Source : Free On-Line Dictionary of Computing

bubble sort
     
        A sorting technique in which pairs of adjacent values in the
        list to be sorted are compared and interchanged if they are
        out of order; thus, list entries "bubble upward" in the list
        until they bump into one with a lower sort value.  Because it
        is not very good relative to other methods and is the one
        typically stumbled on by {naive} and untutored programmers,
        hackers consider it the {canonical} example of a naive
        algorithm.  The canonical example of a really *bad* algorithm
        is {bogo-sort}.  A bubble sort might be used out of ignorance,
        but any use of bogo-sort could issue only from brain damage or
        willful perversity.
     
        [{Jargon File}]