Channeling my inner Quine here. Did you mean:

The operation is not "copy" but "snarf". It's called "snarf" because
snarf is what it does.

Of course the White Knight would also have asked what the name of the
operation was called.

But be that as it may, a simple explanation of the difference between
"snarf" and "copy" would be welcome, especially since under Windows I can
snarf in Sam and paste into TextPad. Whereas I have to copy in Notepad and
paste into TextPad.

On 13 September 2016 at 00:27, Rob Pike <robpike@gmail.com> wrote:

> The operation is not to copy but to snarf. It's called snarf because
> snarf is what it does. There is no design document.
>
> -rob
>
> On Mon, Sep 12, 2016 at 8:44 PM, Alexander Kapshuk
> <alexander.kapshuk@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Both 'Zerox' and 'Snarf' are there:
> >
> > /sys/src/cmd/acme/cols.c:34
> > textinsert(t, 0, L"New Cut Paste Snarf Sort Zerox Delcol ", 38, TRUE);
> >
> > On Mon, Sep 12, 2016 at 1:38 PM, Robert Raschke <rtrlists@googlemail.com>
> wrote:
> >> Hi Mateusz,
> >>
> >> as far as I remember, it was originally called "xerox". But that is
> >> trademarked. No idea where the word "snarf" comes from.
> >>
> >> Cheers,
> >> Robby
> >>
> >> On 12 Sep 2016 12:19, "Mateusz Piotrowski" <mpp302@gmail.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> Hello,
> >>
> >> I've discovered Plan 9 recently and became curious about some
> >> design decisions.
> >>
> >> Why there is a snarf buffer and not a copy buffer?
> >>
> >> As it might seem to be a dull question, it is not. I am very
> >> interested in the reason behind this decision. I've browsed
> >> numerous websites (including cat-v.org and the 9fans archives)
> >> but I wasn't able to find anything about it.
> >>
> >> I decided to ask this question [1] on Unix & Linux StackExchange
> >> but its community doesn't seem to know the answer.
> >>
> >> My guess is that "copying" is not as an atomic action.
> >> "Copying" is in fact:
> >>
> >> - obtaining the content you want to copy (_snarfing_)
> >> - inserting the content where you want it to be (_pasting_)
> >>
> >> Hence the use of snarf instead of copy.
> >>
> >> Am I right? Is there a document / book / article where
> >> it is explained?
> >>
> >> Cheers!
> >>
> >> Mateusz Piotrowski
> >>
> >> [1]:
> >> http://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/308943/why-does-
> plan-9-use-snarf-instead-of-copy
> >
>
>