Gambit

[gam-bit] /ˈgæm bɪt/

noun
1.
Chess. an opening in which a player seeks to obtain some advantage by sacrificing a pawn or piece.
2.
any maneuver by which one seeks to gain an advantage.
3.
a remark made to open or redirect a conversation.
/ˈɡæmbɪt/
noun
1.
(chess) an opening move in which a chessman, usually a pawn, is sacrificed to secure an advantageous position
2.
an opening comment, manoeuvre, etc, intended to secure an advantage or promote a point of view
n.

“chess opening in which a pawn is risked for advantage later,” 1650s, gambett, from Italian gambetto, literally “a tripping up” (as a trick in wrestling), from gamba “leg,” from Late Latin gamba (see gambol). Applied to chess openings in Spanish in 1561 by Ruy Lopez, who traced it to the Italian word, but the form in Spanish generally was gambito, which led to French gambit, which has influenced the English spelling of the word. Broader sense of “opening move meant to gain advantage” in English is recorded from 1855.
language
A variant of Scheme R3.99 supporting the future construct of Multilisp by Marc Feeley [email protected]. Implementation includes optimising compilers for Macintosh (with Toolbox and built-in editor) and Motorola 680×0 Unix systems and HP300, BBN GP100 and NeXT. Version 2.0 conforms to the IEEE Scheme standard.
Gambit used PVM as its intermediate language.
(ftp://acorn.cs.brandeis.edu/dist), (ftp://ftp.cso.uiuc.edu/pub/amiga/fish/f7/ff764/Gambit_Terp). (ftp://ftp.iro.umontreal.ca/pub/parallele/gambit/).
Mailing list: [email protected].
(1998-02-10)