:wedgie: /n./ [Fairchild] A bug. Prob. related to {wedged}.
:wedgitude: /wedj'i-t[y]ood/ /n./ The quality or state of being {wedged}.
:weeble: /weeb'l/ /interj./ [Cambridge] Used to denote frustration, usually at amazing stupidity. "I stuck the disk in upside down." "Weeble…." Compare {gurfle}.
:weeds: /n./ 1. Refers to development projects or algorithms that have no possible relevance or practical application. Comes from `off in the weeds'. Used in phrases like "lexical analysis for microcode is serious weeds…." 2. At CDC/ETA before its demise, the phrase `go off in the weeds' was equivalent to IBM's {branch to Fishkill} and mainstream hackerdom's {jump off into never-never land}.
:weenie: /n./ 1. [on BBSes] Any of a species of luser resembling a less amusing version of {B1FF} that infests many {BBS} systems. The typical weenie is a teenage boy with poor social skills travelling under a grandiose {handle} derived from fantasy or heavy-metal rock lyrics. Among sysops, `the weenie problem' refers to the marginally literate and profanity-laden {flamage} weenies tend to spew all over a newly-discovered BBS. Compare {spod}, {computer geek}, {terminal junkie}, {warez d00dz}. 2. [Among hackers] When used with a qualifier (for example, as in {Unix weenie}, VMS weenie, IBM weenie) this can be either an insult or a term of praise, depending on context, tone of voice, and whether or not it is applied by a person who considers him or herself to be the same sort of weenie. Implies that the weenie has put a major investment of time, effort, and concentration into the area indicated; whether this is good or bad depends on the hearer's judgment of how the speaker feels about that area. See also {bigot}. 3. The semicolon character, `;' (ASCII 0111011).
:Weenix: /wee'niks/ /n./ [ITS] A derogatory term for
{{Unix}}, derived from {Unix weenie}. According to one noted
ex-ITSer, it is "the operating system preferred by Unix Weenies:
typified by poor modularity, poor reliability, hard file deletion,
no file version numbers, case sensitivity everywhere, and users who
believe that these are all advantages". (Some ITS fans behave as
though they believe Unix stole a future that rightfully belonged to
them. See {{ITS}}, sense 2.)
:well-behaved: /adj./ 1. [primarily {{MS-DOS}}] Said of
software conforming to system interface guidelines and standards.
Well-behaved software uses the operating system to do chores such
as keyboard input, allocating memory and drawing graphics. Oppose
{ill-behaved}. 2. Software that does its job quietly and
without counterintuitive effects. Esp. said of software having
an interface spec sufficiently simple and well-defined that it can
be used as a {tool} by other software. See {cat}.
:well-connected: /adj./ Said of a computer installation,
asserts that it has reliable email links with the network and/or
that it relays a large fraction of available {Usenet}
newsgroups. `Well-known' can be almost synonymous, but also
implies that the site's name is familiar to many (due perhaps to an
archive service or active Usenet users).
:wetware: /wet'weir/ /n./ [prob. from the novels of Rudy
Rucker] 1. The human nervous system, as opposed to computer
hardware or software. "Wetware has 7 plus or minus 2 temporary
registers." 2. Human beings (programmers, operators,
administrators) attached to a computer system, as opposed to the
system's hardware or software. See {liveware}, {meatware}.
:whack: /v./ According to arch-hacker James Gosling (designer of
{NeWS}, {GOSMACS} and Java), to "…modify a program with no
idea whatsoever how it works." (See {whacker}.) It is actually
possible to do this in nontrivial circumstances if the change is
small and well-defined and you are very good at {glark}ing
things from context. As a trivial example, it is relatively easy
to change all `stderr' writes to `stdout' writes in a
piece of C filter code which remains otherwise mysterious.