The most successful terminal system is the web browser, of course. It's not a conventional terminal, in the sense of a monospaced grid of characters, but the a

The most successful terminal system is the web browser, of course. It's not a conventional terminal, in the sense of a monospaced grid of characters, but the architecture is the same: server and client are separated, all "business" logic resides or originates in the server, and the client is generic and reusable. I could offer public services over SSH, and anyone with an SSH client could connect. (Makes me think of BBSes.) A specific application offered over SSH requires no pre-provisioning on the client; likewise web applications require no pre-provisioning. Of course, the web wasn't really intended as a terminal system, it was a hypertext system theoretically divorced from any given user interface, but it's certainly become an applications platform, and the way it's managed to inherit some benefits from terminal systems is a major reason why. Nowadays probably most line-of-business, intranet applications are web-based, but there appear to be exceptions. I did see one business who kept its orders in some unknown application accessed via PuTTY, used quite proficiently by salespeople who AFAIK were otherwise nontechnical.