:swap space: /n./ Storage space, especially temporary storage space used during a move or reconfiguration. "I'm just using that corner of the machine room for swap space."
:swapped in: /n./ See {swap}. See also {page in}.
:swapped out: /n./ See {swap}. See also {page out}.
:swizzle: /v./ To convert external names, array indices, or references within a data structure into address pointers when the data structure is brought into main memory from external storage (also called `pointer swizzling'); this may be done for speed in chasing references or to simplify code (e.g., by turning lots of name lookups into pointer dereferences). The converse operation is sometimes termed `unswizzling'. See also {snap}.
:sync: /sink/ n., /vi./ (var. `synch') 1. To synchronize, to bring into synchronization. 2. [techspeak] To force all pending I/O to the disk; see {flush}, sense 2. 3. More generally, to force a number of competing processes or agents to a state that would be `safe' if the system were to crash; thus, to checkpoint (in the database-theory sense).
:syntactic salt: /n./ The opposite of {syntactic sugar}, a feature designed to make it harder to write bad code. Specifically, syntactic salt is a hoop the programmer must jump through just to prove that he knows what's going on, rather than to express a program action. Some programmers consider required type declarations to be syntactic salt. A requirement to write `end if', `end while', `end do', etc. to terminate the last block controlled by a control construct (as opposed to just `end') would definitely be syntactic salt. Syntactic salt is like the real thing in that it tends to raise hackers' blood pressures in an unhealthy way. Compare {candygrammar}.
:syntactic sugar: /n./ [coined by Peter Landin] Features added to a language or other formalism to make it `sweeter' for humans, features which do not affect the expressiveness of the formalism (compare {chrome}). Used esp. when there is an obvious and trivial translation of the `sugar' feature into other constructs already present in the notation. C's `a' notation is syntactic sugar for `*(a + i)'. "Syntactic sugar causes cancer of the semicolon." — Alan Perlis.
The variants `syntactic saccharin' and `syntactic syrup' are also recorded. These denote something even more gratuitous, in that syntactic sugar serves a purpose (making something more acceptable to humans), but syntactic saccharin or syrup serve no purpose at all. Compare {candygrammar}, {syntactic salt}.
:sys-frog: /sis'frog/ /n./ [the PLATO system] Playful variant
of `sysprog', which is in turn short for `systems programmer'.
:sysadmin: /sis'ad-min/ /n./ Common contraction of `system
admin'; see {admin}.