We would talk through the cubicle wall about all sorts of things - I would help him with Mac things and he would help me with Unix things. (I still use vi and FreeBSD a lot.) His business card title was Software Swami and mine was Software Explorer. He got me a great vanity email address: [email protected]. It was a badge of honor to have an email address with just your first name at a company which had many, many people. He was, of course, [email protected]. I had that email address for ten years before it became popular for people to be on email. In fact, I had that email address for several years when I did not even work at Apple! (1991-1993) During that time I still used it. I then returned to Apple again in 1994 to work on PowerPC Macs but when I left for Microsoft at the end of 1994 I finally lost my email address.
I also went flying with Rick in his airplanes, including a Mooney 201 and a Piper Malibu. We would fly to the Nut Tree, or to the Elephant Bar in Santa Barbara, or to Harris Ranch in central California. These trips were just for dinner after work. Those were great days!
Anyway, one day Rick was laughing and laughing and the source of his laughter was this document, which he gave me a copy of years ago in 1986. It was called The Meaning of ls. The place names are mainly from California. It is humorous to Californian Unix programmers and probably to few others. (Rick and I are both Californian Unix programmers.)
Rick offers this further explanation of the origin of this document:
I was indeed a major author of "ls." At the Portland Usenix Conference in 1985, Sonja Bock (then of Genentech) introduced me to The Meaning of Liff by Douglas Adams. She and I then began making up items in a similar vein, naturally related to Unix. There were a few other contributors; I'm sure Eryk Vershen must've offered a few.
Enjoy!
December 2, 1986
The Meaning of ls
Alameda
(n) The act of trying to figure out the mean time
required for e-mail delivery over the several hops
between sites.
Alamo
(n) The command line option you always tend to forget.
Aldercroft
(n) You have wasted time with an Aldercroft when you
change a program and keep testing the old version by
mistake.
Alum Rock
(n) A problem which requires rebooting the system to
clear up. Many times an Alum Rock will send the system
directly to Morgan Hill.
Alviso
(n) A meaningless warning message.
Ano Nuevo
(n) The process of logging out and logging in again in
the attempt to cleanup a confused terminal state.
Antioch
(n) The cabinet in which backup tapes are stored.
Aptos
(n) The mental state entered during the debugging pro-
cess when one decides to write a filter to identify and
locate missing closing braces, parens and comment
sequences. Also known as Nesting Instinct.
Atherton
1. (n) One who gives the appearance of great knowledge
of the system, but is immediately proven phony by the
first real question; 2. (v) To document or comment using
conventions, constants, or variables defined nowhere.
Bakersfield
(n) The column which contains an invalid delimiter.
Belmont
(n) Any sequence of heavily quoted and escaped meta-
characters which will be accepted unquestionably by one
shell and cause the other to go Hayfork.
Belvedere
(n) The holy war between two factions of programmers
about the ``correct'' way to format C programs. See
Purisima.
Benicia
(n) State of mind during which you solve someone else's
problem when you don't have to, and don't have nearly
the time to spend, but you help anyway.
Berkeley
(n) 1. In hacking, the as-yet unrecognized bug that has
been commented out pending further enlightenment; 2. Of
sailing, to throw up over the correct side of the boat.
Berryessa
(n) That subset of files or versions created between the
last backup and the next headcrash.
Big Basin
(n) The inevitable catastrophic mistake which will some-
day be made while logged in as root.
Big Sur
(n) The furor caused by a Millbrae which turns out to
have been bogus.
Bodega Bay
(n) A directory liberally sprinkled with filenames that
contain Piedmonts.
Bolinas
(n) The dazzling and highly technical discourses
delivered by staff (in bored and condescending tones) to
meddlesome users to explain why the last fixes to the
system do not seem in any appreciable way to have
improved its efficency. See Pinnacles.
Bonny Doon
(n) A particularly enjoyable practical joke played
remotely to someone's terminal. For example, sending
the scroll-up/scroll-down sequence periodically to
jitter the screen image. See Lafayette.
Brisbane
(n) Any of a number of syntax errors involving missing
white space, as in
foo->bar=*quux;.
