smoke and mirrors n.
Marketing deceptions. The term is
mainstream in this general sense. Among hackers it's strongly
associated with bogus demos and crocked benchmarks (see also
MIPS, machoflops). "They claim their new box cranks 50
MIPS for under $5000, but didn't specify the instruction mix --
sounds like smoke and mirrors to me." The phrase, popularized by
newspaper columnist Jimmy Breslin c.1975, has been said to
derive from carnie slang for magic acts and `freak show' displays
that depend on `trompe l'oeil' effects, but also calls to mind
the fierce Aztec god Tezcatlipoca (lit. "Smoking Mirror") for
whom the hearts of huge numbers of human sacrificial victims were
regularly cut out. Upon hearing about a rigged demo or yet another
round of fantasy-based marketing promises, hackers often feel
analogously disheartened. See also stealth manager.
Marketing deceptions. The term is
mainstream in this general sense. Among hackers it's strongly
associated with bogus demos and crocked benchmarks (see also
MIPS, machoflops). "They claim their new box cranks 50
MIPS for under $5000, but didn't specify the instruction mix --
sounds like smoke and mirrors to me." The phrase, popularized by
newspaper columnist Jimmy Breslin c.1975, has been said to
derive from carnie slang for magic acts and `freak show' displays
that depend on `trompe l'oeil' effects, but also calls to mind
the fierce Aztec god Tezcatlipoca (lit. "Smoking Mirror") for
whom the hearts of huge numbers of human sacrificial victims were
regularly cut out. Upon hearing about a rigged demo or yet another
round of fantasy-based marketing promises, hackers often feel
analogously disheartened. See also stealth manager.
Related:
- smoke and mirrors: n. Marketing deceptions. The term is
mainstream in this general sense.
Among hackers it's strongly associated with bogus... - benchmark: [techspeak] n. An inaccurate measure of computer
performance.
"In the computer industry, there are three kinds of... - stealth manager n.
[Corporate DP] A manager that appears
out of nowhere,
promises undeliverable software to unknown end users... - Brief History Of Linux (#18)
There are lies, damned lies,
and Microsoft brochures Even from the very first... - bogus: adj. 1. Non-functional. "Your patches are bogus."
2.
Useless. "OPCON is a bogus program." 3. False. "Your... - oid suff.
[from Greek suffix -oid = `in the image
of'] 1.
Used as in mainstream slang English to indicate a poor... - MIPS: /mips/ [abbreviation] n. 1. A measure of computing speed;
formally, `Million Instructions Per Second' (that's... - benchmark n.
[techspeak] An inaccurate measure of computer
performance.
"In the computer industry, there are three kinds of... - MIPS /mips/ n.
[abbreviation] 1. A measure of
computing speed;
formally, `Million Instructions Per Second' (that's...
From the same category:
- chanop /chan'-op/ n.
[IRC] See channel op... - cookbook n.
[from amateur electronics and radio] A book of small
code segments that the reader can use to do various magic
things in programs.
One current example is the "PostScript... - YAUN /yawn/ n.
[Acronym for `Yet Another Unix Nerd'] Reported from... - arena n.
[common; Unix] The area of memory attached to a
process by brk(2) and sbrk(2) and used by
malloc(3) as dynamic storage.
So named from a malloc: corrupt arena message emitted... - backreference n.
1. In a regular expression or pattern
match,
the text which was matched within grouping parentheses...
