conduit

Definition

A fancy pipe or channel for moving stuff from point A to point B, whether that's water, electrical cables, or metaphorical information. In construction, it's the protective tube that keeps your wires from becoming a fire hazard; in medicine, it's any duct carrying bodily fluids. Think of it as infrastructure's most versatile middleman.

Example Usage

The electrician ran new conduit through the walls, ensuring the wiring wouldn't electrocute future homeowners during renovations.

Source: Construction and technical terminology

Related Terms

Intermediate

bidirectional

Technical jargon for "goes both ways," describing systems, data flows, or communication channels that work in two opposite directions simultaneously. It's the difference between a walkie-talkie (unidirectional, one person talks while the other listens) and a phone call (bidirectional, where both people can interrupt each other freely). Engineers love this word because it makes simple concepts sound impressively complex.

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executable

A file that contains actual runnable code rather than just data or instructions—the software equivalent of the difference between a recipe and a ready-made meal. Double-click an executable and your computer will attempt to run it, for better or worse (mostly worse if you downloaded it from a sketchy website). These files have extensions like .exe, .app, or .bin, and they're what antivirus software watches like a hawk.

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Intermediate

Pipeline

An automated sequence of steps that code goes through from development to production, or a visual representation of your company's hopes and dreams flowing through stages of increasing disappointment. When the pipeline breaks, everything stops.

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Intermediate

Dogfooding

Using your own product internally before inflicting it on customers, based on the phrase "eating your own dog food." If the developers won't use their own software, that tells you everything you need to know about the software.

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Advanced

Gib wipe

A plea from Escape from Tarkov players begging developers for a game reset, usually accompanied by the emoticon ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ. 'Gib' is internet speak for 'give,' and the wipe resets everyone's progress so veterans and newbies can suffer equally again. It's basically asking to have your hard work deleted, which tells you everything about gaming masochism.

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alcatel

A budget mobile phone brand that serves as a nostalgic reminder of pre-smartphone days or the current choice of extremely frugal shoppers. Owning one means you either lost a bet or have admirably transcended materialism.

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