The Microsoft Lexicon
or Microspeak made easier 
Compiled and edited by Ken Barnes
with contributions from members of the Cinemania and Music Central teams, 1995-1998.
Please note: We are aware that many of these terms did not originate with Microsoft; the idea of the Microsoft Lexicon has been to chronicle the language as it is used at Microsoft. (If you have theories about etymology, however, we'd love to hear 'em. Everybody seems to have a story for "open the kimono"...)
As seen in!
Click for "Microsoft Lexicographer Maintains Definitive Dictionary of Microsoft Slang"
Post your own notes about the Lexicon on Jeeem's Fridge (click here)
Or send submissions to: mslex@cinepad.com and they will be forwarded to the editor.

Getting granular with Microspeak: Working at Microsoft (especially for people who come from journalism and the entertainment industry like many of us at Cinemania and Music Central) is a lot like passing through the looking glass. Microsoft is a distinctive world with a culture (including bizarre customs and rituals) and a language of its own. (Unfortunately, this culture is rapidly becoming more mainstream as the company itself becomes more traditionally corporate and less colorful; "The Suits" are definitely taking over...) For those of us who love words (as opposed to code), Microsoft is a Wonderland of bizarre and exotic terms and phrases, not all of which resemble English as we (use to) know it. I fell down the Redmond rabbit hole in 1994, and Ken Barnes followed shortly thereafter. Ken is a collector -- of music (mostly on vinyl) and of language (mostly on paper) -- and as we discussed the exotic jargon we heard and read in e-mail, he took it upon himself to compile this lexicon as a "living document" guide to himself and others who found themselves strangers in this strange land. That earned him not only a feature story in the MicroNews, the company's corporate newsletter, but the undying respect and admiration of his fellow a-dashes, and even a grudging chuckle of recognition from a few blue badges. 
-- Jim Emerson (February, 1998)
P.S. Jeeem's CinePad is set primarily in the Arial typeface that is used for almost all Microsoft e-mail, the preferred mode of discourse.

Compiler's Note: This lexicon's goal is to provide a representative compilation of slang peculiar to the Microsoft working environment. Every attempt has been made to avoid listing examples of widespread computer or software industry slang or generalized geekspeak. However, it is impossible in many cases to avoid it, since Microspeak borrows from the geekspeak vocabulary, while elements of Microjargon also penetrate the world outside. Hardcore technological terms have also been avoided where possible in favor of more sociologically oriented terminology.
-- Ken Barnes

A-F G-P Q-Z

A
A-dash: Prefix used for e-mail names (transcribed as "a-") and in conversation to distinguish Microsoft contractors (also see Orange Badge), who are hourly and paid by temp agencies, from Microsoft employees (see Blue Badge, Headcount), who have salaries and vesting stock options.
Action Item: Something you need to follow up on as part of your ownership of an issue. (See Own, Issue)
Admin: Group administrator, a position designed to facilitate matters such as supplies, payment of contractors and vendors, acquiring new equipment, dealing with the Microsoft bureaucracy, allocation of office space, moving (a ritual practiced every six months or so whether needed or not, as a corporate-approved application of chaos theory), planning parties, etc. Normally serves as a roadblock to all but the last function. Admins also serve executive assistants or secretaries to top executives, who in the nominally egalitarian environment of Microsoft are not authorized to have e.a.'s or secretaries but still need (or feel they need) them.
Adminisphere: Organizationally speaking, the levels starting directly above you, characterized by their general cluelessness about issues you're well versed in and tendencies to make policy decisions that ignore your expert input.
Alias: E-mail name for individual or group, mostly used for the latter.
App: An unappetizing shorthand abbreviation of application, meaning a way of using a product or program. Ex: "That app doesn't work on the PowerMAC."
Ask: Used as a noun, preceded by "the," as in "What's the ask?", which basically means "What are you asking ?", or "What's the bottom line?", or, more simply, "What's the question?" Essentially, then, a gratuitous verb-to-noun transmogrification, creating a useless synonym for question.
Author: Person who assembles various multimedia components-text, audio, graphics-into a cohesive presentation. Not to be confused with a traditional author in fiber media (q.v.), who is known in cybermedia as a content provider (q.v.). Also used as a verb ("You need to finish production so Mark can author that piece.")

