1. A terminal that has enough computing capability to render graphics
or to offload some kind of front-end processing from the computer it
talks to. The development of workstations and personal computers has
made this term and the product it describes semi-obsolescent, but one
may still hear variants of the phrase act like a smart terminal used
to describe the behavior of workstations or PCs with respect to
programs that execute almost entirely out of a remote {server}'s
storage, using local devices as displays.
2. obs. Any terminal with an addressable cursor; the opposite of a
{glass tty}. Today, a terminal with merely an addressable cursor, but
with none of the more-powerful features mentioned in sense 1, is
called a {dumb terminal}.
There is a classic quote from Rob Pike (inventor of the {blit}
terminal): "A smart terminal is not a smartass terminal, but rather a
terminal you can educate." This illustrates a common design problem:
The attempt to make peripherals (or anything else) intelligent
sometimes results in finicky, rigid `special features' that become
just so much dead weight if you try to use the device in any way the
designer didn't anticipate. Flexibility and programmability, on the
other hand, are really smart. Compare {hook}.
[glossary]
[Reference(s) to this entry by made by: {dumb terminal}]