foo

jargon /foo/ A sample name for absolutely anything,

especially programs and files (especially scratch files).

First on the standard list of metasyntactic variables used

in syntax examples. See also bar, baz, qux, quux,

corge, grault, garply, waldo, fred, plugh,

xyzzy, thud.

The etymology of "foo" is obscure. When used in connection

with "bar" it is generally traced to the WWII-era Army slang

acronym FUBAR, later bowdlerised to foobar.

However, the use of the word "foo" itself has more complicated

antecedents, including a long history in comic strips and

cartoons.

"FOO" often appeared in the "Smokey Stover" comic strip by

Bill Holman. This surrealist strip about a fireman appeared

in various American comics including "Everybody's" between

about 1930 and 1952. FOO was often included on licence plates

of cars and in nonsense sayings in the background of some

frames such as "He who foos last foos best" or "Many smoke but

foo men chew".

Allegedly, "FOO" and "BAR" also occurred in Walt Kelly's

"Pogo" strips. In the 1938 cartoon "The Daffy Doc", a very

early version of Daffy Duck holds up a sign saying "SILENCE IS

FOO!". Oddly, this seems to refer to some approving or

positive affirmative use of foo. It has been suggested that

this might be related to the Chinese word "fu" (sometimes

transliterated "foo"), which can mean "happiness" when spoken

with the proper tone (the lion-dog guardians flanking the

steps of many Chinese restaurants are properly called "fu

dogs").

Earlier versions of this entry suggested the possibility that

hacker usage actually sprang from "FOO, Lampoons and Parody",

the title of a comic book first issued in September 1958, a

joint project of Charles and Robert Crumb. Though Robert

Crumb (then in his mid-teens) later became one of the most

important and influential artists in underground comics, this

venture was hardly a success; indeed, the brothers later

burned most of the existing copies in disgust. The title FOO

was featured in large letters on the front cover. However,

very few copies of this comic actually circulated, and

students of Crumb's "oeuvre" have established that this title

was a reference to the earlier Smokey Stover comics.

An old-time member reports that in the 1959 "Dictionary of the

TMRC Language", compiled at TMRC there was an entry that

went something like this:

FOO: The first syllable of the sacred chant phrase "FOO MANE

PADME HUM." Our first obligation is to keep the foo counters

turning.

For more about the legendary foo counters, see TMRC. Almost

the entire staff of what became the MIT AI LAB was

involved with TMRC, and probably picked the word up there.

Another correspondant cites the nautical construction

"foo-foo" (or "poo-poo"), used to refer to something

effeminate or some technical thing whose name has been

forgotten, e.g. "foo-foo box", "foo-foo valve". This was

common on ships by the early nineteenth century.

Very probably, hackish "foo" had no single origin and derives

through all these channels from Yiddish "feh" and/or English

"fooey".

[Jargon File]

(1998-04-16)