Meaning of kludgeyness | Babel Free

Examples

“The problem is that commodore basic is strange. Every LOAD is treated as if you are loading another basic program. The interpreter runs the basic program in memory from the beginning after the load is finished. Of course, in your case, it is the same basic program as you started with. You need a little kludgeyness to pull it off: 05 IF A = 1 THEN 20 / 07 A = 1 / 10 LOAD "ML PROG AT $C000",8,1 / 20 POKE THE CIA REGS / 30 OTHER BASIC STUFF / 40 END / This way, A is 0 the first time through and the ML is loaded. When your program runs the second time, it skips the load.”

“On the hardware side, [Sheldon] Laube says, because of the inherent “kludgeyness” of the upgrade, it is not just the microprocessor that needs replacing. “In machines like these, everything else is crummy,” Laube complains. [“]The reliability goes down if you start replacing those parts.””

“The most common seems to be an engine block at the rear of the motor, frequently consisting of a tape wrapping. I don't know whether I should be disappointed by the kludgeyness of this, or impressed by the strength of tape...”

“While there are generative linguists who accept an evolutionary story about the origins of language -- syntax specifically (e.g., Pinker and Bloom, in their 1990 *Behavioral and Brain Sciences* article), a (perhaps surprisingly) large number of generative linguists accept something like Chomsky's view (e.g., Massimo Piatelli-Palmerini, "Evolution, Selection, and Cognition" in *Cognition,* 27 (1989). pp. 1-52; and Frederick Newmeyer, *Grammatical Theory,* (1983), pp. 100ff.). So Chomsky could very well claim that it's irrelevant how selected mechanisms look (in terms of "hairy kludgeyness"), since there's no assumption on his part that language *is* such a selected capacity.”

“We are used to technology meant to accomplish very specific tasks, which either accomplishes those tasks completely or fails entirely. Sorting algorithms do not exist on this binary. They are intended to show you (or not show you) what they perceive to be the most relevant results, using factors that change on the fly dozens of times every second. They process hundreds of variables and when the people tasked with overseeing them change one variable, it’s almost impossible to predict how it will behave across millions of users each receiving a personalized result. Their kludgeyness and imperfection are accepted by-products of this work.”

CEFR level