B
Bandwidth: Essentially a cumbersome synonym for "time," as in "I don't have the bandwidth to deal with that issue," but with implications beyond the merely temporal, encompassing the larger issue of mental resources or capacity. Also, "mindshare" (as in share of mind available to deal with the issue).
Big R/Little R: Archaic but still used by lifers. In the now-obsolete Xenix e-mail system, an upper-case "R" was used for a general reply ("reply all"), while a lower-case "r" denoted a response to the sender only. Thus, a "little r only" request in e-mail means "reply only to me," or "keep the lid on this."
Binary Problem: A method of paring down a complex issue to a two-possible-solutions scenario (yes or no, 1 or 0, stop or go, etc.) Described by resident Microsoft philosopher Stephen Brown as "classic MS reductivism...clearly an economical way of thinking, since it eliminates all need to consider the vast gray area that occupies the psychic space of most issues and problems."
Bitstorm: (Probably general industry usage) A volume of traffic on a service high enough to cause the digital equivalent of gridlock.
Black Hole: A project requiring infinite amounts of work. In other words, the vast majority of Microsoft projects.
Bleeding edge: (General industry usage) Synonym for "cutting edge," with an added implication of the pioneer's vulnerability. Ex: "We're really on the bleeding edge with this product. Hope it sells through." Being "edgy" is still, however, a desirable Microsoft quality.
Bloatware: (General industry usage) Software that takes up a huge and disproportionate amount of space on your hard drive. Synonym: Spacehog.
Blocking Issue: (see Issue) A barrier or problem that prevents a neat solution to an issue. Usually technical but can be any sort of potential roadblock. 
Blue Badge (or Blue Card): (sometimes, slightly derogatorily, blue badger, or just plain blue) Synonym for full-time Microsoft employees, the Brahmins of the deeply ingrained Microsoft caste system, whose card keys have a blue background rather than the orange used for contractors (see Orange Badge) and green for vendors. Derivative terms include "turn blue," meaning to earn full-time status.
Bookmark: Possibly of extra-Microsoft origin (or usage). To make note of a prospective hire ("I bookmarked her after I saw her speak at a convention"; "Bookmark him, Danno"). Derived from the Web practice of bookmarking favorite sites.
BOOP: One of at least 10,000 peculiar-to-Microsoft acronyms. There are so many casually-tossed-off acronyms (mostly of three letters, such as OOF=Out Of Facility) in daily use that there's even an acronym for the concept itself: TLA (three-letter acronym). This particular four-letter acronym is especially disarming; it stands for "Bill and the Office Of the President," meaning Bill Gates and his three top honchos. At one time you could e-mail to BOOP and the message would get to those four gentlemen. After a reorg (q.v.) on December 3, 1996, BOOP was replaced by the less-endearing Executive Committee.
Bouncing: Cybernetic equivalent of going off the air-for repairs, a new app, or other internal tinkering. "The system is bouncing at 4:30 and should be up in 20 minutes."
Braindump: A process by which a departing Microsoft employee or contractor imparts the essential information vital to performing his or her job to the designated replacement. The process normally consumes no more than five minutes immediately prior to the incumbent's departure from the company, nevermore to return.
Broken: Temporarily disabled; currently not working ("You can't access the site right now; it's broken"). There's a distinct (and often optimistic) air of impermanence about this term, implying a deep-rooted faith that anything can be fixed.
Bucket: A virtual container in which tasks can be dumped: e.g., "Stick that interface issue in Ed's bucket." Sometimes, a container in which low-priority concepts can be consigned: "Toss that simple exit function in the feature bucket; we don't have the bandwidth to deal with it this build."
Bug: All-purpose term for mistake, error, glitch. Standard usage for the industry; now fairly widespread throughout the computer-literate world. Despite its universal acceptance, the term is, according to the not entirely objective web source Woody's Office Watch, deliberately avoided by Microsoft technical support personnel when referring to MS software. Employed instead are such euphemisms as "issue" (in various permutations) or more highly evolved doublespeak terms such as "undocumented feature" (cf. Feature), "challenge," or "design side effect." Company loyalists insist, however, that one reason for this circumlocution is that in Microspeak, "bug" has the all-inclusive definition of any problem or complaint filed about a product, whether valid or not, as opposed to the general usage, which refers only to actual problems. According to this line of reasoning, any discussion of bugs with outsiders can give the impression that Microsoft products are far more buggy than anyone else's. Others respond, "And your point would be..."
Build: The drive to complete a project or new version of a product. "The IE 4.0 build is eating up all our dev resources."
Bump: Synonym for "push back" (q.v.); i.e., readdress an issue after an unsatisfactory or dilatory response. "You'll need to bump legal again on the permissions issue." See Ping.
BusDev: (pron. "BIZ-dev) Most likely also common outside Microsoft. Verbal and written shorthand for business development, the arm of the company responsible for...well, developing businesses, or assessing the pros and cons of continuing, discontinuing, or moving into established business realms.
Buttoned Down: Compliment, meaning tightly reasoned, clear, concise, etc. Not often heard of late.
Buyoff: (Also buy-off) Approval from above; green light. "We need BOOP's buyoff before this project's a go.
Buzzword Bingo: Deeply, perhaps uniquely cynical pastime, a competition taking place at company meetings. The meetings, essentially monster pep rallies usually held at the Kingdome, feature inspirational speeches from top company execs; in buzzword bingo you're electronically issued a bingo card inscribed with Microjargon and industry catch phrases deemed likely to crop up in the day's orations, and every time one of your buzzwords is spoken you get credit. Overzealous players have been known to leap up in the middle of a speech and proclaim "Bingo!"

