22 lines
3.2 KiB
HTML
22 lines
3.2 KiB
HTML
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1" standalone="no"?>
|
||
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><title>ITS</title><link rel="stylesheet" href="../../jargon.css" type="text/css"/><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets V1.61.0"/><link rel="home" href="../index.html" title="The Jargon File"/><link rel="up" href="../I.html" title="I"/><link rel="previous" href="Itanic.html" title="Itanic"/><link rel="next" href="IWBNI.html" title="IWBNI"/></head><body><div class="navheader"><table width="100%" summary="Navigation header"><tr><th colspan="3" align="center">ITS</th></tr><tr><td width="20%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="Itanic.html">Prev</a> </td><th width="60%" align="center">I</th><td width="20%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="IWBNI.html">Next</a></td></tr></table><hr/></div><dt><a id="ITS"/><dt xmlns="" id="ITS"><b>ITS</b>: <span xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" class="pronunciation">/I·T·S/</span>, <span xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" class="grammar">n.</span></dt></dt><dd><p> 1. Incompatible Time-sharing System, an influential though highly
|
||
idiosyncratic operating system written for PDP-6s and PDP-10s at MIT and
|
||
long used at the MIT AI Lab. Much AI-hacker jargon derives from ITS
|
||
folklore, and to have been ‘an ITS hacker’ qualifies one
|
||
instantly as an old-timer of the most venerable sort. ITS pioneered many
|
||
important innovations, including transparent file sharing between machines
|
||
and terminal-independent I/O. After about 1982, most actual work was
|
||
shifted to newer machines, with the remaining ITS boxes run essentially as
|
||
a hobby and service to the hacker community. The shutdown of the lab's
|
||
last ITS machine in May 1990 marked the end of an era and sent old-time
|
||
hackers into mourning nationwide (see
|
||
<a href="../H/high-moby.html"><i class="glossterm">high moby</i></a>). There is an <a href="http://www.its.os.org/" target="_top">ITS home page</a>.</p></dd><dd><p> 2. A mythical image of operating-system perfection worshiped by a
|
||
bizarre, fervent retro-cult of old-time hackers and ex-users (see
|
||
<a href="../T/troglodyte.html"><i class="glossterm">troglodyte</i></a>, sense 2). ITS worshipers manage somehow
|
||
to continue believing that an OS maintained by assembly-language
|
||
hand-hacking that supported only monocase 6-character filenames in one
|
||
directory per account remains superior to today's state of commercial art
|
||
(their venom against <a href="../U/Unix.html"><i class="glossterm">Unix</i></a> is particularly intense).
|
||
See also <a href="../H/holy-wars.html"><i class="glossterm">holy wars</i></a>,
|
||
<a href="../W/Weenix.html"><i class="glossterm">Weenix</i></a>.</p></dd><div class="navfooter"><hr/><table width="100%" summary="Navigation footer"><tr><td width="40%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="Itanic.html">Prev</a> </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="u" href="../I.html">Up</a></td><td width="40%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="IWBNI.html">Next</a></td></tr><tr><td width="40%" align="left" valign="top">Itanic </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="h" href="../index.html">Home</a></td><td width="40%" align="right" valign="top"> IWBNI</td></tr></table></div></body></html>
|