🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1102@mcgill-vision.UUCP> mouse@mcgill-vision.UUCP
(der Mouse) writes:
>Does anyone know where this widespread (on the net, at least)
>impression that the privileged part of a system is called its "kernal"
>came from?

One source is that Commodore's trade name for the operating system on the
C-64 is "kernal."  Those people with a microcomputer background would often
see it in the literature spelled that way and would not have realized that
it refered to a specific product and was not a generic term.

>It grates every time I see it, but I generally manage to
>hold myself in check (I know I shouldn't flame spelling).

The one that grates on me is the abuse of "it's."  The use of the apostrophe
is perhaps the only rule in English that has no exceptions -- I certainly
don't know of any others.  There's no excuse for someone intellegent enough
to program a computer to make a mistake using it.
-- 
-- Greg Noel, NCR Rancho Bernardo   Greg.Noel@SanDiego.NCR.COM  or  greg@ncr-sd