ad-hockery

/adhok'@ree/ , n. [Purdue] 1. Gratuitous assumptions made inside certain
programs, esp. expert systems, which lead to the appearance of
semi-intelligent behavior but are in fact entirely arbitrary. For example,
fuzzy-matching of input tokens that might be typing errors against a symbol
table can make it look as though a program knows how to spell. 2.
Special-case code to cope with some awkward input that would otherwise cause
a program to choke , presuming normal inputs are dealt with in some cleaner
and more regular way. Also called ad-hackery , ad-hocity ( /ad-hos'@-tee/ ),
ad-crockery. See also ELIZA effect. This is ad-hockery in action. (The next
cartoon in the Crunchly saga is 74-08-18. The previous one is 73-07-29.