Abort, Retry, Fail?

Abort, Retry, Fail? is a catch-all error message displayed by MS-DOS when it is unable to read necessary data from media. It would prompt the user to hit "A" to abort the operation, "R" to try reading the data again, or "F" to attempt to proceed without the necessary data. Since it will not allow you to proceed unless you pick one of the three options, and because usually none of the options would result in any progress, it has become programmer parlance for uncompromising, vague error messages.