As so most excellently explained in the Jargon file: foobar: n. [very common] Another widely used metasyntactic variable; see foo for etymology. Probably originally propagated through DECsystem manuals by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) in 1960s and early 1970s; confirmed sightings there go back to 1972. Hackers do em>not generally use this to mean FUBAR in … Continue reading What is “foobar”