daemon
- 1A background computer process that runs without a controlling terminal.
The web server relies on a daemon to handle incoming connections around the clock.
System administrators restart the logging daemon after changing its configuration.
Similarservice
Note
Programmers at MIT's Project MAC, whose usage Unix inherited, took the name from Maxwell's demon, a figure from a physics thought experiment and a classic case of an idea given a body. The expansion "disk and execution monitor" is a backronym, invented after the fact. Daemons typically start when the system boots and run continuously, handling printing, logging or network connections without anyone at a terminal.
Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 8 facts
- The computing term originated with programmers at MIT's Project MAC and was inspired by Maxwell's demon. ei.cs.vt.edu
- Unix inherited the terminology. en.wikipedia.org
- Maxwell's demon is an imagined agent in a physics thought experiment. en.wikipedia.org
- "Disk and execution monitor" is a backronym rather than the original derivation. en.wiktionary.org
- Daemons commonly start at boot and remain running. admin.com
- Daemons handle printing. docs.freebsd.org
- Daemons handle logging and network connections. en.wikipedia.org
- Daemons operate without a user controlling them at a terminal. man7.org
- 2Another spelling of demon: an evil spirit, especially one thought to serve the Devil or to torment people.
The poem describes a daemon whispering doubts into the sleeper's ear.
Medieval manuscripts often pictured a daemon lurking near the gates of hell.
UsageWhen the meaning is plainly evil, demon is the clearer spelling.
Note
Every meaning of demon travels with this spelling, from a devil of Hell to a person's private fears. The ae keeps the Latin shape visible. Because the same spelling also names the Greek guardian spirit, a reader may not know which kind of being is meant.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- The spelling daemon preserves the Latin spelling. cld.bbaw.de
- Daemon also names a guardian spirit in the ancient Greek tradition. freebsd.org
- 3A minor deity or divinity, ranking below the major gods in myth and religious belief.
Socrates spoke of a daemon that warned him away from wrong choices.
Country folk left small offerings for the daemons of field and forest.
Note
In Greek thought such beings stood between the Olympian gods and mortals, often attached to a person, place or natural feature. Scholars now extend the term to other religions, as in Carolyn Graves-Brown's Daemons and Spirits in Ancient Egypt (2018).
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 4 facts
- Greek thought included daemons intermediate between gods and mortals, particularly in Plato and subsequent writers. en.wikipedia.org
- Tutelary beings could be associated with people, places, or geographic features. en.wikipedia.org
- Scholars apply the term daemon to ancient Egyptian religious entities. uwp.co.uk
- Carolyn Graves-Brown wrote Daemons and Spirits in Ancient Egypt, first published in 2018. jstor.org
- 4A muse or personified source of inspiration, especially one that also causes anguish to the artist it drives.
The composer described his creative daemon as both a gift and a torment.
Every poem she finished seemed to feed the daemon that drove her onward.
UsageOne has a daemon, is driven by it, and wrestles with it.
Similarmuse
Note
Literary critics keep returning to this tormenting muse. Harold Bloom's The Daemon Knows (2015) has Coleridge, "deep in daemons," drawing Kubla Khan and Christabel from them. Stefan Zweig's The Struggle with the Daemon pictures it living within the artist, where it must be subdued or it snatches the helm.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 4 facts
- Harold Bloom wrote The Daemon Knows, first published in 2015. api.pageplace.de
- Bloom describes Coleridge as deep in daemons and credits those daemons with inspiring Kubla Khan and Christabel. en.wiktionary.org
- Stefan Zweig wrote The Struggle with the Daemon. penguinrandomhouse.com
- Zweig depicts an internal daemon that must be subdued and can seize control, using the image of snatching the helm. everand.com
- 5A concept or idea represented as though it were a living entity.
In her essay, progress becomes a restless daemon that can never stop building.
The philosopher personified doubt as a daemon perched on every certainty.
Practice
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Origins
Ancient Greek δαίμων (daímōn) meant "dispenser" or "tutelary deity." Latin took it as daemōn ("tutelary deity"), and English borrowed it from Latin.
This computing sense alludes to Maxwell's demon. People sometimes claim the word is short for "disk and execution monitor," but that expansion is usually treated as a backronym, invented after the word already existed.