infant mortality

3 definitions found

infant mortality - WordNet (r) 2.1 (2005) :

  infant mortality
      n 1: the death rate during the first year of life [syn: infant deathrate
           , infant mortality, infant mortality rate]

infant mortality - Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (26 May 2007) :

  infant mortality
  
     <hardware> It is common lore among hackers (and in the
     electronics industry at large) that the chances of sudden
     hardware failure drop off exponentially with a machine's time
     since first use (that is, until the relatively distant time at
     which enough mechanical wear in I/O devices and
     thermal-cycling stress in components has accumulated for the
     machine to start going senile).  Up to half of all chip and
     wire failures happen within a new system's first few weeks;
     such failures are often referred to as "infant mortality"
     problems (or, occasionally, as "sudden infant death
     syndrome").
  
     See bathtub curve, burn-in period.
  
     [Jargon File]
  
     (1995-03-20)
  

infant mortality - Jargon File (4.4.4, 14 Aug 2003) :

  infant mortality
   n.
  
     It is common lore among hackers (and in the electronics industry at
     large; this term is possibly techspeak by now) that the chances of
     sudden hardware failure drop off exponentially with a machine's time
     since first use (that is, until the relatively distant time at which
     enough mechanical wear in I/O devices and thermal-cycling stress in
     components has accumulated for the machine to start going senile). Up
     to half of all chip and wire failures happen within a new system's
     first few weeks; such failures are often referred to as infant
     mortality problems (or, occasionally, as sudden infant death
     syndrome). See bathtub curve, burn-in period.