assembler programming.

:app: /ap/ /n./ Short for `application program', as opposed
to a systems program. Apps are what systems vendors are forever
chasing developers to create for their environments so they can
sell more boxes. Hackers tend not to think of the things they
themselves run as apps; thus, in hacker parlance the term excludes
compilers, program editors, games, and messaging systems, though a
user would consider all those to be apps. (Broadly, an app is
often a self-contained environment for performing some well-defined
task such as `word processing'; hackers tend to prefer more
general-purpose tools.) See {killer app}; oppose {tool},
{operating system}.

:arena: [Unix] /n./ The area of memory attached to a process by
`brk(2)' and `sbrk(2)' and used by `malloc(3)' as
dynamic storage. So named from a `malloc: corrupt arena'
message emitted when some early versions detected an impossible
value in the free block list. See {overrun screw}, {aliasing
bug}, {memory leak}, {memory smash}, {smash the stack}.

:arg: /arg/ /n./ Abbreviation for `argument' (to a
function), used so often as to have become a new word (like
`piano' from `pianoforte'). "The sine function takes 1 arg,
but the arc-tangent function can take either 1 or 2 args."
Compare {param}, {parm}, {var}.

:ARMM: /n./ [acronym, `Automated Retroactive Minimal
Moderation'] A Usenet robot created by Dick Depew of Munroe Falls,
Ohio. ARMM was intended to automatically cancel posts from