Ask HN: Why “hello world” and “foo:bar”?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33993158

by absqueued • 4 years ago

1 8 4 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

How did we started on this pattern?

Not sure about "Hello World!" besides being a cute phrase for new programs to say.

Foo Bar I would assume is from F.U.B.A.R., or F%&#ed Up Beyond All Repair. If so, then maybe 2 simple variables is all you can safely tweak? No clue, really.

xen2xen12• 4 years ago

I thought "Hello World" was the first example in the K&R C manual?

xen2xen12• 4 years ago

https://riptutorial.com/c/example/3675/original--hello--worl...

The first example from the most popular programming book in the world?

dragonwriter• 4 years ago

https://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc3092.txt

absqueued2• 4 years ago

This is a gem :).

Clearly explains = " ... FUBAR (`Fucked Up Beyond All Repair'), later modified to foobar".

floxy• 4 years ago

Pretty sure the "Hello, World" got its start from the first program used in "The C Programming Language" by Kernighan and Ritchie, back in 1978. I've always presumed the foo and bar come from FUBAR[0] which seems to have originated in WWII army lingo.

[0] https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/FUBAR

absqueued2• 4 years ago

In that sense, foobar, or fubar literally means "terrible"?

l3uwin• 4 years ago

Yes, if it's fucked up beyond all recognition, it's bad.

Ask HN: Why “hello world” and “foo:bar”?

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