C
Campus: What more industrially oriented corporations would call a "plant" or "facility." Microsoft's collegiate orientation is worth an appendix of its own.
CLM: TLA (q.v.) for "career-limiting move." Badmouthing adminispheric dictates, no matter how ill-considered, can be a CLM. So can compiling lexicons.
Code Complete: When the program codes of a project have passed all the tests that program management and testing have determined there's time to throw at it. Ready to go, though not necessarily (in fact, probably not) bug-free.
Code Warrior: A developer; a writer of code; the building block of traditional Microsoft success. See Dev.
Config: Particularly displeasing shortened form of configuration.
Content Providers: (General industry usage) Writers, usually, although the term can also apply to artists, musicians, and anyone else whom the code lords condescend to allow to provide the raw material for their tools to propagate or facilitate.
Context-switch: A verb, unbelievably, meaning "change subjects." Ex: "Enough about outsourcing issues. Let's context-switch to planning the rollout."
Cookie: Webspeak term for the electronic location in a browser where basic information and preferences supplied by the user about him or herself are stored.
Cool: Basically employed in the same generation-spanning, mildly hip way as in general parlance, but overused vastly out of proportion to its applicability, generally in a one-word response. Origin of the term's primacy is mysterious but it is all-pervasive, up to the very loftiest levels. Ex: "We showed the prototype to BillG, and he said it was way cool." Gag-reflex-inducing customized spelling gaining currency: kewl.
Core Competence: What Microsoft is good at. Subject of heated internal debates between conservatives who want to stick with the software basics and expansionists who favor venturing into untested waters, like-horror of horrors-content.
Core Product: A tangible, salable product, such as a CD-ROM, as opposed to a web app of the same information. Increasingly less relevant as Microsoft shifts emphasis more strongly to the Internet and discontinues most CD-ROM products.
Crisp: Well-reasoned, precisely reasoned. Opposite of Random.
Cycles: Another approximate synonym for "time" (see Bandwidth), as in "there aren't enough cycles in the day to drive this issue." The internal, informal Cityscape Microspeak Dictionary defined cycles economically as "human brainpower measured in computer metric." Often used in tandem with the verb "burn," as in "He's really burning a lot of cycles trying to resolve those UI issues."

D
Death March: The long, lingering final countdown to a ship date, involving 16-25-hour days, catnaps on couches, and plenty of "flat food" (food, mostly from vending machines, that you can slip under people's doors so they can keep working).
Deliverable: A task that you "own" and are responsible for delivering. Ex: "What progress have you made on your deliverables?" Variant-Key Deliverable: a more important task/project than a mere, run-of-the-mill, mundane deliverable.
Delta: The distance, or period of time, between where a project or item is and where it should be. Derived from the mathematical term (as opposed to river mouth, Greek alphabet, or fraternity usages) describing "an incremental change in a variable." Used in reference to all manner of things-"testing delta," "production delta," or "stock delta," defined as the difference between an employee's "strike price" (the lowest price of MS stock during the first 30 days of the blue badger's employment) and the current price, often a figure inspiring boisterous gloating.
Dependency: A necessity; something that has to work right or come through for a larger project to be accomplished. Variants-Zero-Dependency (does not affect the project in question); Key Dependency-a really necessary necessity.
Dev: Short for Development, the developers (or code warriors)-not unknown to be a trifle eccentric-who make everything work. "We'll hand that issue off to dev." "Dev's not here, man."
Disambiguate: A remarkably unclear way to say "clarify."
Disconnect: Miscommunication. Always used as a noun ("We had a disconnect on the HTML issue").
Disintermediate: Almost certainly an example of pure Marketing-speak, rather than Microjargon, but difficult to resist including anyway. Essentially means, once the syllables are peeled away, disposing of intermediary entities between two primary market forces; i.e., maneuvering to dispense with distributors and manufacturers that "interfere" with the basic relationship between the creator of a work and the consumer. Colloquial English translation: eliminate the middleman.
Doc: Casual, widespread abbreviation of "document."
Dogfood: Software code not fit for public consumption but good enough for internal purposes, very unrefined and buggy (that is, full of bugs), but containing the basic nutrients. Alternately, code you're developing and using in daily functions simultaneously (a process known as "eating your own dogfood").
Doorstop: Possibly general argot. A computer that's become obsolete for reasons of insufficient processing speed or storage capacity. As of Summer '97, this class included all 286 and 386 models and most 486's.
Drill down: To delve deeply into the core of an issue, rather than deal with it in a superficial manner; to analyze the details.
Drive: To push; to captain the initiative on a particular issue or project. "Ed is driving the HTML issue for the product."

