Blinkenlights
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Blinkenlights is a hacker's neologism for diagnostic lights on old mainframe computers and modern network hardware. The Jargon File gives the following etymology:
- This term derives from the last word of the famous blackletter-Gothic sign in mangled mock German that once graced about half the computer rooms in the English-speaking world. One version ran in its entirety as follows.
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- ACHTUNG!
- ALLES TURISTEN UND NONTEKNISCHEN LOOKENPEEPERS!
- DAS KOMPUTERMASCHINE IST NICHT FÜR DER GEFINGERPOKEN UND MITTENGRABEN! ODERWISE IST EASY TO SCHNAPPEN DER SPRINGENWERK, BLOWENFUSEN UND POPPENCORKEN MIT SPITZENSPARKSEN.
- IST NICHT FÜR GEWERKEN BEI DUMMKOPFEN. DER RUBBERNECKEN SIGHTSEEREN KEEPEN DAS COTTONPICKEN HÄNDER IN DAS POCKETS MUSS.
- ZO RELAXEN UND WATSCHEN DER BLINKENLICHTEN.
- This "silliness" dates back to least as far as 1955 at IBM and had already gone international by the early 1960s, when it was reported at the University of London's ATLAS computing site. There are several variants of it in circulation, some of which actually do end with the word blinkenlights.
Although the sign might initially appear to be in German and uses an approximation of German grammar, it is composed largely of words that are either near-homonyms of English words or (in the cases of the longer words) actual English words that are rendered in a faux-German spelling. As such, the sign is generally comprehensible by many English speakers regardless of whether they have any fluency in German. Much of the humor in these signs was their intentionally incorrect language.
The sign is also reported to have been seen on an Electron microscope at the Cavendish Laboratory in the 1950s. Such pseudo-German parodies were common in Allied machine shops during and following World War II, and an example photocopy is shown in the Jargon File.
The Jargon File also mentions that German hackers have developed their own versions of the blinkenlights poster, in fractured English:
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- ATTENTION
- This room is fulfilled mit special electronische equippment. Fingergrabbing and pressing the cnoeppkes from the computers is allowed for die experts only!
- So all the “lefthanders” stay away and do not disturben the brainstorming von here working intelligencies. Otherwise you will be out thrown and kicked anderswhere!
- Also: please keep still and only watchen astaunished the blinkenlights.
[edit] Actual blinkenlights
With dramatically rising CPU frequencies in computer processors, the traditional front-panel "blinkenlights" soon became useless for watching to monitor computations and diagnose software bugs. Still, they remain useful for indicators of power on/off status and hard-disk usage on most personal computers. There are a number of other notable later uses of blinking lights in computers, as well.
The Connection Machine, a 65,536-processor parallel computer designed in the mid-1980s, was a black cube with one side covered with a grid of red blinkenlights; the sales demo had them evolving Conway's Game of Life patterns.
The CPU load monitors on the front of BeBoxes were also called “blinkenlights”.
This word gave its name to several projects, including screen savers, hardware gadgets, and other nostalgic things. Some notable enterprises include Project Blinkenlights and the Blinkenlights Archaeological Institute.
Many Dell computers have a set of blinkenlights near the PS/2 keyboard plug or rear USB ports (for desktops), or on the front fascia (for servers). It is a set of four bi-color lights for diagnostic purposes (e.g., video card failure, memory failure, etc.).
Ethernet NICs, external modems, and similar devices generally have at least a pair of blinkenlights indicating data being sent and received. Older modems from the 1990s had a dozen or so blinkenlights on the front, indicating state such as whether the phone was on or off the hook and whether a carrier signal was detected on the line.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- Blinkenlights entry in the Jargon file
- Loren Petrich's Grab Bag – contains a GIF rendering of the Blinkenlichten in blackletter
