8 ms·
It's the first arbitrary number. 4711 is the second arbitrary number. They were used as the numeric foo and bar when I studied programming in high school and co
by yesbabyyes 7y ago
It's the first arbitrary number. 4711 is the second arbitrary number. They were used as the numeric foo and bar when I studied programming in high school and college during the 90s. I always thought it was universal hackerdom, but I actually rarely see them referenced. Perhaps it's a European thing?
- tus88 7y agoDo you have a source on "arbitrary number"? There were no obvious explanations online.
- perl4ever 7y agoI was thinking, what is the smallest number not found in any sequence on https://oeis.org/ https://oeis.org/?
- yesbabyyes 7y agoIt's not a mathematical or in any way strict thing. It's just a number chosen to exemplify any number. Just like "foo", "bar", "baz", "qux", etc, a sequence of numbers could be e.g. 17, 42, 4711. I grew up with it, and googling it seems that at least 4711 is a German thing.