E
E-Mail Names: On the surface, a reasonably logical method of distinguishing 20,000 or so Microsoft employees and contractors on the internal corporate e-mail system. Consists of a five- or six-letter alias (q.v.) constructed from first and last name - if Leonardo Di Caprio worked for Microsoft, for example, his e-mail handle would be something like "leodic." Where it gets strange is that the corporate culture fosters a substitution of the e-mail name for the real name, in memos, formal documents, and even, repellently, in conversation. (Ex: "johnd owns that issue," "contingent staffers report to edcur," and constant casual references to Bill Gates as "billg.")
E-mail names also instantly serve to identify the e-mailers rank in the hiring hierarchy - full-time employees' handles solely comprise the first-and-last-name combo; contractors have an "a-" affixed to the front of their handles (e.g., a-hosim; the a- [pron. "a-dash" (q.v.)] stands for agency, meaning a temp-agency employee); vendors' handles are preceded by "v-" (v-dash); and "temporary employees" (probationary full-time employee hires who don't receive all the perks of conventional FTEs, meaning no stock options) get a "t-" (t-dash). This system conveniently enables, for example, a busy FTE scanning his e-mail to note that a message in his in-box was sent by a contractor and therefore can be safely ignored.
EOD: (Sometimes lower-cased.) Endemic TLA meaning "end of day." Ex: "I need your take-away from the off-site by EOD tomorrow."
EOM: (Often lower-cased.) End Of Message. Appended to subject line of e-mail to indicate that no further communication is forthcoming.
Exposure: Defined pithily by an anonymous MS Glossary contributor as "those areas for which one's ass is not covered." Ex: "Our exposure for the 3.0 version is the skimpy content."
Extensible: Marketing usage. In reference to products or features, capable of being build on, elaborated, or...extended. What might, in plainer English, be called "extendable."
Eye Candy: Not exclusively Microspeak, but a commonly used term denoting visually attractive material, analogous to "ear candy" in the music business (although not to "nose candy").
Eyeballs: Users of a website; audience (a vague equivalent of listeners to a radio station).

F
Facemail: Technologically backward means of communication, clearly inferior to voicemail or e-mail. Involves actually walking to someone's office and speaking to him or her face to face. Considered highly inefficient and declasse.
Feature: Euphemism for bug (q.v.). Dysfunctional attributes in a product are often "explained" away by apologists with the phrase "It's not a bug, it's a feature." As a result, "it's a feature" became a shorthand expression for "it's a screwed-up situation," or synonymous with "it's a bummer."
Feewall: (See Firewall.) A barrier of demarcation for financial responsibility. "Does this project fall on our side of the feewall?" translates directly as "Do we have to pay for this?"
Fiber Media: Material published on the hopelessly archaic medium of paper. Ex: "Yeah, I used to be a writer in fiber media, but now I'm a content provider in cybermedia."
Firewall: (General industry usage) A cyber-barrier. Ex: "Let's build a firewall on the website to separate editorial from advertising. Also increasingly common parlance for a barrier or separator in any context, not just cyberspace.
Flame Mail: A term in widespread general usage, meaning unpleasant e-mail in which one's ancestry, intelligence, and upbringing are brought into question, usually with a wolverine-like viciousness far out of proportion to the severity of the original offense. At Microsoft, flame mail is often sent when an individual has committed an egregious error, such as using the "Reply All" function in answering a company-wide e-mail requesting the serial number of all 20,000+ employees/contractors.
Freeze: Point in a project's timespan after which no more changes can be permitted. Or, as Cityspeak Dictionary eloquently puts it, "Point in product development after which the answer to all great new ideas is no."
Full Plate: More than enough to do: "Someone else will have to drive this one; Ed's already got a full plate." Likely not of exclusive Microsoft origin.
FYIV: FLA for "Fuck you, I'm vested." Delightful expression invoked under stress by MS employees whose stock options have matured, assuring them sufficient financial independence to reject work demands they feel are out of line. Ex: "You think I'm gonna go on a death march for this product? FYIV!"
G
Generating Content: Writing. "We'll need to hire some content providers to generate content by Milestone 1."
Global Fix: A programmatic trick to correct all instances of a recurring error. "Ed's working on a global fix to turn all the commas in the CD-ROM into semi-colons."
Going Forward: Synonymous with "moving on"; phrase used to express impatience with comments deemed irrelevant, distracting, overly defeatist, or negative. "Going forward, what kind of dev resources do we need to go live with this?"
Golden: Having achieved perfection, or close enough for shipping, anyway. Primarily used in reference to products, but also applied to people ("You're golden now, pal") to signify "in a great position," "in great shape," etc.
Granular: Generally, and rather peculiarly, used in tandem with the verb "to get," as in "We need to get granular on this issue," meaning to examine the fine details. To get granular one needs, it goes without saying, to drill down.
Gronk: The sound of a computer embroiled in bandwidth issues. "I tried to reboot, but my computer just sat there gronking until I had to call Help Desk." Possibly more a generalized computer geek term than a specific item of Microspeak.
GUI (pronounced "gooey"): General computer-industry usage. Acronym for Graphical User Interface. GUIs allow people to navigate through applications and documents on computers using graphical icons and buttons. The Apple Macintosh popularized the GUI, allowing users to open applications by clicking on icons with a mouse rather than typing commands on the keyboard. Then Microsoft, in a revolutionary turn, took GUI to the next level by renaming the Macintosh Trash Can the "Recycle Bin."

