On Wed, 23 Feb 2000, Robert Dawson wrote:
> Radford Neal wrote:
> >
> > Finally, I doubt very much that the "C" language stands for "computer".
> > What would it's predecessor language, called "B", have stood for?
> >
> > Radford Neal
< snip, many delightful and _interesting_ details
of the etymology -- or perhaps the genealogy?
-- of assorted computer languages >
> I hope this has in no way lessened the confusion <grin>
Puts me in mind of the course-authoring language developed at OISE in
Toronto several decades ago, named CAN. My colleagues who developed (or,
perhaps, perpetrated) it always claimed that the name was an acronym for
"Completely Arbitrary Name". I've never been entirely sure whether that
was true, or whether they were pulling everyone's leg (a distinct
possibility, with that lot). (To have named it after Canada, and then to
have acknowledged that, would have been to display a quite un-Canadian
degree of national hubris. :-)
-- Don.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Donald F. Burrill [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Professor Emeritus, OISE [EMAIL PROTECTED]
348 Hyde Hall, Plymouth State College, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
MSC #29, Plymouth, NH 03264 603-535-2597
184 Nashua Road, Bedford, NH 03110 603-471-7128
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