meaning of retrocomputing

1. retrocomputing /ret-roh-k*m-pyooting/ Refers to emulations of way-behind-the-state-of-the-art hardware or software, or implementations of never-was-state-of-the-art; especially if such implementations are elaborate practical jokes and/or parodies, written mostly for hack value, of more "serious" designs. Perhaps the most widely distributed retrocomputing utility was the "pnch6" or "bcd6" program on V7 and other early Unix versions, which would accept up to 80 characters of text argument and display the corresponding pattern in punched card code. Other well-known retrocomputing hacks have included the programming language INTERCAL, a JCL-emulating shell for Unix, the card-punch-emulating editor named 029, and various elaborate PDP-11 hardware emulators and RT-11 OS emulators written just to keep an old, sourceless Zork binary running. [Jargon File] retronym A term invented to distinguish a subclass of things from new members of the superclass, where the distinction was previously not necessary, since the old subclass had been all there was of the superclass. For example, the retronyms "snail mail" and "paper mail" were coined by those for who "mail" was likely to mean electronic mail. While the English language in general has a few retronyms "whole milk", "snow skiing", "acoustic guitar", hacker jargon is necessarily at points capriciously rich in retronyms, e. g. plaintext, natural language, impact printer, eyeball search, biological virus. [More examples?]

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