Yesterday in Taiwan, Richard Stallman said it is
pronounced, but I disagree. He talked about the
etymology of the name. There had been a series of
FINE, SINE programs, meaning this program Is Not
Emacs. So he started working down the alphabet
looking for Something Not Unix and found GNU.
There apparently had previously been pop culture
plays on the pronunciation of gnu and seeing it's
20 years since the platform got going it is not
'new' anymore. That was basically his case.
My argument for not pronouncing the G is that we
need to stop an infinite regress. Or is it Gs all
the way down?
What does the G in GNU stand for? If it doesn't
stand for anything, then silence is the
appropriate pronunciation. If it stands for gnu,
a gnu, or anything else, ie if the name really
means A gnu (Entity X) is not Unix, the joke
isn't so funny.
It doesn’t stand for “a gnu,” it stands for “GNU.”
we need to stop an infinite regress.
Actually, that’s the whole point of the acronym: it’s recursive. If you think that’s unfunny (I think it’s mildly amusing the first time you encounter it), you’ll be completey repelled to learn about the meaning of GNU’s kernel’s name, “Hurd.”
Hurd: Hird of Unix Replacing Dameons
Hird: Hurd of Interfaces Representing Depth
Yeah.
Whats the sound of GNU clapping?
mr_bean on 2005-05-28T11:12:01
If Stallman's predecessors had called their emacs
derivatives, KNEE instead of FINE and SINE, for
KNEE's Not Emacs Either, they would have had
better and funnier names and Stallman's joke
wouldn't have been so funny.
Though a knee isn't as funny as a gnu.
I don't get the joke in
> Hurd: Hird of Unix Replacing Dameons
> Hird: Hurd of Interfaces Representing Depth
What's this Hird thing? It's not going to be
funny without a reference to a hErd of gnus.
And rather than choosing GNU, I wonder if it
would have been funnier if Stallman had chosen
something with a silent letter that refered to
the ideology of free software, like FREE
ENTERPRISE, FREEFORALL, or something. Perhaps
not. Perhaps it has to be an animal.
Anyway, a camel is funnier than a gnu. Why is
that?Re:Whats the sound of GNU clapping?
sigzero on 2005-05-28T15:05:24
While it is an acronym the animal pronunciation is definately GUH-NEW.Re:Whats the sound of GNU clapping?
mr_bean on 2005-05-28T23:01:46
That's definitely the way Stallman pronounced it,
but seeing it's probably an East African word,
the original pronunciation is no doubt more like
'agnew' without the 'a'. Kind of like, 'Gulp,
New?' Not 'guh-new.'Re:Whats the sound of GNU clapping?
jmm on 2005-05-30T13:10:37
Anyone who grew up listening to Flanders and Swan kuh-nows that it is pronounced guh-new. "I'm a guh-new. How do you do? I'd really like to kuh-now wah-hoo's wah-hoo."Re:Whats the sound of GNU clapping?
cog on 2005-05-28T21:19:43
What's this Hird thing? It's not going to be funny without a reference to a hErd of gnus.Actually, it's the lack of "hErd" in the definition that makes it so bloody funny
:-) And rather than choosing GNU, I wonder if it would have been funnier if Stallman had chosen something with a silent letter that refered to the ideology of free software, like FREE ENTERPRISE, FREEFORALL, or something. Perhaps not. Perhaps it has to be an animal.
If you think of a gnu in the wild, running free (or rather eating grass), it starts making sense (I think).
Anyway, a camel is funnier than a gnu. Why is that?
Gnus can't tell jokes properly because they just can't understand them...
Re:Whats the sound of GNU clapping?
mr_bean on 2005-05-28T23:25:31
A camel is a horse designed by a committee,
right? but a gnu is a cow built by Frankenstein.
It's an ugly animal.
A camel is strange enough to be interesting, but
not strange enough to repel.
The GNU logo doesn't have the visual appeal of
O'Reilly's camel.
Perhaps Stallman could have done something with
BYRD. As in free as a bird, and/y/ is /i/ as a
semi-vowel. Byrd is a word with no vowels.
Perhaps, 'Byrds the Word' and 'The word is Be YeR
own Developer' No. Perhaps something like GENIUS
+ SOUL = JAZZ
