avatar: n. Syn. [in Hindu mythology, the incarnation of a god]
1. Among people working on virtual reality and cyberspace
interfaces, an "avatar" is an icon or representation of a user in a
shared virtual reality. The term is sometimes used on MUDs. 2.
[CMU, Tektronix] root, superuser. There are quite a few Unix
machines on which the name of the superuser account is `avatar'
rather than `root'. This quirk was originated by a CMU hacker who
found the terms `root' and `superuser' unimaginative, and thought
`avatar' might better impress people with the responsibility they
were accepting.
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