Dictionary.net

(or "smart terminal", "programmable terminal") Aterminal that often contains not only a keyboard and screen,but also comes with a disk drive and printer, so it canperform limited processing tasks when not communicatingdirectly with the central computer. Some can be programmed bythe user to perform many basic tasks, including botharithmetic and logic operations. In some cases, when the userenters data, the data will be checked for errors and sometype of report will be produced. In addition, the valid datathat is entered may be stored on the disk, it will betransmitted over communication lines to the central computer.An intelligent terminal may have enough computing capabilityto draw graphics or to offload some kind of front-endprocessing from the computer it talks to.The development of workstations and personal computers hasmade this term and the product it describes semi-obsolescent,but one may still hear variants of the phrase "act like asmart terminal" used to describe the behaviour of workstationsor PCs with respect to programs that execute almost entirelyout of a remote server's storage, using said devices asdisplays.The term once meant any terminal with an addressable cursor;the opposite of a glass tty. Today, a terminal with merelyan addressable cursor, but with none of the more-powerfulfeatures mentioned above, is called a dumb terminal.There is a classic quote from Rob Pike (inventor of the blitterminal): "A smart terminal is not a smart*ass* terminal, butrather a terminal you can educate". This illustrates a commondesign problem: The attempt to make peripherals (or anythingelse) intelligent sometimes results in finicky, rigid "specialfeatures" that become just so much dead weight if you try touse the device in any way the designer didn't anticipate.Flexibility and programmability, on the other hand, are*really* smart.Compare hook.