dodgy adj.
Syn. with flaky. Preferred outside
the U.S.
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dogcow /dog'kow/ n.
See Moof. The dogcow is a
semi-legendary creature that lurks in the depths of the Macintosh
Technical Notes Hypercard stack V3.1. The full story of the
dogcow is told in technical note #31 (the particular dogcow
illustrated is properly named `Clarus'). Option-shift-click will
cause it to emit a characteristic `Moof!' or `!fooM' sound.
Getting to tech note 31 is the hard part; to discover
how to do that, one must needs examine the stack script with a
hackerly eye. Clue: rot13 is
involved. A dogcow also appears if you choose `Page
Setup...' with a LaserWriter selected and click on
the `Options' button. It also lurks in other Mac printer drivers,
notably those for the now-discontinued Style Writers. Sadly,
Apple has removed the pages that used to describe the dogcow.
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dogfood n.
[Microsoft, Netscape] Interim software used internally for
testing. "To eat one's own dogfood" (from which the slang noun
derives) means to use the software one is developing, as part of
one's everyday development environment (the phrase is used
outside Microsoft and Netscape). The practice is normal in the
Linux community and elsewhere, but the term `dogfood' is seldom
used as open-source betas tend to be quite tasty and nourishing.
The idea is that developers who are using their own software will
quickly learn what's missing or broken. Dogfood is typically not
even of beta quality.
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dogpile v.
[Usenet: prob. fr. mainstream "puppy pile"] When many people
post unfriendly responses in short order to a single posting,
they are sometimes said to "dogpile" or "dogpile on" the person
to whom they're responding. For example, when a religious
missionary posts a simplistic appeal to _alt.atheism_, he
can expect to be dogpiled. It has been suggested that this
derives from U.S, football slang for a tackle involving three or
more people; among hackers, it seems at least as likely do derive
from an `autobiographical' Bugs Bunny cartoon in which a gang of
attacking canines actually yells "Dogpile on the rabbit!".
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dogwash /dog'wosh/
[From a quip in the `urgency' field of a very optional
software change request, ca. 1982. It was something like
"Urgency: Wash your dog first".] 1. n. A project of minimal
priority, undertaken as an escape from more serious work. 2. v.
To engage in such a project. Many games and much freeware get written this way.