Burlingame
(n) Any of a selection of net-oriented highly competi-
tive and interactive games involving skill, cunning, and
a modicum of strategy, highly touted and provided
(binary only) by the newest arrival at any giveor.
sound made by a tape drive unloading.
Campbell
(n) The six-minute wild blur of keystrokes issued by a
wizard while fixing a problem. A Campbell is never
really understood by the observer, and often cannot be
fully explained by the perpetrator.
Carbona
(n) The state of perplexed fury felt when seeing awk
bail out for the umpteenth time.
Carmel
(n) The coating of shiny glaze on the bottom of an
unwashed coffee mug.
Capitola
(n) Cost-cutting measures imposed on long distance uucp
links.
Castroville
(adj) Any spectacularly tedious and obscure document is
said to be Castroville.
Coalinga
(n) The protocol performed by one computer upon another
during a uucp link.
Colma
(n) The condition of waiting patiently for screen output
when one assumes the system is slow, however something
has actually crashed.
Crockett
(n) A cute engineering-achievement award you keep around
long after the product has died.
Cupertino
(n) The tool for cutting a neat new leading edge on a
tape. Cupertinoes are often nowhere to be found when
you need them. Should you try to buy one, everyone you
call will know exactly what you want, but nobody will
have one.
Corte Madera
(n) The foreplay protocol used by two computers to
establish a uucp connection prior to performing Coa-
linga.
Daly City
(n) The collection of header, object, and source files
for cunning examples of creeping featurism written
specifically to avoid tackling a sticky algorithm.
Davenport
(n) The hole left by a missing square of raised floor-
ing.
Diablo Canyon
(n) Technical name for the state a process has gotten
into wherein it ignores all attempts to kill it.
Donner Pass
(n) When a command doesn't work, it's often typed again
just to ``make sure''. The second attempt is referred
to as ``Making a Donner Pass.''
Dublin
(n) An effect on pids of getty processes caused by a
Hayward line.
Dumbarton
(n) A person who still doesn't understand the proper use
of a program, even after repeated tutorials.
El Cerrito
(n) The corran out.
El Granada
(n) A severe hardware crash which persists despite
repeated repair attempts by an army of Field Engineers.
An El Granada can be recognized by its distinctive
series of replies from the FE's that they've ``Found it
for sure this time.'' Some El Granadas have been known
to persist for months.
Embarcadero
(n) One who uses root privileges without due caution.
Emeryville
(n) Of systems managers, the state in which one grows
increasingly abrasive towards the user community in
/etc/motd. An example of this is ``Users exceeding quo-
tas will have their passwords arbitrarily changed and
their rogue.saves removed!''
Fairfax
(n) Documentation which has been photocopied so many
times that it is almost unreadable. Most copies of the
John Lions Unix Version 6 notes are Fairfaxes.
Felton
1. (n) The technique used to make a connection in a Por-
tola Valley; 2. (v) Used as a verb to describe the use
of this technique, as in ``he kept Felton around until
he found the right cable''.
Foster City
(n) The local source directory containing pirated code
with one- or two-line changes to make the program appear
specific to your application.
Fremont
(n) The person who knows where blank tapes are to be
found.
Fresno
(n) Measure of the amount of time spent waiting for the
DEC field engineer to call back.
Gilroy
(n) The unknown control character you've typed which has
set your terminal into a wierd state. Unfortunately,
it's impossible to reverse the effect of a Gilroy.
Garberville
(n) The directory containing old versions of programs.
Glacier Point
(n) A print job at the head of the print queue for a
particularly unreliable printer is said to have reached
the Glacier Point if it is never expected to complete
successfully.
Gough
(n) The momentary attack of nausea and dizziness which
occurs after having committed a Big Basin.
Half Moon Bay
(n) A Half Moon Bay is the situation you have created
when you fix one problem and cause a far more serious
one.
Hayfork
(adj) Descriptive of a process which has gone into an
orgy of recursive forks of subprocesses.
Hayward
(adj) A communication line is said to be Hayward when it
is open and particularly noisy, generating breaks and
false carrier transitions.
