/R T F M/ Read The Fucking Manual (always abbreviated, sometimes bowdlerised to "Fine" or "Friendly") An (unhelpful) guru' s traditional response when someone asks a question in a newsgroup or mailing list which he could have easily answered for himself had he bothered to RTFM. The term may also be used to indicate that you couldn' t find the answer in the manual. E.g. "How do I interface Unix to my toaster? And yes, I did RTFM but the FM didn' t help and I can' t RTFS." Other derived forms include RTFAQ, RTFB, RTM, and, more recently, STFW. Compare: UTSL. [Earliest use?] [Jargon File] (2003-06-07)
