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"Science fiction and science have always danced around each other. Science fiction is the subconscious of science."
- Greg Bear

Servok  
  An 'automatic' or clock-set mechanism to perform simple tasks.  

Every available space in the room was crowded with exotic wet-climate plants. Something rustled in the greenery. She tensed, then glimpsed a simple clock-set servok with pipe and hose arms. An arm lifted, sent out a fine spray of dampness that misted her cheeks. The arm retracted and she looked at what it had watered: a fern tree.
From Dune, by Frank Herbert.
Published by Putnam in 1965
Additional resources -

In the appendix to the book (provided by Herbert), servok is defined this way:

SERVOK: clock-set mechanism to perform simple tasks; one of the limited "automatic" devices permitted after the Butlerian Jihad.

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  More Ideas and Technology from Dune
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