[php] Was bedeutet foo?

[Jens Benecke]

On Tue, Oct 10, 2000 at 06:31:21PM +0200, Ulrich Boeing wrote:

> Ich weiß, es ist eigentlich egal, aber was soll andauernd dieses 'foo' ?
> Bedeutet wohl soviel wie irgendwas, dummy etc!

$ dict foo

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2 definitions found

From Jargon File (4.2.0, 31 JAN 2000) [jargon]:

  foo /foo/  1. interj. Term of disgust.  2. [very common] Used
  very generally as a sample name for absolutely anything, esp.
  programs and files (esp. scratch files).  3. First on the standard
  list of {metasyntactic variable}s used in syntax examples.  See also
  {bar}, {baz}, {qux}, {quux}, {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 a post-war bowdlerization,
  but it 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 word `foo' itself had an immediate prewar
  history in comic strips and cartoons.  The earliest 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 odd jokes and personal contrivances, including
  other nonsense phrases such as "Notary Sojac" abd "1506 nix nix".
  According to the Warner Brothers Cartoon Companion
  (ttp://www.spumco.com/magazine/eowbcc/) 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 undoubtedly
  influenced by Yiddish `feh' and English `fooey' and `fool'.
  
     Holman's strip featured a firetruck called the Foomobile that rode
  on two wheels.  The comic strip was tremendously popular in the
  late 1930s, and legend has it that a manufacturer in Indiana even
  produced an operable version of Holman's Foomobile.  According to
  the Encyclopedia of American Comics, `Foo' fever swept the U.S.,
  finding its way into popular songs and generating over 500 `Foo
  Clubs.'  The fad left `foo' references embedded in popular culture
  (including a couple of appearances in Warner Brothers cartoons of
  1938-39) but with their origins rapidly forgotten.
  
     One place they are known to have remained live is in the U.S.
  military during the WWII years.  In 1944-45, the term `foo fighters'
  was in use by radar operators for the kind of mysterious or spurious
  trace that would later be called a UFO (the older term resurfaced in
    popular American usage in 1995 via the name of one of the better
  grunge-rock bands).  Informants connected the term to the Smokey
  Stover strip.
  
     The U.S. and British militaries frequently swapped slang terms
  during the war (see {kluge} and {kludge} for another important
  example) Period sources reported that `FOO' became a semi-legendary
  subject of WWII British-army graffiti more or less equivalent to the
  American Kilroy.  Where British troops went, the graffito "FOO was
  here" or something similar showed up.  Several slang dictionaries
  aver that FOO probably came from Forward Observation Officer, but
  this (like the contemporaneous "FUBAR") was probably a {backronym} .
  Forty years later, Paul Dickson's excellent book "Words" (Dell,
  1982, ISBN 0-440-52260-7) traced "Foo" to an unspecified British
  naval magazine in 1946, quoting as follows: "Mr. Foo is a mysterious
  Second World War product, gifted with bitter omniscience and
  sarcasm."
  
     Earlier versions of this entry suggested the possibility that
  hacker usage actually sprang from "FOO, Lampoons and Parody", the
  title of a comic book first issued in September 1958, a joint
  project of Charles and Robert Crumb.  Though Robert Crumb (then in
  his mid-teens) later became one of the most important and
  influential artists in underground comics, this venture was hardly a
  success; indeed, the brothers later burned most of the existing
  copies in disgust.  The title FOO was featured in large letters on
  the front cover.  However, very few copies of this comic actually
  circulated, and students of Crumb's `oeuvre' have established that
  this title was a reference to the earlier Smokey Stover comics.  The
  Crumbs may also have been influenced by a short-lived Canadian
  parody magazine named `Foo' published in 1951-52.
  
     An old-time member reports that in the 1959 "Dictionary of the
  TMRC Language", compiled at {TMRC}, there was an entry that went
  something like this:
  
    FOO: The first syllable of the sacred chant phrase "FOO MANE PADME
    HUM."  Our first obligation is to keep the foo counters turning.
  
