34 lines
4.7 KiB
HTML
34 lines
4.7 KiB
HTML
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1" standalone="no"?>
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<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><title>mung</title><link rel="stylesheet" href="../../jargon.css" type="text/css"/><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets V1.61.0"/><link rel="home" href="../index.html" title="The Jargon File"/><link rel="up" href="../M.html" title="M"/><link rel="previous" href="mundane.html" title="mundane"/><link rel="next" href="munge.html" title="munge"/></head><body><div class="navheader"><table width="100%" summary="Navigation header"><tr><th colspan="3" align="center">mung</th></tr><tr><td width="20%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="mundane.html">Prev</a> </td><th width="60%" align="center">M</th><td width="20%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="munge.html">Next</a></td></tr></table><hr/></div><dt><a id="mung"/><dt xmlns="" id="mung"><b>mung</b>: <span xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" class="pronunciation">/muhng/</span>, <span xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" class="grammar">vt.</span></dt></dt><dd><p> [in 1960 at MIT, “<span class="quote">Mash Until No Good</span>”; sometime after
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that the derivation from the <a href="../R/recursive-acronym.html"><i class="glossterm">recursive acronym</i></a>
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“<span class="quote">Mung Until No Good</span>” became standard; but see
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<a href="munge.html"><i class="glossterm">munge</i></a>]</p></dd><dd><p> 1. To make changes to a file, esp. large-scale and irrevocable
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changes. See <a href="../B/BLT.html"><i class="glossterm">BLT</i></a>. </p></dd><dd><p> 2. To destroy, usually accidentally, occasionally maliciously. The
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system only mungs things maliciously; this is a consequence of
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<a href="../F/Finagles-Law.html"><i class="glossterm">Finagle's Law</i></a>. See <a href="../S/scribble.html"><i class="glossterm">scribble</i></a>,
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<a href="mangle.html"><i class="glossterm">mangle</i></a>, <a href="../T/trash.html"><i class="glossterm">trash</i></a>,
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<a href="../N/nuke.html"><i class="glossterm">nuke</i></a>. Reports from <a href="../U/Usenet.html"><i class="glossterm">Usenet</i></a>
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suggest that the pronunciation <span class="pronunciation">/muhnj/</span> is now usual in speech, but the
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spelling ‘mung’ is still common in program comments (compare
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the widespread confusion over the proper spelling of
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<a href="../K/kluge.html"><i class="glossterm">kluge</i></a>). </p></dd><dd><p> 3. In the wake of the <a href="../S/spam.html"><i class="glossterm">spam</i></a> epidemics of the
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1990s, mung is now commonly used to describe the act of modifying an email
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address in a sig block in a way that human beings can readily reverse but
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that will fool an <a href="../A/address-harvester.html"><i class="glossterm">address harvester</i></a>. Example:
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johnNOSPAMsmith@isp.net. </p></dd><dd><p> 4. The kind of beans the sprouts of which are used in Chinese food.
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(That's their real name! Mung beans! Really!)</p></dd><dd><p>Like many early hacker terms, this one seems to have originated at
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<a href="../T/TMRC.html"><i class="glossterm">TMRC</i></a>; it was already in use there in 1958. Peter
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Samson (compiler of the original TMRC lexicon) thinks it may originally
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have been onomatopoeic for the sound of a relay spring (contact) being
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twanged. However, it is known that during the World Wars,
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‘mung’ was U.S.: army slang for the ersatz creamed chipped beef
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better known as ‘SOS’, and it seems quite likely that the word
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in fact goes back to Scots-dialect <a href="munge.html"><i class="glossterm">munge</i></a>.</p><p>Charles Mackay's 1874 book <i class="citetitle">Lost Beauties of the English
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Language</i> defined “<span class="quote">mung</span>” as follows:
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“<span class="quote">Preterite of ming, to ming or mingle; when the substantive meaning
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of mingled food of bread, potatoes, etc. thrown to poultry. In America,
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‘<span class="quote">mung news</span>’ is a common expression applied to false news, but
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probably having its derivation from mingled (or mung) news, in which the
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true and the false are so mixed up together that it is impossible to
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distinguish one from another.</span>”</p></dd><div class="navfooter"><hr/><table width="100%" summary="Navigation footer"><tr><td width="40%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="mundane.html">Prev</a> </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="u" href="../M.html">Up</a></td><td width="40%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="munge.html">Next</a></td></tr><tr><td width="40%" align="left" valign="top">mundane </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="h" href="../index.html">Home</a></td><td width="40%" align="right" valign="top"> munge</td></tr></table></div></body></html>
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