H
Headcount: Actual employees, as opposed to mere contractors (otherwise known as "a-dashes" [q.v.]-essentially glorified temps-or "v-dashes"-vendors or independent contractors). Although contractors have been known to earn higher salaries than headcount, an elaborate caste system based on perks (from medical benefits and stock options to window offices, exclusive free use of sports and exercise facilities, and massive company-store discounts on software and hardware) is in place to keep contractors in their place.
Heads-Up: An alert; a signal to be ready to deal with an issue: "That's a heads-up for you on the HTML issue."
Hit: Impact, drain, burden. Ex: "Delivering that v-chat feature will be a huge hit on dev." Also (general usage), a user impression on a website.
Hosed: Slightly more polite synonym for military terms like FUBB or FUBAR; totally screwed or technically disabled. Usually used in reference to a malfunctioning computer app or program. Generally personalized-"I'm hosed" rather than "This is hosed." Probably unrelated, mysterious term of unknown origin meaning the same thing: hoarked.

I
Issue: All-purpose term for practically anything relating to a product, from a particular characteristic or bug to a delicate diplomatic initiative. Used indiscriminately and often.
Iteration: Version, generation, refinement, etc. E.g., "That issue will come up in future iterations." Conforms to standard dictionary definition but still strikes a singularly unpleasant and jarring note when used in common parlance.

J

K
Klugey: (also Kludgey; pronounced "CLUE-gee): Clunky, inefficient, inelegant. "It's kind of a klugey solution, but we don't have the cycles to clean it up." Also used in noun form as Kluge or Kludge.

L
Leverage: To take advantage of; capitalize on. "Let's leverage the publicity hit we got from the Wired article into the marketing strategy for the website."
Live: Odd biomorphic usage, sort of an electronic half-life. "Where will this data live?" means "Where will I be able to find this data?" or "Where will this data be located?"
Low-Hanging Fruit: The simplest, most readily solvable issues or objectives.

M
Mail Thread: A sequence of e-mail messages dealing with a single issue, in which a question is asked or a situation is posed and a handful or dozens or hundreds of people throw in their electronic two cents' worth.
Mangled Microspeak: A thoroughly perverted twist on the original jargon. One of the primary purposes of Microspeak, like all professional argot, is of course to separate the insiders from the outsiders via largely impenetrable terms and phrases. Mangled Microspeak essays a further refinement by attempting to separate the insiders from the true insiders by garbling typical Microterms-e.g., "burning a lot of cycles" becomes "toasting many scooters"; "drill down" becomes "shovel deeply." Always used orally, and often spoken, for some reason that probably relates to ancient Saturday Night Live skits, in a heavy, indeterminate European accent.
Mapping: Targeting. "Mapping a user group" is synonymous with "targeting an audience."
Media: Per the Cityscape Dictionary, "content that isn't words." (See Generating Content.) Media can include photos ("portraits"), song clips, video clips, illustrations ("graphics"), etc.
Metrics: Measurement, statistical data. (finish)
Migrating: Moving; usually applied to movement to new systems or programs. "This process will be migrating from Merismus to Mango next week."
Milestone: Semi-technical term for a predetermined point in the product build at which certain goals have been met. Numbered, as in Milestone 1, Milestone 2, etc. Often in reality more like millstones.
Mode: Frame of mind, usually denoting intense concentration: "Ed's in crunch mode; they're in danger of slipping."
Multi-tasking: Also "multitasking." Common technical term pertaining to multiple functions performed by a computer, applied to people in the sense of juggling two or more tasks simultaneously (speaking on the phone while answering e-mail, walking while chewing gum, etc.). Variant: Parallel Processing. Adjectival variant, describing someone able to multi-task: Multi-threaded.

