Alberto Wagner wrote:
> Why everyone uses $foo or $foobar as examples?
>
>
>
foo
/foo/ 1. interj. Term of disgust. 2 [very common] Used very generally as a
sample name for absolutely everything, esp. programs and files (esp. scratch
files). 3. First on the list of metasyntactic variables used in syntax
examples. See also bar, baz, gux, guux, corge, grault, garply, waldo, fred,
plugh, xyzzy, thud.
When 'foo' is used in connection with 'bar' it has generally traced to the
WWII-era Army slang acronym FUBAR ('Fucked Up Beyond All Repair'), later
modified to foobar. Early versions of the Jargon File interpreted this
change as post-war bowdlerization, but it now seems more likely that FUBAR
was itself a derivative of 'foo' perhaps influenced by German 'furchtbar'
(terrible) - 'foobar' may actually have been the original form.
For, it seems, the world 'foo' itself had an immediate prewar history in
comic strips and cartoons. The earlies documented uses were in the "Smokey
Stover" comic strip popular in the 1930s, which frequently included the word
'foo'. Bill Holman, the author of the strip, filled it with off jokes and
personal contrivances, including other nonsense phrases such as "Notary
Sojac" and "1506 nix nix". According to the Warner Brothers Cartoon
Companion Holman claimed to have found the word 'foo' on the bottom of a
chinese figurine. This is plausible; chinese statuettes often have
apotropaic inscriptions, and this may have been the chinese word 'fu'
(sometimes transliterated 'foo'), which can mean "happiness" when spoken
with the proper tone (the lion-dog guardians flanking the steps of many
chinese restaurants are properly called 'fu dogs'). English speakers'
reception of Holman's 'foo' nonsense word was undoubtely influenced by
Yiddish 'feh' and english 'fooey' and 'fool'.
... (etc.)
(From Babylon Translator).
"Michael Kimsal" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> escribió en el mensaje
[EMAIL PROTECTED]">news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> Alberto Wagner wrote:
> > Why everyone uses $foo or $foobar as examples?
> >
> >
> >
>
> Why not? They are relatively benign words that are simply to
> type and aren't terribly language centric.
>
> $moo and $moocow would work just as well, or $asdf or $qwerty
> or others.
>
> As far as I know, they have no specific connotation,
> but they've been used as placement holder names since
> at least the early 80's when I started programming.
>
>
>
> Michael Kimsal
> http://www.phphelpdesk.com
> PHP support when you need it
> 734-480-9961
>
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