From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkey_patch http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkey_patch (references to footnotes are from original site): The term monkey patc

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkey_patch http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkey_patch (references to footnotes are from original site): The term monkey patch seems to have come from an earlier term, guerrilla patch, which referred to changing code sneakily – and possibly incompatibly with other such patches – at runtime.[2] The word guerrilla, homophonous with gorilla (or nearly so), became monkey, possibly to make the patch sound less intimidating.[2] An alternative etymology is that it refers to “monkeying about” with the code (messing with it).