essentials n. Things necessary to maintain a productive and secure hacking environment. "A jug of wine, a loaf of bread, a 20-megahertz 80386 box with 8 meg of core and a 300-megabyte disk supporting full UNIX with source and X windows and EMACS and UUCP via a 'blazer to a friendly Internet site, and thou."

Raymond, E.S. & Steele, G.L. (eds.), The Jargon File [1991] https://magic-cookie.co.uk/jargon/mit_jargon.htm#x817