crufty

1 definition found

crufty - Jargon File (4.4.4, 14 Aug 2003) :

  crufty
   /kruhf'tee/, adj.
  
     [very common; origin unknown; poss. from `crusty' or `cruddy']
  
     1. Poorly built, possibly over-complex. The canonical example is
     "This is standard old crufty DEC software". In fact, one fanciful
     theory of the origin of crufty holds that was originally a mutation
  of
     `crusty' applied to DEC software so old that the `s' characters were
     tall and skinny, looking more like `f' characters.
  
     2. Unpleasant, especially to the touch, often with encrusted junk.
     Like spilled coffee smeared with peanut butter and catsup.
  
     3. Generally unpleasant.
  
     4. (sometimes spelled cruftie) n. A small crufty object (see frob);
     often one that doesn't fit well into the scheme of things. "A LISP
     property list is a good place to store crufties (or, collectively,
     random cruft)."
  
     This term is one of the oldest in the jargon and no one is sure of
  its
     etymology, but it is suggestive that there is a Cruft Hall at Harvard
     University which is part of the old physics building; it's said to
     have been the physics department's radar lab during WWII. To this day
     (early 1993) the windows appear to be full of random techno-junk. MIT
     or Lincoln Labs people may well have coined the term as a knock on
  the
     competition.