pnambic

/p*-nam'bik/ (From the scene in the film, "The Wizard of Oz"

in which the true nature of the wizard is first discovered:

"Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain"). A term

coined by Daniel Klein [email protected] for 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 its

actions, inputs or outputs. The term may also be applied to a

process or function whose apparent operations are wholly or

partially falsified or one 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 for illumination of this point.

["Open Channel", IEEE "Computer", November 1981].

[Jargon File]

(1994-11-01)