N
NDA: Acronym for Non-Disclosure Agreement, meaning Keep Your Mouth Shut. A legal document, invoked by Microsoft attorneys for anything more sensitive than setting a lunch date, that allows them to crucify anyone who reveals confidential information. 
Net: Summarize. "Ed really knows how to net a presentation." Related command: Net it out, meaning boil it down.
New Paradigm: Pompous way of essentially saying "unique": "This website establishes a new paradigm on the Net."
Nimble: Agile, responsive, quick to react. Generally used to describe smaller software companies, which tend to be able to make decisions and maneuver more quickly than the lumbering monolith that Microsoft has, in many spheres of activity, become.
Nonlinear: Becoming nonlinear is roughly synonymous with "going apeshit"; in other words, irrationally angry. "When he found out the RTM date was slipping, Ed went totally nonlinear."

O
Offline: (also, off-line). Outside the confines of a mass meeting, so as not to take up the time of attendees not directly concerned with an issue. Ex: "Let's take this conversation offline." By extension, a synonym for "in private" or "confidentially"; "Let's take this offline" equals "Let's talk about this in private." Nuance note: the word "offline" cannot be used in Microspeak unless it's preceded by the construction "let's take this ________". Often used as a semi-polite way of saying, "Shut up about that, you impolitic idiot. These a-dashes aren't cleared to know about it."
1:1: Pronounced "one-on-one." Possibly of extra-Microsoft origin. A regularly scheduled (usually weekly) meeting between a program manager or other supervisor and a subordinate (if a nonhierarchical hierarchy like Microsoft can be said to have subordinates) to review issues specific to the subordinate's duties. The subordinate is frequently joined by the program manager at these meetings, if the program manager has time.
OOF: A TLA that's turned into a word of its own. Stands for "out of office," although as an accurate acronym it leaves something to be desired. (OOO would be more precise. Historians tell us that OOF originally meant "out of facility" [or, alternatively, "off of facility" or, even more alternatively, "Out of Office Feature," which last may be the most logical derivation], a vastly more awkward and stiff way of saying "out of office.") Most frequently used as part of the phrases "OOF mail" or "OOF notice," meaning an automatic e-mail response to correspondents informing them that the receiver will be out of the office for a designated period. Also occasionally used, rather irritatingly, in conversation: "I'm OOF next Friday; you'll have to drive on it." (See also EOD, EOM)
Open The Kimono: A marvelous phrase of non-Microsoft origin, probably stemming from the rash of Japanese acquisitions of American enterprises in the '80s, that has been adopted into the Microspeak marketing lexicon. Basically a somewhat sexist synonym for "open the books," it means to reveal the inner workings of a project or company to a prospective new partner.
Orange Badge: Contractor, temp, contingent staffer (see also A-dash). From the background color of the photo ID badge/card key used for temps.
Outsource: To assign a project to off-campus vendors. "We don't have the bandwidth to finish this feature; we'll have to outsource it." Term now spread throughout the entire lean, mean, downsized business world.
Over The Wire: (Probably not restricted to Microsoft) Online. As increasing numbers of plebes learn to work the phrase "online" into their vocabularies, a new and potentially confusing piece of jargon meaning the same thing was obviously required, so necessity mothered invention.
Own: To take responsibility for an issue. Ownership is even more serious than drivership; you can drive an issue without owning it, but it's unlikely that you would own it without also driving it (just like automobiles, in fact). Syn-Champion (as a verb; to "champion the issue"). Variant-Owning The Vision: Ownership on a loftier, almost metaphysical level.

