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<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><title>dragon</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="../D.html" title="D"/><link rel="previous" href="Dr--Fred-Mbogo.html" title="Dr. Fred Mbogo"/><link rel="next" href="Dragon-Book.html" title="Dragon Book"/></head><body><div class="navheader"><table width="100%" summary="Navigation header"><tr><th colspan="3" align="center">dragon</th></tr><tr><td width="20%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="Dr--Fred-Mbogo.html">Prev</a> </td><th width="60%" align="center">D</th><td width="20%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="Dragon-Book.html">Next</a></td></tr></table><hr/></div><dt><a id="dragon"/><dt xmlns="" id="dragon"><b>dragon</b>: <span xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" class="grammar">n.</span></dt></dt><dd><p> [MIT] A program similar to a <a href="daemon.html"><i class="glossterm">daemon</i></a>, except
that it is not invoked at all, but is instead used by the system to perform
various secondary tasks. A typical example would be an accounting program,
which keeps track of who is logged in, accumulates load-average statistics,
etc. Under ITS, many terminals displayed a list of people logged in, where
they were, what they were running, etc., along with some random picture
(such as a unicorn, Snoopy, or the Enterprise), which was generated by the
&#8216;name dragon&#8217;. Usage: rare outside MIT &#8212; under Unix and
most other OSes this would be called a <span class="firstterm">background demon</span> or
<a href="daemon.html"><i class="glossterm">daemon</i></a>. The best-known Unix example of a dragon is
<span class="citerefentry"><span class="refentrytitle">cron</span>(1)</span>.
At SAIL, they called this sort of thing a <span class="firstterm">phantom</span>.</p></dd><div class="navfooter"><hr/><table width="100%" summary="Navigation footer"><tr><td width="40%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="Dr--Fred-Mbogo.html">Prev</a> </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="u" href="../D.html">Up</a></td><td width="40%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="Dragon-Book.html">Next</a></td></tr><tr><td width="40%" align="left" valign="top">Dr. Fred Mbogo </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="h" href="../index.html">Home</a></td><td width="40%" align="right" valign="top"> Dragon Book</td></tr></table></div></body></html>