more than you could ever dream of on the etymology of foobar-
http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc3092.txt


----- Original Message -----
From: "Wendell Piez" <wapiez@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, September 06, 2001 12:49 PM
Subject: Re:  FOO vs FO


> I think we are asymptotically approaching some kind of "knowledge" on this
> important question.
>
> My own folk etymology cortical implant tells me that "Foobar" is an
> adaptation of "FUBAR", a military acronym (originally ca. WWII) that
stands
> for "f****d up beyond all recognition". As in "Situation normal --
foobar".
>
> (Jim, "Fouled Up Beyond All Belief" would be "FUBAB" wouldn't it? but it'd
> get past your obscenity filter anyhow.)
>
> How it got from that, to being CS nonsense-word placeholders, I dunno. But
> of course a great deal of early programming happened in the military.
David
> Marston's explanation of "foo" from the Smokey Stover comic strip seems
(to
> this ear) altogether plausible. Maybe when they needed a second one, since
> they had "foo" they went to "bar" since they all knew about "fubar" (and
> didn't care too much how it was spelled).
>
> Anyone have a notion as to "baz"?
>
> Anyway,
> Wendell
>
> At 07:58 AM 9/6/01, Doug wrote:
> >Does anyone know why FOO was chosen to mean anything?
> >
> > >From the W3 site, in a message at
> >"http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-style/msg00613.html", someone
asked
> >"What does foo.bar mean in CSS?". The response was:
> >
> >         Ah, a puzzle!
> >
> >         1. The literal answer is probably not the answer the author is
> >looking for.
> >
> >         2. `foo' and `bar' are commonly used as placeholders for
arbitrary
> >character strings.
> >
> >In XML Bible by E. Harold, page 52, the author says that FOO means
"whatever
> >you want it to". Further down, on page 517, we find that for formatting
> >objects, the defacto standard prefix is "FO".
> >
> >Why was FOO and FO chosen instead of something less confusing? I can
> >understand FO for formatting objects, but why FOO? Why not XXX or ABC??
> >
> >  XSL-List info and archive:  http://www.mulberrytech.com/xsl/xsl-list
>
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>       the directors, like the sparrows, which I perceive use it
>       extensively for a perch." -- Thoreau
>
>
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