P
Permatemp: Temp/contractor/contingent employee who's been working for Microsoft for a consecutive period of years, rather than weeks or months. Controversial term, and touchy subject, at the company, owing to a pending lawsuit over whether permatemps are entitled to the same benefits and stock options as full-time employees (FTEs).
Ping: Term has evolved slightly and fallen in and out of favor; at time of writing (7/97) it's back in. A reminder, or (used as a verb, which is slightly more common) to remind: "I need to ping my program manager to get some more test help." Originally named onomatopoetically for an actual noise a computer would make when communicating with another computer to verify a connection.
Process: The complex system devised to deal with a deliverable involving tracing and documenting its progress through every stage of its development. The ideal process structure personnel ratio consists of approximately five people assigned to document the actual work of one person.
Product Planner: These theorists would simply be called marketers in most organizations, although Microsoft has marketers as well. Product planners are semantically positioned more usefully than the more mundane marketers, in that the term implies that the person's primary duties involve planning a product's campaign (theoretical) rather than marketing the product (actual work).
Push Back: Respond more forcefully to an unfavorable answer. If your request for three new headcount for your project is denied by upper management, you must push back with stronger reasons why you cannot possibly accomplish the project without those three headcount.
Q
Quality Bar: The remarkably flexible level of acceptability in a product. Tends inexorably to drop as the pressure of an impending milestone, content freeze, or other deadline builds. 
QVD: TLA for Quietly Vesting Disease. The behavior of full-time Microsoft employees as they near a critical vesting point prior to their anticipated departure from the company. Symptoms include arriving at noon or later, taking on obscure projects with no particular value to the company, and avoiding decision- making at all costs. An earlier of stage of FYIV (q.v.).

R
Ramp up: Technical term appropriated for general usage, meaning to gear up, to reinforce, and, in a sense, to gird oneself for greater effort. Can be applied externally, as in ramping up resources for a new project, or internally, as in "I've got to ramp up to deal with these Web issues."
Random: Not so much an objective description of unpredictable or accidental factors as a pejorative term to describe poorly reasoned analysis. Antonym: Crisp.
Randomize: To distract or throw off track by constantly changing course or emphasizing irrelevant details. "Marketing randomized him by shifting the goalposts every week."
Real estate: Room, primarily on a computer screen. "Is there enough real estate for all these design elements?"
Reality Distortion Field: When a team deludes itself that it can achieve impossibly tight milestones and solve insurmountable tech problems, and derides any nonbelievers as visionless pessimists and cynics.
Reorg: As the term suggests, a displeasing abbreviation for "reorganization." A frequent phenomenon at Microsoft, where organizational structures are revamped regularly, at great cost to productivity and soon-to-be-former "human resources," to create the impression of flexibility in what now is necessarily a slow-moving corporate leviathan.
Repurpose: Fairly useless neologism meaning to redesign for use in another context. Ex: "We'll repurpose the reviews in the core product to use on the website."
Resonate: Appeal, strike. "Let's see how this plan resonates with marketing."
Revved: A needless abbreviation of revised.
Robust: In a vaguely Rubens-esque sense, a program or piece of code that's fully fleshed-out, strong, brimming with health so that bugs can't survive. Increasingly applied to more nebulous, theoretical concepts (ideas, plans, specs, etc.).
RTM: Acronym for the entirely fictional date that a product is scheduled to be "released to manufacturing." Ex: "We need to push back the RTM another two months." Internet variant: RTW (Release To Web).

S
Self-Toast: To fatally contradict yourself. Extension of the fairly widespread mainstream usage of "toast" as "history," "dead," "burned out."
Showstopper: A function, object, or issue important enough to jeopardize a ship date or schedule in order to correct or include. In other words, a really big bug.
Sim-shipping (or Simshipping): To ship a product's PC and Mac versions at the same time. A rare accomplishment.
Skillset: As implied, a set of skills possessed by a "human resource."
Slipping: Euphemism for abjectly failing to hit a deadline.
Spec: Probably not a pure Microsoftism. Used as both noun and verb: as verb, to analyze a field of information or database prior to the commencement of a project; as noun, the analysis of that information. Also, a preliminary plan or prospectus. "Ed will spec the song clips to see which ones we need to swap out"; "Ed, have you finished the song-clip spec yet?"
Stake In The Ground: A somewhat grandiose, even gory core marketing term, signifying the area or market segment where Microsoft plans to place its hoped-for monopoly. At the proper juncture, the stake is removed and buried in the heart of the competition.
Sub-optimal: Marketing jargon for "substandard" or "less-than-desirable." Ex: "We could leverage resources to do that, but I'm sure it would produce a sub-optimal conclusion."

