Biff

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The Jargon File

Parts of this article are based on the Jargon File, v. 4.4.7,
a public domain document of hacker jargon.

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biff
/bif/
Usage: vt.
Derivation: Now rare


biff: /bif/ vt.

[now rare] To notify someone of incoming mail. From the BSD utility biff(1), which was in turn named after a friendly dog who used to chase frisbees in the halls at UCB while 4.2BSD was in development. There was a legend that it had a habit of barking whenever the mailman came, but the author of biff says this is not true. No relation to B1FF.

[edit]

Sources

Source: biff, in The Jargon File, version 4.4.7.


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