[bombcar]

Take reading a file from disk.

Abort would cancel the entire file read.

Retry would attempt that sector again.

Fail would fail that sector, but the program might decide to keep trying to read the rest of the file.

In practice abort and fail were often the same.

[jagged-chisel]

Makes sense. Maybe I ran across a proper use a time or two back then and just don’t remember. But the two being the same was the overwhelming experience.