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N /N/, quant. 1. A large and indeterminate number of objects: "There were N bugs in that crock!" Also used in its original sense of a variable name: "This crock has N bugs, as N goes to infinity." (The true number of bugs is always at least N + 1; see {Lubarsky's Law of Cybernetic Entomology}.) 2. A variable whose value is inherited from the current context. For example, when a meal is being ordered at a restaurant, N may be understood to mean however many people there are at the table. From the remark "We'd like to order N wonton soups and a family dinner for N - 1" you can deduce that one person at the table wants to eat only soup, even though you don't know how many people there are (see {great-wall}). 3. Nth: adj. The ordinal counterpart of N, senses 1 and 2. 4. "Now for the Nth and last time..." In the specific context "Nth-year grad student", N is generally assumed to be at least 4, and is usually 5 or more (see {tenured graduate student}). See also {random numbers}, {two-to-the-N}.
nadger /nad´jr/, v. [UK, from rude slang noun nadgers for testicles; compare American & British bollixed] Of software or hardware (not people), to twiddle some object in a hidden manner, generally so that it conforms better to some format. For instance, string printing routines on 8-bit processors often take the string text from the instruction stream, thus a print call looks like jsr print:"Hello world". The print routine has to nadger the saved instruction pointer so that the processor doesn't try to execute the text as instructions when the subroutine returns. See {adger}.
nagware /nag´weir/, n. [Usenet] The variety of {shareware} that displays a large screen at the beginning or end reminding you to register, typically requiring some sort of keystroke to continue so that you can't use the software in batch mode. Compare {annoyware}, {crippleware}.
nailed to the wall adj. [like a trophy] Said of a bug finally eliminated after protracted, and even heroic, effort.
nailing jelly vi. See {like nailing jelly to a tree}.
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