The Jargon File (version 4.4.7, 29 Dec 2003):

Foonly
 n.

    1. The PDP-10 successor that was to have been built by the Super Foonly
    project at the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory along with a new
    operating system. (The name itself came from FOO NLI, an error message
    emitted by a PDP-10 assembler at SAIL meaning ?FOO is Not a Legal
    Identifier?. The intention was to leapfrog from the old DEC timesharing
    system SAIL was then running to a new generation, bypassing TENEX which at
    that time was the ARPANET standard. ARPA funding for both the Super Foonly
    and the new operating system was cut in 1974. Most of the design team went
    to DEC and contributed greatly to the design of the PDP-10 model KL10.

    2. The name of the company formed by Dave Poole, one of the principal Super
    Foonly designers, and one of hackerdom's more colorful personalities. Many
    people remember the parrot which sat on Poole's shoulder and was a regular
    companion.

    3. Any of the machines built by Poole's company. The first was the F-1
    (a.k.a. Super Foonly), which was the computational engine used to create
    the graphics in the movie TRON. The F-1 was the fastest PDP-10 ever built,
    but only one was ever made. The effort drained Foonly of its financial
    resources, and the company turned towards building smaller, slower, and
    much less expensive machines. Unfortunately, these ran not the popular 
    TOPS-20 but a TENEX variant called Foonex; this seriously limited their
    market. Also, the machines shipped were actually wire-wrapped engineering
    prototypes requiring individual attention from more than usually competent
    site personnel, and thus had significant reliability problems. Poole's
    legendary temper and unwillingness to suffer fools gladly did not help
    matters. By the time DEC's ?Jupiter Project? followon to the PDP-10 was
    cancelled in 1983, Foonly's proposal to build another F-1 was eclipsed by
    the Mars, and the company never quite recovered. See the Mars entry for
    the continuation and moral of this story.


The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (30 December 2018):

Foonly

   1. The PDP-10 successor that was to have been built by the
   Super Foonly project at the Stanford Artificial Intelligence
   Laboratory along with a new operating system.  The intention
   was to leapfrog from the old DEC time-sharing system SAIL
   was then running to a new generation, bypassing TENEX which at
   that time was the ARPANET standard.  ARPA funding for
   both the Super Foonly and the new operating system was cut in
   1974.  Most of the design team went to DEC and contributed
   greatly to the design of the PDP-10 model KL10.

   2. The name of the company formed by Dave Poole, one of the
   principal Super Foonly designers, and one of hackerdom's more
   colourful personalities.  Many people remember the parrot
   which sat on Poole's shoulder and was a regular companion.

   3. Any of the machines built by Poole's company.  The first
   was the F-1 (a.k.a.  Super Foonly), which was the
   computational engine used to create the graphics in the movie
   "TRON".  The F-1 was the fastest PDP-10 ever built, but only
   one was ever made.  The effort drained Foonly of its financial
   resources, and the company turned toward building smaller,
   slower, and much less expensive machines.  Unfortunately,
   these ran not the popular TOPS-20 but a TENEX variant called
   Foonex; this seriously limited their market.  Also, the
   machines shipped were actually wire-wrapped engineering
   prototypes requiring individual attention from more than
   usually competent site personnel, and thus had significant
   reliability problems.  Poole's legendary temper and
   unwillingness to suffer fools gladly did not help matters.  By
   the time of the Jupiter project cancellation in 1983, Foonly's
   proposal to build another F-1 was eclipsed by the Mars, and
   the company never quite recovered.  See the Mars entry for
   the continuation and moral of this story.

   [Jargon File]