online medical dictionary | definition of rococo

<jargon, abuse> Baroque in the extreme. Used to imply that a program has become so encrusted with the software equivalent of gold leaf and curlicues that they have completely swamped the underlying design. Called after the later and more extreme forms of Baroque architecture and decoration prevalent during the mid-1700s in Europe. Alan Perlis said: "Every program eventually becomes rococo, and then rubble."

Compare: critical mass.

(01 Feb 1996)

A florid style of ornamentation which prevailed in Europe in the latter part of the eighteenth century.

Origin: F.; of uncertain etymology.

(01 Mar 1998)