line eater
1. A {bug} in some now-obsolete versions of the
{Usenet} software that used to eat up to {BUFSIZ} bytes of the
article text. The bug was triggered by having the text of the
article start with a space or tab. This bug was quickly
personified as a mythical creature called the "line eater",
and postings often included a dummy line of "line eater food".
Ironically, line eater "food" not beginning with a space or
tab wasn't actually eaten, since the bug was avoided; but if
there ▫was▫ a space or tab before it, then the line eater
would eat the food ▫and▫ the beginning of the text it was
supposed to be protecting. The practice of "sacrificing to
the line eater" continued for some time after the bug had been
{nailed to the wall}, and is still humorously referred to.
The bug itself is still (in mid-1991) occasionally reported to
be lurking in some mail-to-netnews {gateways}.
2. {NSA line eater}.
(1996-04-09)