JargonFile/entries/random.txt

random

adj. 1. Unpredictable (closest to mathematical definition); weird. The system's been behaving pretty randomly. 2. Assorted; undistinguished. Who was at the conference? Just a bunch of random business types. 3. (pejorative) Frivolous; unproductive; undirected. He's just a random loser. 4. Incoherent or inelegant; poorly chosen; not well organized. The program has a random set of misfeatures. That's a random name for that function. Well, all the names were chosen pretty randomly. 5. In no particular order, though deterministic. The I/O channels are in a pool, and when a file is opened one is chosen randomly. 6. Arbitrary. It generates a random name for the scratch file. 7. Gratuitously wrong, i.e., poorly done and for no good apparent reason. For example, a program that handles file name defaulting in a particularly useless way, or an assembler routine that could easily have been coded using only three registers, but redundantly uses seven for values with non-overlapping lifetimes, so that no one else can invoke it without first saving four extra registers. What randomness ! 8. n. A random hacker; used particularly of high-school students who soak up computer time and generally get in the way. 9. n. Anyone who is not a hacker (or, sometimes, anyone not known to the hacker speaking); the noun form of sense 2. I went to the talk, but the audience was full of randoms asking bogus questions. 10. n. (occasional MIT usage) One who lives at Random Hall. See also J. Random , some random X. 11. [UK] Conversationally, a non sequitur or something similarly out-of-the-blue. As in: Stop being so random! This sense equates to hatstand , taken from the Viz comic character Roger Irrelevant - He's completely Hatstand.
	`random`

	adj. 1. Unpredictable (closest to mathematical definition); weird. The system's been behaving pretty randomly. 2. Assorted; undistinguished. Who was at the conference? Just a bunch of random business types. 3. (pejorative) Frivolous; unproductive; undirected. He's just a random loser. 4. Incoherent or inelegant; poorly chosen; not well organized. The program has a random set of misfeatures. That's a random name for that function. Well, all the names were chosen pretty randomly. 5. In no particular order, though deterministic. The I/O channels are in a pool, and when a file is opened one is chosen randomly. 6. Arbitrary. It generates a random name for the scratch file. 7. Gratuitously wrong, i.e., poorly done and for no good apparent reason. For example, a program that handles file name defaulting in a particularly useless way, or an assembler routine that could easily have been coded using only three registers, but redundantly uses seven for values with non-overlapping lifetimes, so that no one else can invoke it without first saving four extra registers. What randomness ! 8. n. A random hacker; used particularly of high-school students who soak up computer time and generally get in the way. 9. n. Anyone who is not a hacker (or, sometimes, anyone not known to the hacker speaking); the noun form of sense 2. I went to the talk, but the audience was full of randoms asking bogus questions. 10. n. (occasional MIT usage) One who lives at Random Hall. See also J. Random , some random X. 11. [UK] Conversationally, a non sequitur or something similarly out-of-the-blue. As in: Stop being so random! This sense equates to hatstand , taken from the Viz comic character Roger Irrelevant - He's completely Hatstand.