TANSTAAFL /tan'stah-fl/ [acronym, from Robert Heinlein's classic "The
Moon is a Harsh Mistress".] "There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch",
often invoked when someone is balking at the prospect of using an
unpleasantly heavyweight technique, or at the poor quality of some piece
of free software, or at the signal-to-noise ratio of unmoderated Usenet
newsgroups. "What? Don't tell me I have to implement a database back end
to get my address book program to work!" "Well, TANSTAAFL you know."
This phrase owes some of its popularity to the high concentration of
science-fiction fans and political libertarians in hackerdom.
I have read ALL of Heinlein's work multliple times. And, since I read
them as they came out, I got the benefit of getting them on the
"timeline".
Terry
Kevin Lange wrote:
> I was always partial to TANSTAAFL .... There Ain't No Such Thing As A
> Free Lunch ....It has stuck with me ever since I read it in Ben Bova's
> book Cities in Flight. Of course, I have heard it many times since
> then.
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Sara Hoenshell [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Friday, August 03, 2001 9:53 AM
> To: Multiple recipients of list ORACLE-L
> Subject: RE: completely off-topic question...
>
>
> I think it means Hope This Helps.HTHSara
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On
> Behalf Of Michael
> Sent: Friday, August 03, 2001 6:36 AM
> To: Multiple recipients of list ORACLE-L
> Subject: completely off-topic question...
>
> ...which means it's probably going to start a
> great big thread :) I see a lot of emails with HTH
> on them, seemingly some sort of way to say
> "thankyou" or something... as they're always at
> the end of somebodies message right before they
> sign off their name.. I have pondered, and
> pondered as to what HTH could stand for, could
> somebody be so kind as to fill me in
> ? Thanks,Michael.
>
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Author: Terry Ball
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