unixism
n.
A piece of code or a coding technique that depends on the protected
multi-tasking environment with relatively low process-spawn overhead
that exists on virtual-memory Unix systems. Common {unixism}s include:
gratuitous use of fork(2); the assumption that certain undocumented
but well-known features of Unix libraries such as stdio(3) are
supported elsewhere; reliance on {obscure} side-effects of system
calls (use of sleep(2) with a 0 argument to clue the scheduler that
you're willing to give up your time-slice, for example); the
assumption that freshly allocated memory is zeroed; and the assumption
that fragmentation problems won't arise from never free()ing memory.
Compare {vaxocentrism}; see also {New Jersey}.
Unixism
<operating system, jargon> A piece of code or a coding
technique that depends on the protected {multitasking}
environment with relatively low process-spawn overhead that
exists on {virtual-memory} {Unix} systems.
Common {Unixisms} include: gratuitous use of "{fork}"; the
assumption that certain undocumented but well-known features
of Unix libraries such as "{stdio}" are supported elsewhere;
reliance on obscure side-effects of {system calls} (use of
"sleep" with a 0 argument to tell the scheduler that you're
willing to give up your time-slice, for example); the
assumption that freshly allocated memory is zeroed; and the
assumption that {fragmentation} problems won't arise from
never freeing memory.
Compare {vaxocentrism}. See also {New Jersey}.
[{Jargon File}]
(1995-02-27)