Hillsborough
(n) The erroneous initialization or misplaced
increment/decrement operator which causes any given loop
to terminate one iteration too soon or too late.
Hollister
(n, archaic) Steel knife used to clear jammed bits in a
keypunch machine. Hollisters are extremely rare today,
though surprisingly not as rare as in the days when they
were used.
Holy City
(n) A site which changes root passwords regularly.
Ignacio
(n) The formula used to determine the number of
redirects necessary to make a command of any use.
Inverness
(n) A sudden hardware glitch which usually sends the
system directly to Morgan Hill.
Klamath
(n) The key, especially space or carriage-return, struck
with distinctive violence, which punctuates an
individual's typing style; hence hackers can be identi-
fied by their Klamath falls.
Lafayette
(n) The characteristic laugh of the recipient of a Bonny
Doon who immediately begins thinking of a retaliatory
one.
Livermore
(n) Technical term describing login behavior when two
gettys are directed at the same terminal, usually as the
result of a Milpitas.
Larkspur
(n) A diversieries of innovative shortcuts; eventually,
all Larkspurs end in the realization that the conserva-
tive approach would have been finished long ago.
Loleta
(n) The seductive code patch received via net.games that
results in a Big Sur amongst the gaming community.
Lompico
(n) Measure of the amount by which any given buffer is
slightly too small.
Los Altos
(n) Measure of the time wasted during a hurried login
because you typed your password too soon and now e too.
Los Gatos
(n) Handshake protocols described in operating and
owner's manuals in which a typo has gone unnoticed.
Manteca
(n) A ``possible cause'' for your problem, which you
check for lack of a better idea. As expected, you find
out it was fine all along; at least it gave you time to
think of something new to try.
Mendocino
(n) The state of your terminal after trying to use
curses.
Millbrae
(n) Any promise that the changes made will not affect
users.
Milpitas
(n) A small error made while logged in as root. A Mil-
pitas is usually not very serious and is easy to fix,
though it often raises a few eyebrows.
Modesto
(n) A guru who solves all problems quietly and accu-
rately, with minimal fanfare. Opposite of a Ukiah.
Monta Vista
(n) The safe plahe canned ``caveat'' speech given when
delivering a preliminary version of a program which
isn't quite complete.
Monte Sereno
(n) The false sense of security one gets when a program
appears to be running perfectly, before finding out that
things were actually going terribly wrong.
Moraga
(n) Description for the sudden sharp pain that occurs
when an obviously private e-mail message appears on your
terminal during a demo for corporate management or roy-
alty. Often occurs in the presence of a colleague who
is especially adept at putting two and two together.
Morgan Hill
(n) The place a system goes when it's hung or otherwise
in serious trouble. See Alum Rock and Inverness.
Napa
(n) The silence of your terminal during login password
validation.
Niles
(n) Unit of measure of magnetic tape spooled to the
floor.
Novato
(n) To perform a Novato, you execute a quick command
sequence dance to ensure that you did actually exit from
the su shell you were running.
Occidental
(n) The ``illegal lhs'' error messages reported by the C
Compiler.
Pacifica
(n) Statements, made to users, to the changed''. Both
the speaker and the listener know that a Pacifica is
patently false.
Pajaro
(n) The laughter caused when you do something so dumb
that your colleagues can't help breaking up.
Palo Alto
1. (n) The head-spinning rush of adrenalin experienced
by those logged in as root after typing rm -r * as
they remember forgetting to give the pwd command just
previously; 2. That feeling only experienced in other
people's bathrooms as one realizes that the water in the
bowl is surging up rather than down following a hearty
flush.
Permanente
(n) The familiar hardtenance.
Pescadero
(n) Aerson who complains of system troubles when it's
actually his problem. The term's Latin origins suggest
a literal translation to the effect that something's
fishy.
Petaluma
(n) An erratic power failure which causes damage to the
system.
Piedmont
(n) The nonprinting character in a filename which pro-
tects the file from further access.
Pinnacles
(n) The sharply barbed remarks made by the users to
stafnges to the wrong version of a program. Often used
in speech as ``feeling like a real Pinole...''.
