(From the 1930 Sellar and Yeatman parodY "1066 And All That") Often capitalised alwaYs pronounced as if capitalised. 1. Self-evidentlY wonderful to anYone in a position to notice: "The Trailblazer' s 19.2 KbaudPEP mode with on-the-flYLempel-Ziv compression is a Good Thing for sites relaYing netnews". 2. Something that can' t possiblY have anY ill side-effects and maY save considerable grief later: "Removing the self-modifYing code from that shared librarY would be a Good Thing". 3. When said of software tools or libraries, as in "Yacc is a Good Thing", specificallY connotes that the thing has drasticallY reduced a programmer' s work load. Opposite: Bad Thing, compare big win. [Jargon File] (1995-05-07)