bit bucket

   [very common]

   1.  The universal data sink (originally, the mythical receptacle used
   to catch bits when they fall off the end of a register during a shift
   instruction). Discarded, lost, or destroyed data is said to have gone
   to  the  bit bucket. On {Unix}, often used for {/dev/null}. Sometimes
   amplified as the Great Bit Bucket in the Sky.

   2. The place where all lost mail and news messages eventually go. The
   selection  is  performed according to {Finagle's Law}; important mail
   is much more likely to end up in the bit bucket than junk mail, which
   has  an  almost 100% probability of getting delivered. Routing to the
   bit  bucket  is automatically performed by mail-transfer agents, news
   systems, and the lower layers of the network.

   3.  The ideal location for all unwanted mail responses: "Flames about
   this  article  to  the  bit  bucket." Such a request is guaranteed to
   overflow one's mailbox with flames.

   4.  Excuse  for  all mail that has not been sent. "I mailed you those
   figures  last week; they must have landed in the bit bucket." Compare
   {black hole}.

   This  term is used purely in jest. It is based on the fanciful notion
   that bits are objects that are not destroyed but only misplaced. This
   appears  to  have been a mutation of an earlier term `bit box', about
   which  the same legend was current; old-time hackers also report that
   trainees used to be told that when the CPU stored bits into memory it
   was actually pulling them "out of the bit box". See also {chad box}.

   Another  variant  of this legend has it that, as a consequence of the
   "parity  preservation  law",  the number of 1 bits that go to the bit
   bucket must equal the number of 0 bits. Any imbalance results in bits
   filling  up the bit bucket. A qualified computer technician can empty
   a full bit bucket as part of scheduled maintenance.

   The  source  for  all these meanings, is, historically, the fact that
   the  {chad  box}  on  a  paper-tape  punch was sometimes called a bit
   bucket.

   

   A literal {bit bucket}.

   (The  next cartoon in the Crunchly saga is 76-02-14. The previous one
   is 75-10-04.)

[glossary]
[Reference(s) to this entry by made by: {/dev/null}{bit bucket}{black hole}{chad box}{drop on the floor}{virtual shredder}]