To try and put my first comment more clearly: They both refer to distance removed from hardware. Neither refers purely to software things like webservers or application servers, which is how you and others described them in what I was first responding to.
"Server" does not solely refer to software, it is also a name used for hardware. Think along the lines of mainframe, host, hypervisor, and so on.
> does not solely refer to software, it is also a name used for hardware.
A computer that primarily runs a server (or multiple servers) is often colloquially also called a server in recognition of what it is doing, but server is still in reference to the software. If you repurposed that hardware to sit on someone's desk to run Excel, most wouldn't call it a server anymore.
> Think along the lines of mainframe
I am not sure that works. I expect a mainframe running Excel on someone's desk would still be considered a mainframe by most as mainframe usually refers to a hardware architecture. A server, in the colloquial hardware sense, could be of any kind of architecture, including a mainframe!
Regardless, serverless is not associated with hardware as it is usually used. It is, as virtually everyone uses it, about removing/not needing the server in your application, typically used in the context of a service like AWS Lamba which offers the aforementioned runtime environment that negates the need for your application to be a server. In fact, Lambda is specifically named in what looks like a majority of the sibling threads here. It is abundantly clear where the typical use lies. If you know of instances of people using it to refer to another concept, I would love to see it.
I at least am not talking about hardware vs software uses of the word.
I don't think anyone is actually confused about that. We all know that server also can mean "computer that is being used to serve", and we all know that "serverless" does not mean that there is no computer that is being used to serve.
I mean that "thingless" means there is no thing. In "serverless" software, there is still a server. In both the hardware and software senses, but again forget the hardware part.
It's just that the software itself is not also it's own server for itself.
What doesn't make sense to me is it just seems weird to use a word like that to apply to that condition. "serverless", if it were anything other than "server", would mean there is no server, or does not use a server, or does not work by way of a server, etc. Like software that isn't client-server in the first place.
In this context of web apps, I would say that "serverless" would be impossible or meaningless, but the closest thing to a meaning would be "I don't need to worry about running the server".
Of course no matter what, you do need to run or at least use, some kind of server. If you program using all microservices in place of functions, you still have a piece of code somewhere that calls the microservices, and that code needs to be installed somewhere and run somewhere, and that is a server you need to run. Even if it's a fully managed service, you still need to subscribe to the service and manage your account, which is essentially "running the server". Fail to do it correctly and the app stops working.
I guess an "engineless" car is a car without an engine, and that maps exactly to what they're saying serverless means, software that doesn't include it's own server. But cars do generally include an engine, so an "engineless" car is a exceptional thing and so a meaningful term.
But software normally never includes it's own server. That is a recent thing and still only in the subset context of web apps. "serverless" in that sense is more like saying "roadless" car.
Sure, the car in fact doesn't include it's own road so it's true, but weird. Cars don't generally include their own road so it's weird to point out.
If you said "roadless car" out of the blue, just like "serverless" it wouldn't actually be quite meaningful at face value, but the closest thing to a meaning would be a car that does not require a road. An off-road vehicle. Not a car that doesn't include a road.
"Server" does not solely refer to software, it is also a name used for hardware. Think along the lines of mainframe, host, hypervisor, and so on.