demo

/de'moh/ 1. A demonstration of a product, often of an early

version or prototype. A demo is a far more effective way of

inducing bugs to manifest themselves than any number of test

runs, especially when important people are watching.

2. demo version.

3. A program written to demonstrate the programmer's coding

ability and/or the power of the computer it runs on. Such

demos are nearly always written in machine code and

traditionally feature scrolling text about the author, his

friends, his code and anything else he fancies and animated

graphics.

[Jargon File]

(1994-11-04)