NABOB

Origin of the name

Thomas Tuerke explains that the name of the program their was inspired by Spiro Agnew, a republican American which was vice-president president Nixon of 1969 with 1973, and which remained famous for certain of its quotations.

In fact, it is about that which he pronounced for the first time on September 11th 1970 with San Diego, at the time of a Discours in which he qualified the opponents with the policy of the government of nattering nabobs off negativism . This expression, which one can translate by “Nabab S narquois of the Négativisme”, was pointed out by its recourse to the Allitération in NR.

Alibi

To diffuse their program, they posted it on Palladin, the BBS that Al Kalian managed.

With this intention, they took the Pseudonyme of Roberto Gahdja, supposedly Ph.D. with the Slac. Indeed, the Diminutif of Roberto is Bob, which enabled them to make name that they had chosen, “ nabob ”, the Acronyme of “ New Archive by Bob ” (“new of file by Bob”). One also finds it in the extension compressed files, which is .BOB.

This fictitious researcher presented his program like a beta release .4.01, and claimed to request the assistance of possible testers to detect bugs, and to collect their impressions and their suggestions.

The program was implied to be developed by a firm called µWord Enterprises, Inc.

Description

Principle of compression

The files which it produces after compression invariably have a size of a Octet, and always contain the same thing: only one character, that whose code is 1, and whose result with posting is a Smiley (☺).

Of course, the software does not allow the decompression of these files, since this task would require a relief cock as bulky as the file before compression, returning compression without interest: it is an application of the Paradoxe of the compressor.

Interface

The interface of this program is in line of order, and in language English E.

To accentuate realism of it, its originators equipped it with messages indicating the progression process of compression, with followed points of suspension message done. (“finished”).

Explanation of the fault

An attempt of decompression or visualization of the contents of a compressed file by NABOB shows this Error message: Each compression leads indeed to the message: The gravitational singularity is a notion developed in the theory of the black holes, just like “ vent-horizon ”, oneself-saying it trade Mark, which is in fact the expression English E indicating the concept of horizon of the events. However the documentation of NABOB precisely split metaphysical speech on the black holes and the neutron stars, because the Matière there is very compressed.

In the same order of idea, documentation explains why the technique of compression is declined in four alternatives, named according to the various types of Quark S. And indeed, to each compression, one of the four mentions Down-ing… (quark '' down ''), Up-ing… (quark '' up ''), Stranging… (quark '' strange '') or Charming… (quark '' charm '') is indicated, the choice being obviously random.

Revelation of the hoax

As of the second attempt of decompression or visualization, the hoax is revealed, since the message becomes:

Context

This hoax was born with the apogee of the war of the tools and the formats of compression which had resulted from the legal proceedings brought in 1988 against Phil Katz by SEA, to have plagiarized most of its software ARC by conceiving PKARC.

In answer to the proliferation of tools which had been followed from there, all praising the superiority of their algorithm of compression on those of the competitor , Tuerke and Kalian developed NABOB, which was presented in documentation accompanying it like the ultimate tool for compression ( the *ULTIMATE* in file compression ), more effective than all the others.

Spinning with Irony the Metaphor of the Marketing of the tools for compression of the time, of which only the part allowing decompression was distributed free, while that able to compress was paying (cf PKZIP/PKUNZIP, RAR/UNRAR), NABOB contrary was presented like a tool allowing only to compress.

Always accordingly with parody, the program is in addition equipped with an interface and a syntax imitating those of ARC, PKARC, LHA, and the first versions of PKZIP. Documentation specifies besides:

Reactions

August 1st

See too

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