:MIPS: /mips/ [abbreviation] n. 1. A measure of computing speed;
formally, `Million Instructions Per Second' (that's 10^6
per second, not 2^(20)!); often rendered by hackers as
`Meaningless Indication of Processor Speed' or in other
unflattering ways. This joke expresses a nearly universal attitude
about the value of most {benchmark} claims, said attitude being
one of the great cultural divides between hackers and
{marketroid}s. The singular is sometimes `1 MIP' even though
this is clearly etymologically wrong. See also {KIPS} and
{GIPS}. 2. Computers, especially large computers, considered
abstractly as sources of {computron}s. "This is just a
workstation; the heavy MIPS are hidden in the basement." 3. The
corporate name of a particular RISC-chip company; among other
things, they designed the processor chips used in DEC's 3100
workstation series. 4. Acronym for `Meaningless Information per
Second' (a joke, prob. from sense 1).
-- The AI Hackers Dictionary
