Hoppist Terminals

History

Origin of Terminals & Computers

When hopfolk had a need to communicate long distance, especially for those lacking telepathic ability, information highways were built across Karrots, excluding Pobbsith. Wired and wireless technology had advanced to where the need to meet in reality was substituted digitally. Devices that could self-compute became prevalent for a short time, but were costly. Early into public adoption of the technology, their use was heavily discouraged by The Council Courts, and access was limited to restricted libraries where a user was forced to remotely validate their identity with government-assigned credentials on a terminal, which connected to a central computational device which served as the host and server in the network stack. Meaning all physical interactions where interpreted by the terminal, sent to the host/server, and displayed to a monitor on the terminal for the end user.

Political reform after the Grand Sop Army took power did not focus on addressing this issue for several orbits, until the freed society of Karrots demanded that they have access to the global network again. Terminals existed to be a simple interface device to remote into the actual computers on the new Hoppist Network, which kept the terminal-to-computer concept, but was physically overhauled as cameras and other supervisory devices were removed from the world. Tubes were added to most Hoppist Network servers and hubs, so mail could be publicly exchanged, however, terminals remained mostly the same as time went on.

Grand Sop Army Adoption

Often, military applications were in dire need of proper computers aboard space vessels. Several departments could use a group of terminals connecting to a while individuals, such as engineers, security and officers had a personal portable computer at any time, usually in tablet form. To reduce security vulnerabilities and potential cyberattacks, computing devices automatically power-off after being unused for a certain timeframe. Terminals, however, remain on at all times, only shutting their displays off when not in use.

Alternatively, terminals are configured remotely to segregate access inherently, meaning they offer an advantage for military and security use. Some terminals can't access certain servers, hosts or computers at all, even if part of the same physical network aboard a ship or in a base. This means maintenance is far easier as well, since terminals are low in resource cost and require minimal cabling to the network. Terminals have been instrumental in serving the Grand Sop Army for countless years and are default for Hoppist Network deployments.

Terminals vs Computers

Several hopfolk, especially those that were absent during the reign of the Council Courts, had a fixation on personal devices with the design of terminals and the built-in function of actual computational devices that natively ran software inside. Sop had one of these devices in his youth and personally offered his to be torn down for research to rebuild these nearly-lost devices. Computers were made to order, like starships, at this point in time, as most hopfolk were accustomed to having a terminal at home, or travelling to a Grand Sop Army base to use one in their libraries.

When travelling, computers are better served for individuals, or on vessels with no need to connect to a network. Consumer and commercial starship computers often are used for inventory, captain's logs and personal use, such as entertainment to pass time during voyages. Terminals are rarer in these vehicles for several reasons.

For example, small starships lack tablets or personal computers, and instead feature one central computer on the bridge, with a backup of its data stored in another part of the vehicle. However, large cargo ships with a large crew will have a small network of two or more supercomputers with terminals across the ship.