The next version of Perl, the computer language I use professionally, will be based upon an assembly / abstraction layer called Parrot. Now, although once Parrot is built you can use it to run any number of languages - Perl, of course, but also Python, Ruby, and stupid Turing Tarpit languages such as Intercal and Befunge - you first have to build Parrot.
It turns out that it's actually easiest to first build a miniature, cut-down version of Parrot, and then use that to build the rest of Parrot. This is the time-honoured tradition of bootstrapping (i.e. pulling yourself up by your bootstraps - this doesn't work in real life, but it works in computers because they ignore Newtonian physics).
Someone, last week, came up with the ideal name for this miniparrot.
Budgie.
This courtesy of the perl-6 digest of this week. See also other Jargon File examples of programmer speak, such as ambimousetrous, depeditate, feeping creaturism etc.
