2014-04-26 10:52:28 -04:00
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RTFS
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2014-04-26 11:54:15 -04:00
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/RTFS/ [Unix] 1. imp. Abbreviation for Read The Fucking Source. Variant form
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of RTFM , used when the problem at hand is not necessarily obvious and not
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answerable from the manuals or the manuals are not yet written and maybe
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never will be. For even trickier situations, see RTFB. Unlike RTFM, the
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anger inherent in RTFS is not usually directed at the person asking the
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question, but rather at the people who failed to provide adequate
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documentation. 2. imp. Read The Fucking Standard ; this oath can only be
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used when the problem area (e.g., a language or operating system interface)
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has actually been codified in a ratified standards document. The existence
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of these standards documents (and the technically inappropriate but
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politically mandated compromises that they inevitably contain, and the
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impenetrable legalese in which they are invariably written, and the
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unbelievably tedious bureaucratic process by which they are produced) can be
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unnerving to hackers, who are used to a certain amount of ambiguity in the
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specifications of the systems they use. (Hackers feel that such ambiguities
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are acceptable as long as the Right Thing to do is obvious to any thinking
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observer; sadly, this casual attitude towards specifications becomes
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unworkable when a system becomes popular in the Real World. ) Since a hacker
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is likely to feel that a standards document is both unnecessary and
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technically deficient, the deprecation inherent in this term may be directed
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as much against the standard as against the person who ought to read it.
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