:prime time: /n./ [from TV programming] Normal high-usage hours
on a timesharing system; the day shift. Avoidance of prime time
was traditionally given as a major reason for {night mode}
hacking. The rise of the personal workstation has rendered this
term, along with timesharing itself, almost obsolete. The hackish
tendency to late-night {hacking run}s has changed not a bit.
:printing discussion: /n./ [XEROX PARC] A protracted, low-level, time-consuming, generally pointless discussion of something only peripherally interesting to all.
:priority interrupt: /n./ [from the hardware term] Describes any stimulus compelling enough to yank one right out of {hack mode}. Classically used to describe being dragged away by an {SO} for immediate sex, but may also refer to more mundane interruptions such as a fire alarm going off in the near vicinity. Also called an {NMI} (non-maskable interrupt), especially in PC-land.
:profile: /n./ 1. A control file for a program, esp. a text file automatically read from each user's home directory and intended to be easily modified by the user in order to customize the program's behavior. Used to avoid {hardcoded} choices (see also {dot file}, {rc file}). 2. [techspeak] A report on the amounts of time spent in each routine of a program, used to find and {tune} away the {hot spot}s in it. This sense is often verbed. Some profiling modes report units other than time (such as call counts) and/or report at granularities other than per-routine, but the idea is similar. 3.[techspeak] A subset of a standard used for a particular purpose. This sense confuses hackers who wander into the weird world of ISO standards no end!
:progasm: /proh'gaz-m/ /n./ [University of Wisconsin] The euphoria experienced upon the completion of a program or other computer-related project.
:proglet: /prog'let/ /n./ [UK] A short extempore program written to meet an immediate, transient need. Often written in BASIC, rarely more than a dozen lines long, and containing no subroutines. The largest amount of code that can be written off the top of one's head, that does not need any editing, and that runs correctly the first time (this amount varies significantly according to one's skill and the language one is using). Compare {toy program}, {noddy}, {one-liner wars}.
:program: /n./ 1. A magic spell cast over a computer allowing it to turn one's input into error messages. 2. An exercise in experimental epistemology. 3. A form of art, ostensibly intended for the instruction of computers, which is nevertheless almost inevitably a failure if other programmers can't understand it.
:Programmer's Cheer: "Shift to the left! Shift to the right! Pop up, push down! Byte! Byte! Byte!" A joke so old it has hair on it.
:programming: /n./ 1. The art of debugging a blank sheet of paper (or, in these days of on-line editing, the art of debugging an empty file). "Bloody instructions which, being taught, return to plague their inventor" ("Macbeth", Act 1, Scene 7) 2. A pastime similar to banging one's head against a wall, but with fewer opportunities for reward. 3. The most fun you can have with your clothes on (although clothes are not mandatory).
:programming fluid: /n./ 1. Coffee. 2. Cola. 3. Any caffeinacious stimulant. Many hackers consider these essential for those all-night hacking runs. See {wirewater}.