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Computing (FOLDOC) dictionary
TANSTAAFL
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/tan'stah-fl/ (From Robert Heinlein's classic "The
Moon is a Harsh Mistress") "There Ain't No Such Thing As A
Free Lunch".
Often invoked when someone is balking at the prospect of using
an unpleasantly heavyweight technique, or at the poor
quality of some piece of free software, or at the
signal-to-noise ratio of unmoderated Usenet newsgroups.
"What? Don't tell me I have to implement a database back end
to get my address book program to work!" "Well, TANSTAAFL you
know." This phrase owes some of its popularity to the high
concentration of science-fiction fans and political
libertarians in hackerdom.