {funky}, {demented}, {bozotic}.

   :woofer: n.  [University of Waterloo] Some varieties of wide
paper for printers have a perforation 8.5 inches from the left
margin that allows the excess on the right-hand side to be torn off
when the print format is 80 columns or less wide.  The right-hand
excess may be called `woofer'.  This term (like {tweeter}) has    been
in use at Waterloo since 1972, but is elsewhere unknown.  In    audio
jargon, the word refers to the bass speaker(s) on a hi-fi.

   :workaround: n.  1. A temporary {kluge} used to bypass,    mask, or
otherwise avoid a {bug} or {misfeature} in some    system.
Theoretically, workarounds are always replaced by    {fix}es; in
practice, customers often find themselves living    with workarounds
for long periods of time.  "The code died on NUL    characters in the
input, so I fixed it to interpret them as    spaces."  "That's not a
fix, that's a workaround!"  2. A    procedure to be employed by the
user in order to do what some    currently non-working feature should
do.  Hypothetical example:    "Using META-F7 {crash}es the 4.43 build
of Weemax, but as a    workaround you can type CTRL-R, then SHIFT-F5,
and delete the    remaining {cruft} by hand."

   :working as designed: adj.  [IBM] 1. In conformance to a wrong    or
inappropriate specification; useful, but misdesigned.     2. Frequently
used as a sardonic comment on a program's utility.     3. Unfortunately
also used as a bogus reason for not accepting a    criticism or
suggestion.  At {IBM}, this sense is used in    official documents!
See {BAD}.

   :worm: n.  [from `tapeworm' in John Brunner's novel    "The
Shockwave Rider", via XEROX PARC] A program that    propagates itself
over a network, reproducing itself as it goes.     Compare {virus}.
Nowadays the term has negative connotations,    as it is assumed that
only {cracker}s write worms.  Perhaps the    best-known example was
Robert T. Morris's {Great Worm} of 1988,    a `benign' one that got out
of control and hogged hundreds of    Suns and VAXen across the U.S.
See also {cracker}, {RTM},    {Trojan horse}, {ice}.

   :wormhole: /werm'hohl/ n.  [from the `wormhole'    singularities
hypothesized in some versions of General Relativity    theory] 1. obs.
A location in a monitor which contains the    address of a routine,
with the specific intent of making it easy to    substitute a different
routine.  This term is now obsolescent;    modern operating systems use
clusters of wormholes extensively (for    modularization of I/O
handling in particular, as in the Unix    device-driver organization)
but the preferred techspeak for these    clusters is `device tables',
`jump tables' or `capability    tables'.  2. [Amateur Packet Radio] A
network path using a    commercial satellite link to join two or more
amateur VHF networks.     So called because traffic routed through a
wormhole leaves and    re-enters the amateur network over great
distances with usually    little clue in the message routing header as
to how it got from one    relay to the other. Compare {gopher hole}
(sense 2).

   :wound around the axle: adj.  In an infinite loop.  Often used    by
older computer types.

   :wrap around: vi.  (also n. `wraparound' and v. shorthand    `wrap')
1. [techspeak] The action of a counter that starts over    at zero or
at `minus infinity' (see {infinity}) after its    maximum value has
been reached, and continues incrementing, either    because it is
programmed to do so or because of an overflow (as    when a car's
odometer starts over at 0).  2. To change {phase}    gradually and
continuously by maintaining a steady wake-sleep cycle    somewhat
longer than 24 hours, e.g., living six long (28-hour) days    in a week
(or, equivalently, sleeping at the rate of 10    microhertz).  This
sense is also called {phase-wrapping}.

   :write-only code: n.  [a play on `read-only memory'] Code    so
arcane, complex, or ill-structured that it cannot be modified or
even comprehended by anyone but its author, and possibly not even    by
him/her.  A {Bad Thing}.

   :write-only language: n.  A language with syntax (or    semantics)
sufficiently dense and bizarre that any routine of    significant size
is automatically {write-only code}.  A    sobriquet applied
occasionally to C and often to APL, though    {INTERCAL} and {TECO}
certainly deserve it more.     See also {Befunge}.

   :write-only memory: n.  The obvious antonym to `read-only
memory'.  Out of frustration with the long and seemingly useless
chain of approvals required of component specifications, during
which no actual checking seemed to occur, an engineer at Signetics
once created a specification for a write-only memory and included    it
with a bunch of other specifications to be approved.  This    inclusion
came to the attention of Signetics {management} only    when regular
customers started calling and asking for pricing    information.
Signetics published a corrected edition of the data    book and
requested the return of the `erroneous' ones.  Later,    around 1974,
Signetics bought a double-page spread in    "Electronics" magazine's
April issue and used the spec as an    April Fools' Day joke.  Instead
of the more conventional    characteristic curves, the 25120 "fully
encoded, 9046 x N, Random    Access, write-only-memory" data sheet
included diagrams of "bit    capacity vs. Temp.", "Iff vs. Vff",
"Number of pins remaining    vs. number of socket insertions", and "AQL
vs. selling    price".  The 25120 required a 6.3 VAC VFF supply, a +10V
VCC, and    VDD of 0V, +/- 2%.

