hop

n 1: the act of hopping (jumping upward or forward (especially on

one foot))

2: twining perennials having cordate leaves and flowers

arranged in conelike spikes [syn: {hops}]

3: an informal dance where popular music is played [syn: {record

hop}]

v 1: jump lightly [syn: {skip}, {hop-skip}]

2: move quickly from one place to another

3: informal: travel by means of an aircraft, bus, etc.; "She

hopped a train to Chicago"; "He hopped rides all over the

country"

4: make a quick trip esp. by air; "Hop the Pacific Ocean"

5: jump across; "He hopped the bush"

6: make a jump forward or upward

hop

1. One point-to-point transmission in a series

required to get a message from point A to point B on a {store

and forward} network. On such networks (including {UUCPNET}

and {FidoNet}), an important inter-machine metric is the hop

count of the shortest path between them. This can be more

significant than their geographical separation.

Each {exclamation mark} in a {bang path} represents one hop.

2. One direct host-to-host connection forming

part of the route between two hosts in a {routed} {network}

such as the {Internet}. Some {protocols} place an upper limit

on the hop count in order to detect routing loops.

3. To {log in} to a {remote} computer,

especially via {rlogin} or {telnet}. "I'll hop over to foovax

to FTP that."

[{Jargon File}]

(1997-06-25)