the.com/escape hatch
The exit you design before you need it, which is the only kind worth having.
means A pre-planned way out of a commitment, argument, contract, or dangerous situation, built in before trouble arrives.
from Literal first: an escape hatch is a small, deliberately unlocked panel on a ship, submarine, tank, or plane, set there for the sole purpose of letting someone get out fast when the main exits fail or the vessel is sinking/burning. 'Hatch' itself goes back to Old English for a half-door or gate — think of hatching chicks through a trapdoor-like opening, or the hatches of a ship's deck. The figurative sense — a clause, excuse, or backup plan that lets you exit a deal or situation unharmed — rode in on that image during the 20th century, as the physical device became common enough in military and industrial vessels to turn into everyday metaphor.
- origin
- submarines and tanks, literally a way out alive
- software sense
- code path that bypasses the system's own rules
- paradox
- rarely used, yet justifies the whole design
- tell
- if everyone uses it, it is not an exit, it is the door