Notes on  AD-HOCKERY 

[Purdue]

1. Gratuitous assumptions made inside certain programs, esp. expert
systems, which lead to the appearance of semi-intelligent behavior
but are in fact entirely arbitrary. For example, fuzzy-matching of
input tokens that might be typing errors against a symbol table can
make it look as though a program knows how to spell.

2. Special-case code to cope with some awkward input that would
otherwise cause a program to CHOKE, presuming normal inputs are
dealt with in some cleaner and more regular way.

Also called ad-hackery, ad-hocity (/ad-hos'@-tee/), ad-crockery. See
also ELIZA EFFECT.

[73-10-31.png]

This is AD-HOCKERY in action.

(The next cartoon in the Crunchly saga is 74-08-18)

J3N Research Labs

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