cruft together
v. To haphazardly build an ugly yet functional object.
Other Forms
crufty adj.cruftsmanship n.crufting together pp.
Examples
1998
No one is going to steal the efforts of a newbie crufting together eye nausea in FrontPage. But then, those newbies crufting together eye nausea are the people most likely to think that Page Protect is a way kewl idea.
—Art Sackett, “Content Theft,” alt.html.webedit, July 29, 1998
1993
Ages (couldn't think of any better way to present this; you need a 66-line emacs to fully appreciate this, or just cruft together a program in your fav programming language & graph it!)
—Luis Fernandes, “(Very) Unofficial tally of the posts (was Re: What are the demographics…),” rec.arts.startrek.current, June 17, 1993
1990 (earliest)
CRUFT TOGETHER v. To throw together something ugly but temporarily workable.
—Guy Steele, et al., “Jargon File,” MIT, June 12, 1990
Notes
The Jargon File states that the origin of cruft (which it defines as "an unpleasant substance") is unknown, but that it possibly derives from MIT students poking fun at Harvard's Cruft Hall. Another possibility is an association with the famous Crufts Dog Show. Thanks go out to Marty Breslow for suggesting crufty.
Some Related Words
hackathon
Posted: April 30, 1997