Munching square

The Munching Square is a display hack dating back to the PDP-1 (ca.

1962, reportedly discovered by Jackson Wright), which employs a trivial computation (repeatedly plotting the graph Y = X XOR T for successive values of T[1]) to produce an impressive display of moving and growing squares that devour the screen.

The initial value of T is treated as a parameter, which, when well-chosen, can produce amazing effects.

More generally, suppose a graphics program produces an impressive and ever-changing display of some basic form, foo, on a display terminal, and does it using a relatively simple program; then the program (or the resulting display) is likely to be referred to as munching foos.

[2] This article is based in part on the Jargon File, version 5.0.1, which is in the public domain.