foobar

"foobar" is also a: user

created by zodiac

(idea) by zodiac (4.3 y) (print) ? (I like it!) Tue Mar 28 2000 at 9:07:20

Originally fubar split to foo bar and concatinated again.
I recomend using foobar as at least one of the following:

variable name
error message and
teststring

(idea) by SirEdward (1.1 y) (print) ? (I like it!) Tue Jan 30 2001 at 23:01:01

Word used often as an identifier by programmers, especially those who write in C/C++ or languages with a similarly brief syntax like Perl. The reason this is so is, to the best of my knowledge, unknown but one might speculate that it is for one or more of the following reasons:

- Because it's not likely to be the name of a variable/function in an included library or a shell command.
- Because you are less likely to overwrite a file that you would rather keep (except maybe one of your own debug files, which is likely to bear a name derived from said word).
- Because it's almost, but not quite, a cuss word.
- Because C programmers hate to use meaningful variable names.

Many coders, however, consider even "foobar" to be too long, opting instead to use each of its halves (i.e. "foo" and "bar") separately. This also gives the programmer an extra identifier to work with, like so:

chomp($foo=`which echo`);
system "$foo Hello World > bar";

The above is, of course, some simple Perl code which finds the location (path) of the "echo" command, storing the result in a variable named "foo." It then proceeds to echo the phrase "Hello World," redirecting the output to a file named bar. This spares the programmer the effort of dreaming up meaningful names (like "$location_of_the_echo_command") for his or her variables.

(idea) by Jargon (1.8 y) (print) ? (I like it!) Thu Jul 19 2001 at 8:56:23

foo = F = fool

foobar n.

[very common] Another widely used metasyntactic variable; see foo for etymology. Probably originally propagated through DECsystem manuals by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) in 1960s and early 1970s; confirmed sightings there go back to 1972. Hackers do not generally use this to mean FUBAR in either the slang or jargon sense. See also Fred Foobar. In RFC1639, "FOOBAR" was made an abbreviation for "FTP Operation Over Big Address Records", but this was an obvious backronym. It has been plausibly suggested that "foobar" spread among early computer engineers partly because of FUBAR and partly because "foo bar" parses in electronics techspeak as an inverted foo signal; if a digital signal is coded so that a positive voltage or high current condition represents a "1", then a horizontal bar is commonly placed over the signal label.

--The Jargon File version 4.3.1, ed. ESR, autonoded by rescdsk.

printable version
chaos

fubar	foo	backronym	metasyntactic variable
Fred Foobar	SOY! SOY! SOY! Soy makes you strong! Strength crushes enemies! SOY!	Fool	Use meaningful variable names
Forget what you think you know about the opposite sex	Nodebabies: a guide for the layperson	Little Bunny Foo Foo	hot grits
Fuck me harder	Soylent Green	#include	rescdsk
Sedna	Fun with telemarketing calls	variable	DEC
The Jargon File	Fougasse	i.e.	fu

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