Jargon Watch
Alpha Geek
The most knowledgeable, technically proficient person in an office or work group. "Ask Larry, he's the alpha geek around here."
Critical Mess
An unstable stage in a software project's life when any single change or bug fix can result in two or more new bugs. Continued development at this stage leads to an exponential increase in the number of bugs.
G.O.O.D. Job
A "get-out-of-debt" job. A well-paying position you take to pay off your debts, and one you'll quit as soon as you're solvent.
NIMQ (pronounced "nihm-kyoo")
Acronym for "Not in My Queue." Said in response to suggestions to take on additional tasks or projects when you're already overwhelmed. Similar to the more common "It's not my job."
Paintmonkey
Someone with a less-than-glamorous entry-level computer graphics job. A paintmonkey may spend months on a nanosecond of digitized film footage, painting mattes, or doing monotonous touch-ups.
Softlifting
Microsoft's technique of using a small worm program to interrogate computers on a network. The program gathers intelligence on what software is being run on the machines, and then reports back to Microsoft when the customer signs up for The Microsoft Network.
This is reportedly a "feature" of a beta version of Windows 95.
Vomit Comet
A plane used to simulate zero-G for astronaut flight training. Trainees often get motion sickness inside.
- Gareth Branwyn (jargon@wiredmag.com)
Tip o' the coonskin cap to: James Kim, Arnie Cachelin, Mikki Halpin, Stanton McCandlish, Mark Smith, Patrick W. P. Dirks.
