CRAY-1

“If possible, could I have some more?” This article could be expanded on and use more details, and needs them as much as XP-tan needs more RAM!

CRAY-1
[[File:|250px]]
Character Information
Common Names	CRAY-1
Other Names	Cray-1
Human Name(s)	Corina Seymour
Faction	Mainframe Guild
Lineage	Cray (matriarch/founder)
Rival(s)	NOS, UNIX
Appearance
Height	213 cm (7'0")
Hair Color	light blue
Eye Color	grey
Weapon(s)	Magical staff used to harness her ice powers
Design
First Appearance	Nov 2009
Technical Information
System Personified	CRAY-1 (hardware), Cray Operating System (OS)
Developer(s)	Cray Research
Debut	1976
Latest release	circa 1985

Technical Details

The Cray-1 is one of the most successful supercomputers, and regarded as the first true supercomputer in history, released in 1976 with a clock speed of 80 MHz. Each one sold for $5-8 million, and over 80 were sold, successful for such an expensive computer. For years, it was the world's fastest computer. It was designed with optimal speed and efficiency in mind, was designed to deliberately crash a few times a day, and is easily recognizable by its distinctive appearance- tall, cylindrical, built-in seats on its edges, and the large, customizable color panels on the outside.

Another claim to fame is that the Cray-1 was used in the 1982 sci-fi movie "TRON", which was the first movie to be made with computer graphics, and also had a cameo appearance in the movie.

Its original OS was the Cray Operating System (COS), replaced by the UNIX variant UNICOS in 1985. Cray-1-tan also represents COS, and hates UNIX, referring to COS being abandoned in favor of UNICOS.

Character Details

Physical

Cray-1-tan is one of the tallest mainframe-tans with an imposing appearance. She has long, wavy light blue hair decorated with a black headdress with large silver frills. She wears a futuristic-looking gown with a hoopskirt and long black gloves and boots; the gown is sleeveless with a metallic collar. Below the collar is a row of small square panels. Her gown has a grey corset with black panels on the sides, and on the top layer of her skirt are large vertical crystal panels that change color; the colored panel arrangement is modeled after the appearance of the CRAY-1 machine and its customizable appearance.

She lives in a futuristic-looking palace, and it's very cold in there; early CRAY-1 models were prone to overheating, and keeping the palace very cold is CRAY-1-tan's way of dealing with the heat.

Personality

Her personality can also be imposing; keeping a stoic demeanor at nearly all times. Combined with her powers and extreme height, she has an intimidating presence. She is formal, and somewhat socially detached. When interacting with others, she can from one sentence to the next, alternate between being cordial and being rude, all without breaking away from her stoicness. There is another side to her though. Past her aloof demeanor, she is remarkably down-to-earth, being much more humble than she used to be. She still has high standards, but has become a bit more lenient than she was before, stemming from remorse over pushing her daughter too far.

She likes art, aesthetics, fashion design and weaving. Her interest in weaving is a reference to the CRAY-1's elaborate wiring, which was wired by hand by skilled weavers. She is also a sci-fi fan, and computer graphics artist in reference to the CRAY-1's role in the production of "TRON".

Powers

Her sorcery powers are ice-based, and she carries a staff modeled after the CRAY-1's cooling pipes.

Family and relationships

Data General Family

She is acquainted with the Data General-tans, of whom RDOS-tan was hired as her assistant under contract (the Data General Nova running RDOS was used as a control unit in the early CRAY-1 model) until she became more self-sufficient. At first she didn't like them, being too arrogant to accept their help, even feeling insulted. RDOS-tan's persistence paid off, as Cray-1-tan learned to accept help, and RDOS-tan became one of her first friends. After RDOS-tan's work contract as Cray-1's assistant expired, they continued to keep in contact with each other.

Livermore Time Sharing System (LTSS)

LTSS-tan has a vendetta against her, for making her obsolete, and 'stealing' one of her daughters. It is thought that the vendetta was mutual, and one of the reasons why Cray-1 was emotionally cold and harsh, out of a perceived necessity.

Cray Time Sharing System (CrTSS)

CrTSS-tan was one of her colleagues, and was treated like adoptive daughter. While this was well-intentioned, and she didn't hold her to the same very high standards as she did for Cray-2-tan, it had the unintended consequence of making CrTSS-tan feel worse, since she felt she wasn't worthy.

Multics

In 1978, Multics was hired to be Cray-1's servant, referencing Multics' use as a front-end system for the Cray XMP, under a system usually known as the Multics Cray Station. At first, they clashed due to competing egos, but ended up collaborating on several projects and respected each other. It isn't specified if Cray-1 knows that Multics is Unix's mother, and what the consequences would have been if she knew.

Unix

Cray-1 resents Unix, for colonizing her territory, which led to CrTSS's forced exile and death.

Appearances

OS-tangent

The multi-part strip titled "When the Aristocrat Was a Servant" takes place in the late 70's or early 80's and is a silly interpretation of Multics having to work as Cray-1's servant. The first obstacle to their interactions is both of their senses of personal pride; the second obstacle is their clashing senses of fashion, which erupts when Cray-1 insults Multics' fashion sense. Between dealing with servitude, threats of retribution for turning up the thermostat, and having her fashion sense insulted, Multics was the most insulted by the latter.

Showing Cray-1's enigmatic personality is on part 2 when she allows Multics to turn up the thermostat, but threatens to attack her, but then just as non-chalantly introduces herself.

• part 1
• part 2

See Also

• Wikipedia article on Cray-1
• Multics Cray Station