1. v. (from `preventive maintenance') To bring down a machine
for inspection or test purposes. See provocative maintenance; see
also scratch monkey. 2. n.
Abbrev. for `Presentation Manager', an elephantine OS/2 graphical user
interface.
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pnambic /p*-nam'bik/
[Acronym from the scene in the film version of "The Wizard of
Oz" in which the true nature of the wizard is first discovered:
"Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain."] 1. A stage of
development of a process or function that, owing to incomplete
implementation or to the complexity of the system, requires human
interaction to simulate or replace some or all of the actions,
inputs, or outputs of the process or function. 2. Of or
pertaining to a process or function whose apparent operations are
wholly or partially falsified. 3. Requiring prestidigitization.
The ultimate pnambic product was "Dan Bricklin's Demo", a
program which supported flashy user-interface design prototyping.
There is a related maxim among hackers: "Any sufficiently
advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo." See
magic, sense 1, for illumination of
this point.
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pod n.
[allegedly from abbreviation POD for `Prince Of Darkness'] A
Diablo 630 (or, latterly, any letter-quality impact printer).
From the DEC-10 PODTYPE program used to feed formatted text to
it. Not to be confused with P.O.D..
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interface, Next:pointy
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point-and-drool interface n.
Parody of the techspeak term `point-and-shoot interface',
describing a windows, icons, and mouse-based interface such as is
found on the Macintosh. The implication, of course, is that such
an interface is only suitable for idiots. See for the rest of us, WIMP environment, Macintrash, drool-proof paper. Also
`point-and-grunt interface'.
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interface, Up:= P =
pointy hat n.
See wizard hat. This
synonym specifically refers to the wizards of Unseen University
in Terry Pratchett's "Discworld" serious of humorous fantasies;
these books are extremely popular among hackers.