mark

n 1: a number or letter indicating quality (especially of a

student's performance); "she made good marks in

algebra"; "grade A milk"; "what was your score on your

homework?" [syn: {grade}, {score}]

2: a distinguishing symbol; "the owner's mark was on all the

sheep" [syn: {marker}, {marking}]

3: a reference point to shoot at; "his arrow hit the mark"

[syn: {target}]

4: a visible indication made on a surface; "some previous

reader had covered the pages with dozens of marks"

5: the impression created by doing something unusual or

extraordinary that people notice and remember; "it was in

London that he made his mark"; "he left an indelible mark

on the American theater"

6: a symbol of disgrace or infamy; "And the Lord set a mark

upon Cain"--Genesis [syn: {stigma}, {brand}, {stain}]

7: the basic unit of money in Germany [syn: {Deutsche Mark}, {Deutschmark}]

8: a person who is gullible and easy to take advantage of [syn:

{chump}, {fish}, {fool}, {gull}, {patsy}, {fall guy}, {sucker},

{schlemiel}, {shlemiel}, {soft touch}, {mug}]

9: a written or printed symbol (as for punctuation); "his

answer was just a punctuation mark"

10: a perceptible indication of something not immediately

apparent (as a visible clue that something has happened);

"he showed signs of strain"; "they welcomed the signs of

spring" [syn: {sign}]

11: the shortest of the four Gospels in the New Testament [syn:

{Mark}, {Gospel According to Mark}]

12: an indication of damage [syn: {scratch}, {scrape}, {scar}]

13: marking consisting of crossing lines [syn: {crisscross}, {cross}]

14: something that exactly succeeds in achieving its goal; "the

new advertising campaign was a bell ringer"; "scored a

bull's eye"; "hit the mark" [syn: {bell ringer}, {bull's

eye}]

v 1: attach a tag or label to; "label these bottles" [syn: {tag},

{label}]

2: designate as if by a mark; "This sign marks the border";

"He indicated where the border ended"

3: be a distinctive feature, attribute, or trait; sometimes in

a very positive sense [syn: {distinguish}, {differentiate}]

4: mark by some ceremony or observation [syn: {commemorate}]

5: make or leave a mark on; "mark the trail so that we can find

our way back"

6: to accuse or condemn openly or formally: "He denounced the

government action." [syn: {stigmatize}, {brand}, {denounce}]

7: notice or perceive; "She noted that someone was following

her" [syn: {notice}, {note}] [ant: {ignore}]

8: mark with a scar; "The skin disease scarred his face

permanently" [syn: {scar}, {pock}, {pit}]

9: make small marks into the surface of; "score the clay before

firing it" [syn: {score}, {nock}]

10: establish as the highest level or best performance: "set a

record" [syn: {set}]

11: make underscoring marks [syn: {score}]

12: remove from a list; "Cross the name of the dead person off

the list" [syn: {cross off}, {cross out}, {strike out}, {strike

off}]

13: put a check mark on or next to; "Please check each name on

the list" [syn: {check}, {check off}, {mark off}, {tick

off}]

14: assign a grade or rank to, according to one's evaluation; as

of scholastic work [syn: {grade}]

15: insert punctuation marks into [syn: {punctuate}]

Mars

A legendary tragic failure, the archetypal Hacker Dream Gone

Wrong. Mars was the code name for a family of PDP-10

compatible computers built by Systems Concepts (now, The SC

Group): the multi-processor SC-30M, the small uniprocessor

SC-25M, and the never-built superprocessor SC-40M. These

machines were marvels of engineering design; although not much

slower than the unique {Foonly} F-1, they were physically

smaller and consumed less power than the much slower DEC KS10

or Foonly F-2, F-3, or F-4 machines. They were also

completely compatible with the DEC KL10, and ran all KL10

binaries (including the operating system) with no

modifications at about 2--3 times faster than a KL10.

When DEC cancelled the Jupiter project in 1983, Systems

Concepts should have made a bundle selling their machine into

shops with a lot of software investment in PDP-10s, and in

fact their spring 1984 announcement generated a great deal of

excitement in the PDP-10 world. {TOPS-10} was running on the

Mars by the summer of 1984, and {TOPS-20} by early fall.

Unfortunately, the hackers running Systems Concepts were much

better at designing machines than at mass producing or selling

them; the company allowed itself to be sidetracked by a bout

of perfectionism into continually improving the design, and

lost credibility as delivery dates continued to slip. They

also overpriced the product ridiculously; they believed they

were competing with the KL10 and VAX 8600 and failed to reckon

with the likes of Sun Microsystems and other hungry startups

building workstations with power comparable to the KL10 at a

fraction of the price.

By the time SC shipped the first SC-30M to Stanford in late

1985, most customers had already made the traumatic decision

to abandon the PDP-10, usually for VMS or Unix boxes. Most of

the Mars computers built ended up being purchased by

{CompuServe}.

This tale and the related saga of {Foonly} hold a lesson for

hackers: if you want to play in the {Real World}, you need to

learn Real World moves.

[{Jargon File}]