:infinite loop: /n./ One that never terminates (that is, the machine {spin}s or {buzz}es forever and goes {catatonic}). There is a standard joke that has been made about each generation's exemplar of the ultra-fast machine: "The Cray-3 is so fast it can execute an infinite loop in under 2 seconds!"
:Infinite-Monkey Theorem: /n./ "If you put an {infinite} number of monkeys at typewriters, eventually one will bash out the script for Hamlet." (One may also hypothesize a small number of monkeys and a very long period of time.) This theorem asserts nothing about the intelligence of the one {random} monkey that eventually comes up with the script (and note that the mob will also type out all the possible *incorrect* versions of Hamlet). It may be referred to semi-seriously when justifying a {brute force} method; the implication is that, with enough resources thrown at it, any technical challenge becomes a {one-banana problem}.
This theorem was first popularized by the astronomer Sir Arthur
Eddington. It became part of the idiom of techies via the classic
SF short story "Inflexible Logic" by Russell Maloney, and
many younger hackers know it through a reference in Douglas Adams's
"Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy".
:infinity: /n./ 1. The largest value that can be represented in a particular type of variable (register, memory location, data type, whatever). 2. `minus infinity': The smallest such value, not necessarily or even usually the simple negation of plus infinity. In N-bit twos-complement arithmetic, infinity is 2^(N-1) - 1 but minus infinity is - (2^(N-1)), not -(2^(N-1) - 1). Note also that this is different from "time T equals minus infinity", which is closer to a mathematician's usage of infinity.
:inflate: /vt./ To decompress or {puff} a file. Rare among Internet hackers, used primarily by MS-DOS/Windows types.
:Infocom: /n./ A now-legendary games company, active from 1979 to 1989, that commercialized the MDL parser technology used for {Zork} to produce a line of text adventure games that remain favorites among hackers. Infocom's games were intelligent, funny, witty, erudite, irreverent, challenging, satirical, and most thoroughly hackish in spirit. The physical game packages from Infocom are now prized collector's items. The software, thankfully, is still extant; Infocom games were written in a kind of P-code and distributed with a P-code interpreter core, and freeware emulators for that interpreter have been written to permit the P-code to be run on platforms the games never originally graced.
:initgame: /in-it'gaym/ /n./ [IRC] An {IRC} version of the venerable trivia game "20 questions", in which one user changes his {nick} to the initials of a famous person or other named entity, and the others on the channel ask yes or no questions, with the one to guess the person getting to be "it" next. As a courtesy, the one picking the initials starts by providing a 4-letter hint of the form sex, nationality, life-status, reality-status. For example, MAAR means "Male, American, Alive, Real" (as opposed to "fictional"). Initgame can be surprisingly addictive. See also {hing}.
[1996 update: a recognizable version of the initgame has become a
staple of some radio talk shows in the U.S. We had it first! —
ESR]
:insanely great: /adj./ [Mac community, from Steve Jobs; also BSD Unix people via Bill Joy] Something so incredibly {elegant} that it is imaginable only to someone possessing the most puissant of {hacker}-natures.
:INTERCAL: /in't*r-kal/ /n./ [said by the authors to stand for `Compiler Language With No Pronounceable Acronym'] A computer language designed by Don Woods and James Lyons in 1972. INTERCAL is purposely different from all other computer languages in all ways but one; it is purely a written language, being totally unspeakable. An excerpt from the INTERCAL Reference Manual will make the style of the language clear: