WOW! "Dave Larrington" <
[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Kludge? A little more complicated than previously hinted...
>
> !--------------------------------------------------------------------!
> :kludge: 1. /klooj/ n. Incorrect (though regrettably common) spelling of {kluge} (US). These two
> words have been confused in American usage since
the
> early 1960s, and widely confounded in Great Britain since the end of World War II. 2. [TMRC] A
> {crock} that works. (A long-ago "Datamation" article
by
> Jackson Granholme similarly said: "An ill-assorted collection of poorly matching parts, forming a
> distressing whole.") 3. v. To use a kludge to
get
> around a problem. "I've kludged around it for now, but I'll fix it up properly later."
>
> This word appears to have derived from Scots 'kludge' or 'kludgie' for a common toilet, via
> British military slang. It apparently became confused with U.S. {kluge} during or after World War
> II; some Britons from that era use both words in definably different ways, but {kluge} is now
> uncommon in Great Britain. 'Kludge' in Commonwealth hackish differs in meaning from 'kluge' in
> that it lacks the positive senses; a kludge is something no Commonwealth hacker wants to be
> associated too closely with. Also,
'kludge'
> is more widely known in British mainstream slang than 'kluge' is in the
U.S.
>
> :kluge: /klooj/ [from the German 'klug', clever; poss. related to Polish 'klucz' (a key, a hint, a
> main point)] 1. n. A Rube Goldberg (or Heath Robinson) device, whether in hardware or software. 2.
> n. A clever programming trick intended to solve a particular nasty case in an
expedient,
> if not clear, manner. Often used to repair bugs. Often involves
{ad-hockery}
> and verges on being a {crock}. 3. n. Something that works for the wrong reason. 4. vt. To insert a
> kluge into a program. "I've kluged this routine to get around that weird bug, but there's probably
> a better way." 5. [WPI]
> n. A feature that is implemented in a {rude} manner.
>
> Nowadays this term is often encountered in the variant spelling 'kludge'. Reports from {old fart}s
> are consistent that 'kluge' was the original spelling, reported around computers as far back as
> the mid-1950s and, at that time, used exclusively of _hardware_ kluges. In 1947, the "New York
> Folklore Quarterly" reported a classic shaggy-dog story 'Murgatroyd the Kluge Maker' then current
> in the Armed Forces, in which a 'kluge' was a complex and puzzling artifact with a trivial
> function. Other sources
report
> that 'kluge' was common Navy slang in the WWII era for any piece of electronics that worked well
> on shore but consistently failed at sea.
>
> However, there is reason to believe this slang use may be a decade older. Several respondents have
> connected it to the brand name of a device called
a
> "Kluge paper feeder", an adjunct to mechanical printing presses. Legend
has
> it that the Kluge feeder was designed before small, cheap electric motors and control electronics;
> it relied on a fiendishly complex assortment of cams, belts, and linkages to both power and
> synchronize all its operations from one motive driveshaft. It was accordingly temperamental,
> subject to frequent breakdowns, and devilishly difficult to repair -- but oh, so clever! People
> who tell this story also aver that 'Kluge' was the name of
a
> design engineer.
>
> There is in fact a Brandtjen & Kluge Inc., an old family business that manufactures printing
> equipment - interestingly, their name is pronounced /kloo'gee/! Henry Brandtjen, president of the
> firm, told me (ESR, 1994)
that
> his company was co-founded by his father and an engineer named Kluge /kloo'gee/, who built and
> co-designed the original Kluge automatic feeder
in
> 1919. Mr. Brandtjen claims, however, that this was a _simple_ device (with only four cams); he
> says he has no idea how the myth of its complexity
took
> hold. Other correspondents differ with Mr. Brandtjen's history of the
device
> and his allegation that it was a simple rather than complex one, but agree that the Kluge
> automatic feeder was the most likely source of the
folklore.
>
> {TMRC} and the MIT hacker culture of the early '60s seems to have
developed
> in a milieu that remembered and still used some WWII military slang (see also {foobar}). It seems
> likely that 'kluge' came to MIT via alumni of the many military electronics projects that had been
> located in Cambridge
(many
> in MIT's venerable Building 20, in which {TMRC} is also located) during
the
> war.
>
> The variant 'kludge' was apparently popularized by the {Datamation}
article
> mentioned above; it was titled "How to Design a Kludge" (February 1962,
pp.
> 30, 31). This spelling was probably imported from Great Britain, where {kludge} has an independent
> history (though this fact was largely unknown
to
> hackers on either side of the Atlantic before a mid-1993 debate in the Usenet group
> alt.folklore.computers over the First and Second Edition versions of this entry; everybody used to
> think {kludge} was just a
mutation
> of {kluge}). It now appears that the British, having forgotten the
etymology
> of their own 'kludge' when 'kluge' crossed the Atlantic, repaid the U.S.
by
> lobbing the 'kludge' orthography in the other direction and confusing
their
> American cousins' spelling!
>
> The result of this history is a tangle. Many younger U.S. hackers
pronounce
> the word as /klooj/ but spell it, incorrectly for its meaning and pronunciation, as 'kludge'.
> (Phonetically, consider huge, refuge, centrifuge, and deluge as opposed to sludge, judge, budge,
> and fudge. Whatever its failings in other areas, English spelling is perfectly consistent about
> this distinction.) British hackers mostly learned /kluhj/ orally, use it in a restricted negative
> sense and are at least consistent. European hackers have mostly learned the word from written
> American
sources
> and tend to pronounce it /kluhj/ but use the wider American meaning!
>
> Some observers consider this mess appropriate in view of the word's
meaning.
>
> !--------------------------------------------------------------------!
>
> from "The Jargon File", v 4.31. Now we all know
>
> Dave Larrington -
http://legslarry.crosswinds.net/
> ===========================================================
> Editor - British Human Power Club Newsletter
>
http://www.bhpc.org.uk/
> ===========================================================
