pitch

n 1: the property of sound that varies with variation in the

frequency of vibration

2: the throwing of a baseball by a pitcher to a batter [syn: {delivery}]

3: (British) a vendor's position (especially on the sidewalk);

"he was employed to see that his paper's news pitches were

not trespassed upon by rival vendors"

4: promotion by means of an argument and demonstration [syn: {sales

talk}, {sales pitch}]

5: degree of deviation from a horizontal plane: "the roof had a

steep pitch" [syn: {rake}, {slant}]

6: any of various dark heavy viscid substances obtained as a

residue [syn: {tar}]

7: a high approach shot in golf [syn: {pitch shot}]

8: an all-fours game in which the first card led is a trump

[syn: {auction pitch}]

9: abrupt up-and-down motion (as caused by a ship or other

conveyance); "the pitching and tossing was quite exciting"

[syn: {lurch}, {pitching}]

10: the action or manner of throwing something; "his pitch fell

short and his hat landed on the floor"

v 1: throw or toss with a light motion; "flip me the beachball";

"toss me newspaper" [syn: {flip}, {toss}, {sky}]

2: move abruptly [syn: {lurch}, {shift}]

3: fall forwards

4: set to a certain pitch, as of an instrument or one's voice;

"He pitched his voice very low"

5: sell or offer for sale from place to place [syn: {peddle}, {monger},

{huckster}, {hawk}, {vend}]

6: be at an angle; "The terrain sloped down" [syn: {slope}, {incline}]

7: heel over [syn: {cant}, {cant over}, {tilt}, {slant}]

8: erect and fasten; "pitch a tent" [syn: {set up}]

9: erect and fix firmly in place; "They pitched the roof at a

steep slant"

10: cause to be at a particular level; "She pitched her

aspirations too high"

11: set the level or character of; "She pitched her speech to

the teenagers in the audience" [syn: {gear}]

patch

1. A temporary addition to a piece of code, usually

as a {quick-and-dirty} remedy to an existing {bug} or

{misfeature}. A patch may or may not work, and may or may not

eventually be incorporated permanently into the program.

Distinguished from a {diff} or {mod} by the fact that a patch

is generated by more primitive means than the rest of the

program; the classical examples are instructions modified by

using the front panel switches, and changes made directly to

the binary executable of a program originally written in an

{HLL}. Compare {one-line fix}.

2. To insert a patch into a piece of code.

3. [in the Unix world] A {diff}.

4. A set of modifications to binaries to be applied by a

patching program. {IBM} systems often receive updates to the

{operating system} in the form of absolute {hexadecimal}

patches. If you have modified your OS, you have to

disassemble these back to the {source code}. The patches

might later be corrected by other patches on top of them

(patches were said to "grow scar tissue"). The result was

often a convoluted {patch space} and headaches galore.

There is a classic story of a {tiger team} penetrating a

secure military computer that illustrates the danger inherent

in binary patches (or, indeed, any patches that you can't - or

don't - inspect and examine before installing). They couldn't

find any {trap doors} or any way to penetrate security of

IBM's OS, so they made a site visit to an IBM office

(remember, these were official military types who were

purportedly on official business), swiped some IBM stationery,

and created a fake patch. The patch was actually the trapdoor

they needed. The patch was distributed at about the right

time for an IBM patch, had official stationery and all

accompanying documentation, and was dutifully installed. The

installation manager very shortly thereafter learned something

about proper procedures.

5. {Larry Wall}'s "patch" utility, which automatically applies

a patch to a set of {source code} or other text files. It

accepts input in any of the four forms output by the {Unix}

{diff} utility and uses many helpful {heuristics} to determine

how to apply them.

Diff and patch are the standard way of producing and applying

updates to {Unix} files ditributed via {Usenet} and the

{Internet}, both have been ported to other {operating

systems}.

See your nearest {GNU archive site}.

[{Jargon File}]

(1996-06-04)