   :Wrong Thing: n.  A design, action, or decision that is    clearly
incorrect or inappropriate.  Often capitalized; always    emphasized in
speech as if capitalized.  The opposite of the    {Right Thing}; more
generally, anything that is not the Right    Thing.  In cases where
`the good is the enemy of the best', the    merely good -- although
good -- is nevertheless the Wrong    Thing. "In C, the default is for
module-level declarations to be    visible everywhere, rather than just
within the module.  This is    clearly the Wrong Thing."

   :wugga wugga: /wuh'g* wuh'g*/ n.  Imaginary sound that a    computer
program makes as it labors with a tedious or difficult    task.{grind}
(sense 4).

   :wumpus: /wuhm'p*s/ n.  The central monster (and, in many
versions, the name) of a famous family of very early computer games
called "Hunt The Wumpus", dating back at least to 1972 (several
years before {ADVENT}) on the Dartmouth Time-Sharing System.     The
wumpus lived somewhere in a cave with the topology of an
dodecahedron's edge/vertex graph (later versions supported other
topologies, including an icosahedron and Mo"bius strip). The    player
started somewhere at random in the cave with five `crooked    arrows';
these could be shot through up to three connected rooms,    and would
kill the wumpus on a hit (later versions introduced the    wounded
wumpus, which got very angry).  Unfortunately for players,    the
movement necessary to map the maze was made hazardous not    merely by
the wumpus (which would eat you if you stepped on him)    but also by
bottomless pits and colonies of super bats that would    pick you up
and drop you at a random location (later versions added    `anaerobic
termites' that ate arrows, bat migrations, and    earthquakes that
randomly changed pit locations).

   This game appears to have been the first to use a non-random
graph-structured map (as opposed to a rectangular grid like the    even
older Star Trek games).  In this respect, as in the    dungeon-like
setting and its terse, amusing messages, it prefigured    {ADVENT} and
{Zork} and was directly ancestral to the latter    (Zork acknowledged
this heritage by including a super-bat colony).     Today, a port is
distributed with SunOS and as freeware for the    Mac.  A C emulation
of the original Basic game is available at the    Retrocomputing
Museum, `http://www.ccil.org/retro'.

   :WYSIAYG: /wiz'ee-ayg/ adj.  Describes a user interface    under
which "What You See Is _All_ You Get"; an unhappy    variant of
{WYSIWYG}.  Visual, `point-and-shoot'-style    interfaces tend to have
easy initial learning curves, but also to    lack depth; they often
frustrate advanced users who would be better    served by a
command-style interface.  When this happens, the    frustrated user has
a WYSIAYG problem.  This term is most often    used of editors, word
processors, and document formatting programs.     WYSIWYG `desktop
publishing' programs, for example, are a clear    win for creating
small documents with lots of fonts and graphics in    them, especially
things like newsletters and presentation slides.     When typesetting
book-length manuscripts, on the other hand, scale    changes the nature
of the task; one quickly runs into WYSIAYG    limitations, and the
increased power and flexibility of a    command-driven formatter like
{{TeX}} or Unix's {{troff}}    becomes not just desirable but a
necessity.  Compare {YAFIYGI}.

   :WYSIWYG: /wiz'ee-wig/ adj.  Describes a user interface    under
which "What You See Is What You Get", as opposed to one    that uses
more-or-less obscure commands that do not result in    immediate visual
feedback.  True WYSIWYG in environments supporting    multiple fonts or
graphics is a a rarely-attained ideal; there are    variants of this
term to express real-world manifestations    including WYSIAWYG (What
You See Is _Almost_ What You Get) and    WYSIMOLWYG (What You See Is
More or Less What You Get).  All these    can be mildly derogatory, as
they are often used to refer to    dumbed-down {user-friendly}
interfaces targeted at    non-programmers; a hacker has no fear of
obscure commands (compare    {WYSIAYG}).  On the other hand, {EMACS}
was one of the very    first WYSIWYG editors, replacing (actually, at
first overlaying)    the extremely obscure, command-based {TECO}.  See
also {WIMP    environment}.  [Oddly enough, WYSIWYG has already made it
into the    OED, in lower case yet. --ESR]

