Subj : Re: Why always FOO and BAR
To   : comp.programming
From : Scott Moore
Date : Tue Jul 19 2005 12:57 pm



Rob Thorpe wrote:
> Scott Moore wrote:
> 
>>pegasus wrote:
>>
>>>Can any body tell me why in any example and ppl always refer foo and
>>>bar.......
>>>
>>
>>The acronym comes from the WWII FUBAR, which standands for "Fouled Up
>>Beyond All Recognition", with the "F" usually stated in vulgar terms.
>>Programmers, for some reason, misspell this as FOOBAR.
>>
>>Also from WWII is SNAFU, "Situation Normal, All Fouled UP", which
>>has similar changes for the "F".
> 
> 
> It's not clear that FUBAR has any relation to foo and bar, though it's
> certainly possible.
> 
> In the UK meta-syntactical variables were traditionally "fred", "jim"
> and "sheila".  In the BBC computer the memory ranges for hardware I/O
> had these names.
> 

I agree. I have never been able to prove it. But I still think its quite
likely.

.