4 ms·

Being pedantic, why is it called server? Wouldn't service be more appropriate? Or deamon for that matter, service is already over used in our field but a daemon

by flukus 10y ago

Being pedantic, why is it called server? Wouldn't service be more appropriate? Or deamon for that matter, service is already over used in our field but a daemon has a specific meaning.

Freak_NL 10y ago
Daemon doesn't imply communication capabilities, server does. In common parlance 'server' may carry a connotation of remoteness, but for software professionals a client/server architecture just means that there is a distinct process that other processes may 'talk' to via any agreed upon protocol (e.g., sockets or HTTP). Just think of it as a local language server daemon. :)
Sean1708 10y ago
To me calling it a service would imply cloud more that calling it a server does.
oblio 10y ago
Server is a bit overloaded but its most common meanings are: 1. PC that hosts a server application 2. Application that serves client applications. After all, we have HTTP servers, FTP servers, etc. "Server" seems to be the appropriate name, here.
masklinn 10y ago
> Being pedantic, why is it called server? Because it serves data to clients connecting to it. Hence e.g. Emacs Server[0] or X Server[1]. Historically server doesn't imply a network operation. > Or deamon for that matter, service is already over used in our field but a daemon has a specific meaning. It's a subset (well not exactly you can have non-daemon servers but close enough), most daemons are not servers, in fact many daemons are client (e.g. ntpd). Service is basically the windows name for daemon, so it has the same lack of connotation, a service can be a client, a server, neither, both. [0] https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/emacs/Emacs-Server.html https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/emacs/Em... [1] http://www.linfo.org/x_server.html http://www.linfo.org/x_server.html

4 ms·

Being pedantic, why is it called server? Wouldn't service be more appropriate? Or deamon for that matter, service is already over used in our field but a daemon

by flukus 10y ago

Being pedantic, why is it called server? Wouldn't service be more appropriate? Or deamon for that matter, service is already over used in our field but a daemon has a specific meaning.

Freak_NL 10y ago
Daemon doesn't imply communication capabilities, server does. In common parlance 'server' may carry a connotation of remoteness, but for software professionals a client/server architecture just means that there is a distinct process that other processes may 'talk' to via any agreed upon protocol (e.g., sockets or HTTP). Just think of it as a local language server daemon. :)
Sean1708 10y ago
To me calling it a service would imply cloud more that calling it a server does.
oblio 10y ago
Server is a bit overloaded but its most common meanings are: 1. PC that hosts a server application 2. Application that serves client applications. After all, we have HTTP servers, FTP servers, etc. "Server" seems to be the appropriate name, here.
masklinn 10y ago
> Being pedantic, why is it called server? Because it serves data to clients connecting to it. Hence e.g. Emacs Server[0] or X Server[1]. Historically server doesn't imply a network operation. > Or deamon for that matter, service is already over used in our field but a daemon has a specific meaning. It's a subset (well not exactly you can have non-daemon servers but close enough), most daemons are not servers, in fact many daemons are client (e.g. ntpd). Service is basically the windows name for daemon, so it has the same lack of connotation, a service can be a client, a server, neither, both. [0] https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/emacs/Emacs-Server.html https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/emacs/Em... [1] http://www.linfo.org/x_server.html http://www.linfo.org/x_server.html