Re: unix acronyms -collecting a list?

Article View: comp.unix.shell

Article #4282

#4282

From: rosalia
Date: Thu, 12 Jun 1997 00:00

29 lines
2731 bytes


> > I'm not too lazy or proud to look it up in a dictionary, but my 13
> > volume Oxford English Dictionary has no entry for acronym.

I am very impressed by this whole thread, and I told some of the
people in the British office I am visiting.  They are very smart and
culturny, and they explained to me that the first edition of the OED
(Oxford English Dictionary) was started a very long time ago, and the
letter 'a' would have been completed before the 1940s.

So one guy went home and checked in his second edition of the OED,
which has 26 volumes (!).  It *does* have an entry for ``acronym'',
and mentions that it the word was invented in the US in the 1940s.

The etymology is unknown.

I believe it must stand for something like ``Acronym for Recursively
Obsessed Northern Yankee Mythologies'' or something like that.

In other words, someone invented the ultimate acronym: a word that
describes its own concept, creates its own concept, represents itself,
and is recursive in the XINU and GNU sense.

And on top of that the inventor kept it a secret, and probably smiled
subtly every time a new dictionary covered her (his) special word.

I wonder who this person is; their email address is probably something
like acronym@we-run-the-world-in-secret.org

Technical Details

Message-ID: <r7vi3kk68t.fsf@masala.cygnus.co.uk>

Path: arc1-ca.pugleaf.net!unknown!not-for-mail

References:

<337C64F0.41C6@cs.ucc.ie> <5lsbv4$id8@bmtlh10.bnr.ca> <3383FA57.4855@uab.ericsson.se> <EAMxy9.EF4@cogsci.ed.ac.uk> <A01469D243A414B4.60EFD3C313DDF166.4A538EC778681837@library-proxy.airnews.net> <3396D1DD.6495@qanv.pbz> <3398849a.13740572@news.dircon.co.uk> <339CA4A4.2A1A9E65@ripco.com>

Show Full Headers

Complete Article Headers

X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit
X-Google-Thread: 10eb3b,3d362ec564ebdcba
X-Google-Attributes: gid10eb3b,public
X-Google-Thread: 1103af,3d362ec564ebdcba
X-Google-Attributes: gid1103af,public
X-Google-Thread: faa64,3d362ec564ebdcba
X-Google-Attributes: gidfaa64,public
X-Google-Thread: 1025b4,3d362ec564ebdcba
X-Google-Attributes: gid1025b4,public
X-Google-Thread: 11035d,3d362ec564ebdcba
X-Google-Attributes: gid11035d,public
X-Google-Thread: 1012a6,3d362ec564ebdcba
X-Google-Attributes: gid1012a6,public
X-Google-Thread: fa705,3d362ec564ebdcba
X-Google-Attributes: gidfa705,public
X-Google-Thread: f4bda,3d362ec564ebdcba
X-Google-Attributes: gidf4bda,public
From: rosalia@cygnus.co.uk
Subject: Re: unix acronyms -collecting a list?
Date: 1997/06/12
Message-ID: <r7vi3kk68t.fsf@masala.cygnus.co.uk>
X-Deja-AN: 247762859
Sender: rosalia@masala.cygnus.co.uk
References: <337C64F0.41C6@cs.ucc.ie> <5lsbv4$id8@bmtlh10.bnr.ca> <3383FA57.4855@uab.ericsson.se> <EAMxy9.EF4@cogsci.ed.ac.uk> <A01469D243A414B4.60EFD3C313DDF166.4A538EC778681837@library-proxy.airnews.net> <3396D1DD.6495@qanv.pbz> <3398849a.13740572@news.dircon.co.uk> <339CA4A4.2A1A9E65@ripco.com>
To: rosalia
Organization: Cygnus Solutions, Cambridge, UK
Reply-To: rosalia@cygnus.co.uk
Newsgroups: comp.unix.shell,comp.os.linux.misc,comp.os.linux.x,alt.os.linux,comp.unix.bsd.misc,comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc,gnu.misc.discuss,comp.unix.solaris

Reply to Parent Message