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flap: vt. 1. [obs.] To unload a DECtape (so it goes flap, flap,
flap...). Old-time hackers at MIT tell of the days when the disk
was device 0 and DEC microtapes were 1, 2,... and attempting to flap
device 0 would instead start a motor banging inside a cabinet near the
disk. 2. By extension, to unload any magnetic tape. Modern cartridge
tapes no longer actually flap, but the usage has remained. (The term could
well be re-applied to DEC's TK50 cartridge tape drive, a spectacularly
misengineered contraption which makes a loud flapping sound, almost like an
old reel-type lawnmower, in one of its many tape-eating failure
modes.)
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