Search Result for "daemon": 
Wordnet 3.0

NOUN (2)

1. an evil supernatural being;
[syn: devil, fiend, demon, daemon, daimon]

2. a person who is part mortal and part god;
[syn: daemon, demigod]


The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:

Daemon \D[ae]"mon\, n., Daemonic \D[ae]*mon"ic\, a. See Demon, Demonic. [1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:

Demon \De"mon\, n. [F. d['e]mon, L. daemon a spirit, an evil spirit, fr. Gr. dai`mwn a divinity; of uncertain origin.] 1. (Gr. Antiq.) A spirit, or immaterial being, holding a middle place between men and deities in pagan mythology. [1913 Webster] The demon kind is of an intermediate nature between the divine and the human. --Sydenham. [1913 Webster] 2. One's genius; a tutelary spirit or internal voice; as, the demon of Socrates. [Often written d[ae]mon.] [1913 Webster] 3. An evil spirit; a devil. [1913 Webster] That same demon that hath gulled thee thus. --Shak. [1913 Webster]
WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):

daemon n 1: an evil supernatural being [syn: devil, fiend, demon, daemon, daimon] 2: a person who is part mortal and part god [syn: daemon, demigod]
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:

50 Moby Thesaurus words for "daemon": Geist, Muse, afflatus, ancestral spirits, angel, attendant godling, atua, control, creative thought, creativity, daimonion, demon, divine afflatus, evil spirits, fairy godmother, familiar, familiar spirit, fire of genius, genius, genius domus, genius loci, good angel, good genius, guardian, guardian angel, guardian spirit, guide, household gods, inspiration, intelligence, invisible helper, lares and penates, lares compitales, lares familiaris, lares permarini, lares praestites, lares viales, manes, ministering angel, numen, penates, soul, special providence, specter, spirit, supernatural being, talent, totem, tutelar god, tutelary
V.E.R.A. -- Virtual Entity of Relevant Acronyms (February 2016):

DAEMON Disk And Execution MONitor (Unix)
The Jargon File (version 4.4.7, 29 Dec 2003):

daemon /day'mn/, /dee?mn/, n. [from Maxwell's Demon, later incorrectly retronymed as ?Disk And Execution MONitor?] A program that is not invoked explicitly, but lies dormant waiting for some condition(s) to occur. The idea is that the perpetrator of the condition need not be aware that a daemon is lurking (though often a program will commit an action only because it knows that it will implicitly invoke a daemon). For example, under ITS, writing a file on the LPT spooler's directory would invoke the spooling daemon, which would then print the file. The advantage is that programs wanting (in this example) files printed need neither compete for access to nor understand any idiosyncrasies of the LPT. They simply enter their implicit requests and let the daemon decide what to do with them. Daemons are usually spawned automatically by the system, and may either live forever or be regenerated at intervals. Daemon and demon are often used interchangeably, but seem to have distinct connotations. The term daemon was introduced to computing by CTSS people (who pronounced it /dee'mon/) and used it to refer to what ITS called a dragon; the prototype was a program called DAEMON that automatically made tape backups of the file system. Although the meaning and the pronunciation have drifted, we think this glossary reflects current (2003) usage.
The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (30 December 2018):

daemon /day'mn/ or /dee'mn/ (From the mythological meaning, later rationalised as the acronym "Disk And Execution MONitor") A program that is not invoked explicitly, but lies dormant waiting for some condition(s) to occur. The idea is that the perpetrator of the condition need not be aware that a daemon is lurking (though often a program will commit an action only because it knows that it will implicitly invoke a daemon). For example, under ITS writing a file on the LPT spooler's directory would invoke the spooling daemon, which would then print the file. The advantage is that programs wanting files printed need neither compete for access to, nor understand any idiosyncrasies of, the LPT. They simply enter their implicit requests and let the daemon decide what to do with them. Daemons are usually spawned automatically by the system, and may either live forever or be regenerated at intervals. Unix systems run many daemons, chiefly to handle requests for services from other hosts on a network. Most of these are now started as required by a single real daemon, inetd, rather than running continuously. Examples are cron (local timed command execution), rshd (remote command execution), rlogind and telnetd (remote login), ftpd, nfsd (file transfer), lpd (printing). Daemon and demon are often used interchangeably, but seem to have distinct connotations (see demon). The term "daemon" was introduced to computing by CTSS people (who pronounced it /dee'mon/) and used it to refer to what ITS called a dragon. [Jargon File] (1995-05-11)
Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary:

Daemon the Greek form, rendered "devil" in the Authorized Version of the New Testament. Daemons are spoken of as spiritual beings (Matt. 8:16; 10:1; 12:43-45) at enmity with God, and as having a certain power over man (James 2:19; Rev. 16:14). They recognize our Lord as the Son of God (Matt. 8:20; Luke 4:41). They belong to the number of those angels that "kept not their first estate," "unclean spirits," "fallen angels," the angels of the devil (Matt. 25:41; Rev. 12:7-9). They are the "principalities and powers" against which we must "wrestle" (Eph. 6:12).