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Questions tagged [terminology]

This tag is for questions seeking or discussing a term (or terms) belonging or peculiar to a science, art, or specialized subject (e.g. linguistics, mathematics, physics, biology, finance, theatre, music, philosophy, astronomy, medical, nautical etc.). Consider adding [single-word-requests] and [phrase-requests] tags also if relevant.

239 votes
5 answers
588k views

"log in to" or "log into" or "login to"

When writing an instruction about connecting to a computer using ssh, telnet, etc., I'm not sure what spacing to use in this familiar spoken phrase: "Log in to host.com" "Log into host.com" "Login to ...
John Siracusa's user avatar
127 votes
13 answers
17k views

What is the word for things that work even when they aren't working (e.g. escalators)?

I'm looking for a word (or phrase) to describe mechanisms that are perfectly functional even when they aren't functioning as expected. Examples of these include: Escalators & Electric Walkways: ...
Eric Kigathi's user avatar
  • 1,303
94 votes
5 answers
55k views

What does 'TL;DR' mean and how is it used?

I do my best, at my advanced age, to come to grips with the apparent acceptability of such widely used words/expressions/abbreviations as lol/LOL, IMHO, AFAIK, etc. However, TLDR/tl;dr defeats me. ...
tunny's user avatar
  • 4,828
91 votes
3 answers
31k views

Is it "falsy" or "falsey"?

I have seen both spellings of this word, falsy and falsey. It can mean "something that is equivalent to false" in computer science, such as "The only two falsy values in the Ruby Language are false ...
nonopolarity's user avatar
  • 3,033
77 votes
3 answers
34k views

What is the origin of "daemon" with regards to computing?

Daemon has an interesting usage in computing. From my local dictionary: a background process that handles requests for services such as print spooling and file transfers, and is dormant when not ...
MrHen's user avatar
  • 35.8k
75 votes
14 answers
38k views

What is the correct word for "dependee"?

What is the correct word for "dependee"? In other words, what is the word for something that is depended upon? The relationship here is in the context of software engineering
Louis Rhys's user avatar
  • 3,488
72 votes
8 answers
28k views

“kinda”, “sorta”, “coulda”, “shoulda”, “lotta”, “oughta”, “betcha”, "tseasy", etc. What are these?

In linguistics, is there a term describing this phenomenon, i.e., when the syllables of two words are slurred together in the spoken language? They are not contractions. While contractions are ...
Centaurus's user avatar
  • 50.2k
71 votes
5 answers
57k views

How to pronounce the programmer's abbreviation "char"

In many programming languages, char is a type name for character values. The word character is pronounced with a [k] sound, but what about char? While trying to find the answer elsewhere, I learnt ...
Armen Ծիրունյան's user avatar
70 votes
5 answers
15k views

When does thousand turn into thousands?

My boyfriend and I are arguing whether thousands of miles means 1000+ or 2000+ miles. The first argument is that 1000+ is over 1000 and therefore 'thousands of miles' by rounding up. The other ...
Rachel's user avatar
  • 513
70 votes
10 answers
122k views

X, Y, Z — horizontal, vertical and ...?

When working in a 2D coordinate system you could say that X is the horizontal axis and Y is the vertical axis. Extending this to 3D, is there a similar word for the Z axis? (I'm aware of Width, ...
George Duckett's user avatar
68 votes
8 answers
10k views

Which term correctly identifies those who enjoy programming/technology: "geek" or "nerd"?

Which term correctly identifies those who enjoy and are involved with programming and technology, geek or nerd?
Moshe's user avatar
  • 2,165
66 votes
2 answers
16k views

What is the first part of a joke called?

How does one refer to the first part of a joke? The follow up is often referred to as a punchline but I'm unsure how to refer to the first part. Is it a 'joke' or does a 'joke' include the punchline?
benni_mac_b's user avatar
65 votes
3 answers
15k views

What does the idiom "batteries not included" mean?

In a comment on a Stack Overflow answer to my question, somebody said that "it is a very 'batteries not included' approach": it doesn't look like there's any easy way to make a strict RFC 4627-...
ichbinblau's user avatar
64 votes
21 answers
25k views

What is the word for always YES (100%) or always NO (0%), never in-between

For example: 1) In statistics, this attribute will always either be 0% or 100%, never in-between. 2) The boundary is either safe or destroyed, because there is never a state where it is only '...
simon's user avatar
  • 753
59 votes
10 answers
193k views

"Insecure" or "unsecure" when dealing with security?

Which is the appropriate word to be used in the sentence: The system we were testing was determined to be insecure/unsecure. The usage is in the context of security, specifically a lack thereof. ...
Luke's user avatar
  • 1,270

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