ITS

ITS: /I-T-S/ n.  1. Incompatible Time-sharing System, an
   influential but highly idiosyncratic operating system written for
   PDP-6s and PDP-10s at MIT and long used at the MIT AI Lab.  Much
   AI-hacker jargon derives from ITS folklore, and to have been `an
   ITS hacker' qualifies one instantly as an old-timer of the most
   venerable sort.  ITS pioneered many important innovations,
   including transparent file sharing between machines and
   terminal-independent I/O.  After about 1982, most actual work was
   shifted to newer machines, with the remaining ITS boxes run
   essentially as a hobby and service to the hacker community.  The
   shutdown of the lab's last ITS machine in May 1990 marked the end
   of an era and sent old-time hackers into mourning nationwide (see
   {high moby}).  The Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden is
   maintaining one `live' ITS site at its computer museum (right
   next to the only TOPS-10 system still on the Internet), so ITS is
   still alleged to hold the record for OS in longest continuous use
   (however, {{WAITS}} is a credible rival for this palm).  2. A
   mythical image of operating-system perfection worshiped by a
   bizarre, fervent retro-cult of old-time hackers and ex-users (see
   {troglodyte}, sense 2).  ITS worshipers manage somehow to
   continue believing that an OS maintained by assembly-language
   hand-hacking that supported only monocase 6-character filenames in
   one directory per account remains superior to today's state of
   commercial art (their venom against UNIX is particularly intense).
   See also {holy wars}, {Weenix}.