Pittsburg
(n) The situation which occurs when trouble strikes at
5pm on a Friday. A Pittsburg often starts out appearing
like a simple Pleasanton, but one soon finds out the
truth.
Placerville
(n) Where all lost jobs end up.
Pleasanton
(n) A small, easily solved problem. True Pleasantons
are rare.
Point Arena
(n) Where all Floating-Point Exception errors take your
program.
Portola Valley
(n) The inaccessible or invisible place in a patch-panel
where cable connections must be made.
Prunedale
(n) A small program or script whose usefulness is real-
ized when you delete it after it's lain fallow for
months.
Purisima
(n) The state of mind during which you decide to beau-
tify someone else's program because its present format
is maddening. See Belvedere.
Redding
(v) The act of resetting a device several times in suc-
cession to ensure that it is in a known state.
Richmond
(n) The person who always has the odd cable or hardware
widget that you need.
Ross
(n) An unfamiliar program which you execute to ``see
what it does'' and all it does is hang, or cause you to
go Seaside.
Sacramento
(n) 1. The enlightenment felt by a Unix hacker who gets
a VMS hacker to see the light; 2. The enlightenment
felt by a VMS hacker who gets a Unix hacker to see the
light.
Salinas
(n) A Milpitas which takes 3 people to figure out and
fix while you're out to a long lunch. Often results in
a Sebastopol.
San Gregorio
(n) Exclamation of anger and disgust uttered through
clenched jaws as you realize you just made the same mis-
take for the second (or third) time.
San Jose
(n) The art of selecting forms of alloc() which provide
both memory and a random selection of hieroglyphics.
San Luis Obispo
(n) A piece of code which expands to fill all available
space.
Santa Cruz
(n) The contented state of an unattended system left
running over a long weekend.
Saratoga
(n) The ill-fitting sweater shared by the staff for use
during long debugging sessions in a chilly computer
room. Typically, the Saratoga originally belonged to
someone who left the company years ago.
Sausalito
(n) 1. The nonexistent #ifdef or #ifndef that adds spice
to the concept of portability. 2. The critical step left
out in a set of written or spoken procedures.
Seaside
(n) Your login session goes Seaside because of something
you have done as a naive user. Using various control
keys only makes matters worse. Generally, you don't
know enough to have caused a Hayfork, but your login
session will likely have to be killed from elsewhere
anyway.
Sebastopol
(n) The barrage of good-natured insults endured after
committing a Salinas.
Soledad
(n) The exact measure of the difference in efficiency
between BSD4.1 and BSD4.2.
Sonoma
(n) The interminable delay during an fsck.
Spreckels
(n) Little bits of nonsensical output, often containing
unprintable characters, produced by an errant program.
Stockton
(n) One who gets stuck reloading the paper in a hardcopy
device.
Sunnyvale
(n) The place where zombie processes spend their time
while waiting for init to collect them.
Sunol
(n) The person who knows where the backup tape you want
is stored.
Tiburon
(n) That mode of graphics terminals in which it becomes
impossible to clear graphic memory without hitting the
power switch.
Tracy
(adj) Descriptive term applied to a particularly verbose
program.
Trinidad
(n) The exact measure of the difference in efficiency
between BSD4.1 and BSD4.3.
Turlock
(n) The condition which exists when someone else has the
key to the VAX front panel, and you're working on a
weekend.
Ukiah
(n) One who drones long and loud about his intimate
knowledge of the system, and is avoided because of this
tiresome banter. It is an unfortunate fact that Ukiahs
often know the solution to a problem, but nobody wants
to ask them.
Vallejo
(n) Exclamation given when some serious and arcane prob-
lem is finally fixed through a combination of lucky
guesswork and trial-and-error.
Walnut Creek
(n) 1. The sound made by the vacuum columns in a tape
drive as they first suck the tape in; 2. Where a kernel
hacker often finds he's gotten.
Woodside
(n) Generic name for any home-brew computer system.
Yuba City
(n) The failure of the system to reboot after preventive
maintenance. Intentionally mispronounced Yubiccity in
disgust.