     (For more about the legendary foo counters, see {TMRC}.)  This
  definition used Bill Holman's nonsense word, only then two decades
  old and demonstrably still live in popular culture and slang, to a
  {ha ha only serious} analogy with esoteric Tibetan Buddhism.
  Today's hackers would find it difficulty to resist elaborating a joke
  like that, and it would be hard to believe 1959's were any less
  susceptible. Almost the entire staff of what later became the MIT AI
  Lab was involved with TMRC, and the word spread from there.
  
  

From The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (05 Sep 00) [foldoc]:

  foo
  
          <jargon> /foo/ A sample name for absolutely anything,
          especially programs and files (especially {scratch files}).
          First on the standard list of {metasyntactic variables} used
          in {syntax} examples.  See also {bar}, {baz}, {qux}, {quux},
          {corge}, {grault}, {garply}, {waldo}, {fred}, {plugh},
          {xyzzy}, {thud}.
  
          The etymology of "foo" is obscure.  When used in connection
          with "bar" it is generally traced to the WWII-era Army slang
          acronym {FUBAR}, later bowdlerised to {foobar}.
  
          However, the use of the word "foo" itself has more complicated
          antecedents, including a long history in comic strips and
          cartoons.
  
          "FOO" often appeared in the "Smokey Stover" comic strip by
          Bill Holman.  This surrealist strip about a fireman appeared
          in various American comics including "Everybody's" between
          about 1930 and 1952.  FOO was often included on licence plates
          of cars and in nonsense sayings in the background of some
          frames such as "He who foos last foos best" or "Many smoke but
          foo men chew".
  
          Allegedly, "FOO" and "BAR" also occurred in Walt Kelly's
          "Pogo" strips.  In the 1938 cartoon "The Daffy Doc", a very
          early version of Daffy Duck holds up a sign saying "SILENCE IS
          FOO!".  Oddly, this seems to refer to some approving or
          positive affirmative use of foo.  It has been suggested that
          this might be related to 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").
  
          Earlier versions of this entry suggested the possibility that
          hacker usage actually sprang from "FOO, Lampoons and Parody",
          the title of a comic book first issued in September 1958, a
          joint project of Charles and Robert Crumb.  Though Robert
          Crumb (then in his mid-teens) later became one of the most
          important and influential artists in underground comics, this
          venture was hardly a success; indeed, the brothers later
          burned most of the existing copies in disgust.  The title FOO
          was featured in large letters on the front cover.  However,
          very few copies of this comic actually circulated, and
          students of Crumb's "oeuvre" have established that this title
          was a reference to the earlier Smokey Stover comics.
  
          An old-time member reports that in the 1959 "Dictionary of the
          TMRC Language", compiled at {TMRC} there was an entry that
          went something like this:
  
          FOO: The first syllable of the sacred chant phrase "FOO MANE
          PADME HUM."  Our first obligation is to keep the foo counters
          turning.
  
          For more about the legendary foo counters, see {TMRC}.  Almost
          the entire staff of what became the {MIT} {AI LAB} was
          involved with TMRC, and probably picked the word up there.
  
          Another correspondant cites the nautical construction
          "foo-foo" (or "poo-poo"), used to refer to something
          effeminate or some technical thing whose name has been
          forgotten, e.g. "foo-foo box", "foo-foo valve".  This was
          common on ships by the early nineteenth century.
  
          Very probably, hackish "foo" had no single origin and derives
          through all these channels from Yiddish "feh" and/or English
          "fooey".
  
          [{Jargon File}]
  
          (1998-04-16)
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Oha, ist doch etwas mehr geworden. Aber ich bin zu faul das jetzt noch
wieder zu löschen, das muss die Liste einmal aushalten. ;))
  
Ich hoffe das reicht erstmal :)

"dict" ist schon ein ziemlich cooles Werkzeug ... :)
 
> Woher kommt das?  Gibt es einen tieferen Sinn?  Und lebt Elvis noch?

s.o, s.o, nein.

> Bitte nur Antworten auf alle Fragen :-) Gruß Ulrich

Nein. :-)


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