BSD Daemon
The BSD Daemon is the mascot of the original Berkeley Software Distribution of the Unix operating system.[1][2] The name is derived from a common Unix application called a daemon, which is a program that runs solely in the background, typically with no human intervention (web servers such as Apache typically run as daemons). The BSD Daemon commonly carries a triton (also known as a pitchfork) as a play on the way Unix processes rely on the fork function to start other processes.
The story of the daemon began in 1976, while Mike O'Brien was living in Chicago. It was there that he met up with a well known comic artist named Phil Foglio. At the time, O'Brien was working as a locksmith. So when Foglio's roommate skipped town, he called upon O'Brien to crack their apartment's wall safe, for his former roommate was the only person who knew the combination.
Uncertain in his ability to complete the task, O'Brien asked that if he was able to complete the task, Foglio would draw a piece of t-shirt artwork for him. Astonishingly, he was able to crack the code in a mere fifteen minutes. He then snapped a photograph of his Unix machine to give to a very grateful Foglio, showing him the visual puns he desired to be implemented on his t-shirt, such as a "bit bucket" named /dev/null and demons with forks running along pipes. This /dev/null bucket along with the original daemon, showcasing O'Brien's humor, not to mention Foglio's youthful talent, is illustrated in the photo on the left.Cite error: Closing </ref> missing for <ref> tag
The BSD Daemon is sometimes paired with the Linux operating system mascot, Tux the penguin. They appear together in humorous wallpapers and drawings, although they are generally of dubious legality, as McKusick requires that his mascot be used in relation to the BSD operating system. The BSD Daemon was also constructed in Legos by Eric Harshbarger, the same artist who created the Lego model of Tux.[3]
Related Topics
External links
- More BSD Daemon images
- The Design and Implementation of the 4.3BSD Operating System by Marshall Kirk McKusick and George V. Neville-Neil
References
- ↑ "History of the BSD Daemon" (Retreived 12-April-2007).
- ↑ "The BSD Daemon" (Retreived 12-April-2007).
- ↑ BSD Daemon -- LEGO (Retreived April 13th, 2007).