dragon

	This is the JargonFile ^(V4.00) entry for dragon - Next: Dragon Book, Prev: DPer
:dragon: /n./ [[[MIT]]] A program similar to a daemon, except that it is not invoked at all, but is instead used by the system to perform various secondary tasks. A typical example would be an accounting program, which keeps track of who is logged in, accumulates load-average statistics, etc. Under ITS, many terminals displayed a list of people logged in, where they were, what they were running, etc., along with some random picture (such as a unicorn, Snoopy, or the Enterprise), which was generated by the name dragon. Usage: rare outside MIT -- under Unix and most other OSes this would be called a background demon or daemon. The best-known Unix example of a dragon is cron(1). At SAIL, they called this sort of thing a phantom.
* (text is auto-included via JargonExtension by mutante using jargon with VERSION 4.0.0, 24 JUL 1996* - JargonFile by Eric S. Raymond is in the public domain)*