eric@aplvax.UUCP (08/31/83)
foobar was originally fubar, and stood for "fouled (I could give the original, but then I would have to rot13) up beyond all recognition", I believe. I suspect that there are a few other variations on the theme. eric ...!seismo!umcp-cs!aplvax!eric
brando@linus.UUCP (Thom Brando) (08/31/83)
It has been my understanding for the last 15 years or so that "foobar"
is the phonetic rendering of the term "fubar", or, "F**ked Up Beyond
All Repair"!!!
Thom Brando
{allegra,decvax,ihnp4,utzoo,uw-beaver}!linus!brando (UUCP)kmw@iheds.UUCP (08/31/83)
"foobar" is, I was told by an ex-marine, a mispelling of a military term that became popular during WW II: "fubar," which means "f*cked up beyond all repair"
wgg@floyd.UUCP (Bill Graves) (08/31/83)
Since this seems to have become a topic of discussion on the net, I herewith repeat something I mailed to Arnold this morning. 'Foo' and Bar' come from 'fubar', which is an old WWII expression, being an acronym for "----'ed up beyond all recognition" Walt Kelly is, I believe, responsible for 'Baz' or 'Bazz' from the old 'Pogo' strip. A favorite expletive used by his characters was 'Foobazz', with 'Fazzbazz' getting honorable mention. More about 'foo' itself -- during the 1930's there was another comic strip, featuring a bunch of firemen, and titled "Smokey Stover". It was kind of surrealistic, and the word "foo" was a sort of repeating gag (!). The two-wheeled car the fire chief drove was a foo -- Little signs popped up on lawns proclaiming "foo" -- you get it. As Smokey would have put it "Scramgravy ain't wavy". Bill Graves floyd!wgg
tag@tty3b.UUCP (09/01/83)
Smoky Stover a 1930's comic strip? I remember it, and I'm not that old!
It lasted into the 1960's if I recall correctly.
______
Incidentally, someone actually built a working / \
version of Smoky Stover's two-wheeled car, for | |
use in parades, etc. The trick was to use \
radial tires, unmounted, with two rollers inside |
each one. The rollers were mounted fore and aft | tire support
in the tire, rolling on the inside of the tire. | /
The tire must have looked a little flat, but the +----------
overall effect must have been great. |
| HHHHHHHHH
I have often wished I had such a car while on | _LL \
the Illinois Toll Roads. (They charge tolls by / /__ | bracket
the axle, and it burns me up when a motorcycle | -|__|- | for rollers
with a trailer has to pay more that a two-axle \------/ (bears weight
truck. grumble grumble) of vehicle)
Tom Gloger, Teletype Corporation
(we13|pc013b|otuxa)!tty3b!tagdavidl@tekecs.UUCP (David Levine) (09/01/83)
The appearance of 'foo' in the old Smokey Stover comic strip was the source of
the term 'foo fighters.' 'Foo fighters' was the name given to mysterious balls
of light which occasionally followed aircraft during WWII, and which were never
adequately explained. I have seen them written up in UFO books, and others
claim they must have been St. Elmo's Fire.
Me, I think they were software bugs with nowhere to go... only in recent years
have they found their niche in Unix systems.
Another modern just-so story from
-- David D. Levine (...decvax!tektronix!tekecs!davidl) [UUCP]
(...tekecs!davidl.tektronix@rand-relay) [ARPA]rehmi@umcp-cs.UUCP (09/02/83)
In the Vax Hardware handbook (the red one) you can find FUBAR in the index,
which stands for the "Failed Unibus Address Register"... I love it!
-rehmi
--
By the fork, spoon, and exec of The Basfour.
Arpa: rehmi.umcp-cs@udel-relay
Uucp:...!harpo!seismo!umcp-cs!rehmi
...!{allegra,brl-bmd}!umcp-cs!rehmiurban@trwspp.UUCP (09/03/83)
Huh? I thought FUBAR stood for "Failed UNIBUS Address Register" (at least, that's what it says in the VAX Hardware Handbook). I wonder who the DEC engineer was who managed to get *that* little item into the architecture?
stan@clyde.UUCP (09/08/83)
The people who ask what the meaning of foobar are not in the wrong. The masses of people who put their answer onto the net should be chastised.
ramona@nsc.uucp (Ramona Wu) (09/13/83)
Pray tell, not meaning to sound ignorant but where does one get a copy of "netequette". It is very hard to keep people who are new to the net, like myself, from asking the same questions over and over again if no one seems to know where else to get the answers from. The question of foo bar will no doubt be repeated with the beginning of a new school year. (LOTS of knew netters). Perhaps a net.info or net.newnetters to contain questions and info for new netters so that they won't clutter the other groups. RAM-unit