From: marc AT watson DOT ibm DOT com (user) Subject: Re: About subjects on the mailing list 4 Dec 1998 17:54:14 -0800 Message-ID: <9812041420.AA28914.cygnus.gnu-win32@marc.watson.ibm.com> References: <8f7e62f5 DOT 3665f94a AT aol DOT com> Reply-To: marc AT watson DOT ibm DOT com To: JSONCRAIG AT aol DOT com Cc: gnu-win32 AT cygnus DOT com >From: JSONCRAIG AT aol DOT com .... >#1 Whats with foo? Ex. foo.txt, foo.cpp have all been used in emails...is >there something special about foo? (sorry to bother you if it seems obvious to >you but I'm not real good with this compiler stuff) .... fubar is (i think WW2) jargon for f***ed up beyond all repair For some reason, MIT comp. scientists started to use foo and bar as generic names for programs, variables, etc. For a while, you could tell if someone came through MIT by his use of foo and bar in this way. But that was a long time ago - today its pretty universal. Marc Auslander 914 945-4346 (Tieline 862 Fax x4426) - For help on using this list (especially unsubscribing), send a message to "gnu-win32-request AT cygnus DOT com" with one line of text: "help".