T
Take Inventory: As in "take inventory of the situation." As implied, to assess or analyze.
Take-away: Also takeaway. Not, as might be suspected, food to go, but impressions gleaned from a meeting or message. "My take-away from his e-mail was that he wasn't ready to drill down yet."
Taxonomy Of Options: A greatly murkier (and therefore infinitely preferable) way of saying "range of choices."
Three-Year Plan: A projective near-future business plan. At Microsoft, a new three-year plan is devised at least once a year.
TLA: Three-letter acronym. A widespread general software/computer-boffin term, but refined to a way of life (if not a metalanguage) at Microsoft. See BOOP (an FLA, actually), EOD, EOM, OOF.
Touch Skin: Same basic meaning as facemail (q.v.) or face time. A meeting arranged to counter the austerity of communicating in cyberspace. "We flew that guy to Redmond just so we could touch skin."
Traction: Increasingly popular term (as of Summer 1997) for progress, movement, or getting ahead. "We've got traction on the website app now." 
Triage: Not dissimilar to the medical term. The process of deciding which bugs to fix and which to ignore in order to meet a ship date, or which elements in a project to retain and which to eliminate.
Truline: (or Tru-Line). (From screenwriting jargon, recently appropriated for Microsoft purposes.) One-sentence summary of a project's projected appeal or purpose.

U
UI: Acronym for User Interface. Standard web terminology. The means by which people navigate through applications and documents on computers. Interfaces can take the form of textual, graphical, physical, and auditory devices. Often a synonym for buttons, buttons, and more buttons. "There's nothing intuitive about the new UI. I can't find anything!"
Uninstalled: Fired, canned, dismissed.
Upselling: Elegant term for the process of selling more or higher-grade products through their introduction on a more basic, lower-level product.
Usability: A well-established "process" by which it's determined which features in a product are most "usable" for "users." "Have you run the MAC version through usability testing yet?"
Users: Not restricted to Microsoft, this is a piece of terminology that challenges all "players" in the software/Internet arena. Users is a synonym for audience or consumers-you track the number of users who visit your website or use your product-but a less than ideal one, since it conjures images of either manipulators or drug addicts. Unfortunately, other synonyms (see Eyeballs) have failed to replace users in the collective industry vocabulary.

V
Vaporware: A Microsoft classic, dating back to at least the early-'90s era of Microserfs (likely before), and now escaped into the world at large. Software that was conceived (and probably promoted and advertised) but never came to fruition; by extension, a foolish or fanciful conceit.
Vesting: Marking time until your stock options vest and you can exit the company or retire. "Ed's not exerting too much effort these days; he's vesting."

W
Weasel Text: A message on a Microsoft website explaining why a heretofore-popular feature or option has been discontinued. As with most aspects of Microsoft that require communicating with the public or the media, these tend to range from stilted and murky to spectacularly inept.
Weasel User: What the outside world has learned to label "computer nerd." Specifically, a buyer of a Microsoft product who bombards PSS (the company's customer support apparatus) with constant and generally ludicrous technical complaints.
Whiteboard: Only slightly higher-tech version of, as name suggests, that classic educational aid the blackboard. Meeting crutch, power tool, and sacred hard-data repository all at once, the whiteboard is a central ingredient of Microculture. No meeting worth its salt is without an impromptu rush to the whiteboard by one or more issue-driving parties (usually the person running the meeting) to sketch a schematic or devise a quick outline or highlight an idea. In order to leave a clear, tabula rasa-style whiteboard for the next group, these key insights are invariably erased after a meeting (usually before anyone can write them down). 
Wide distribution: A process in which somemne seeking crucial information ("Has anyone seen my Jamiroquai poster?") sends e-mail to thousands of Microsoft employees and contractors in hopes of finding one individual with the answer. In anticipation of the inevitable flame mail and death threats that will follow, such e-mail often begins, "Sorry for the wide distribution, but..." 
Workaround: A jury-rigged temporary solution for getting around an apparently immovable and unfixable technical bug. Also adaptable to solutions dealing with apparently immovable and unfixable people.

X

Y

Z
Zero Bug Release (ZBR): Not, as you might suspect, a version of a software product that's error-free, but (in an Orwellian twist) a release with the major bugs eliminated, retaining plenty of less significant problems.

Acknowledgments: Jim Emerson, Peyton Mays, Sam Sutherland, Rachel Purpel, Jennifer DelaCruz, Rebecca Hughes, Hope McPherson, Heather Mitchell, Peter Tysver, Stephen Brown, Jack Shafer, Larry Sisson, the Microsoft Archives website (which, strangely, chiefly comprises general software-biz slang rather than "pure" Microspeak, if there is such a thing), the Cityscape (now Sidewalk) Unit, the Retro 360 team (RIP), John Schussler, Mark Mackenzie, Eric Voetberg, Chris Williams, Liz Russell. New entries avidly sought, although primary compiler reserves the right to amend and distort definitions.