Re: "Underscore" character

2012-01-17 Thread Shmuel Metz (Seymour J.) 
In
,
on 01/17/2012
   at 02:43 PM, John Gilmore  said:

>That said, Mr Altmark's rude comments

PKB.

>are unhelpful.

Au contraire, his comments were helpful and yours were unhelpful.
 
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Re: "Underscore" character

2012-01-17 Thread Gainsford, Allen 
John Gilmore writes:
> Mr Altmark is again only marginally correct about the term
> 'underscore', as the OED quotations for it make clear, it is a
> slightly antique term used literally.

The OED defines "underscore", among other meanings, as: "a key on
a computer or typewriter keyboard which produces a short horizontal
line on the baseline."

Is this somehow unclear?  It certainly does not seem "antique".

> The response it elicited from Mr Altmark requires another sort of
> comment.  Its tone is magisterial.  Its content is radically
> inadequate.  He should do his homework before he ventures another
> such.  I shall not be so polite next time.

For Mr Gilmore to accuse anyone else of taking a "magisterial" tone
is truly hilarious.


Allen Gainsford
Info Developer, Banking Shared Services
HP Enterprise Services (South Pacific)
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Re: "Underscore" character

2012-01-17 Thread John Gilmore 
Alan Altmark writes:


This entire conversation is rather silly,  but I feel compelled to
point out that 'underscore' and 'low line' are the official names for
that symbol [which are not regulated by the OED or other dictionary,
btw].  There is a spacing underscore and a combining underscore.  And
the symbol is _still_ in widespread use by the general public in plain
text.


The appearance of my post on IBM-MAIN, where it did not belong, was my
fault.  It should have been directed to trhe ASSEMBLER LIST.  I am
still having some software problems with directing email to the right
list after changing my email address because the old one was hacked.

That said, Mr Altmark's rude comments are unhelpful.  The authority of
the OED does not stem from any regulatory function.  The subliterate
are and should be free to use language in any way they wish.

Mr Altmark is again only marginally correct about the term
'underscore', as the OED quotations for it make clear, it is a
slightly antique term used literally.  Current use of it is almost
always figurative.  Literal used is overwhelmingly of the alternative
term 'underline'.  Moreover, when it is used in plain text it is not
used for 'spacing' or 'combining'.  Placed under another character it
is used either for emphasis or as an alternative to italics, e.g., in
book titles.

I come now to Mr Altmark's use of the phrase 'official names'  He does
not make clear just what 'official' means or where the definitions he
cites reside.  In my posts on the assembler list I made clear that
there is a context, the C/UNIX/ASCII one, in which the term
'underscore' is widely used.

There are others in which it has not.  In IBM's PL/I Language
References, for example, the table that defines special characters
defines '_' as 'break character (underscore)' ; and even this
concession to the dubious alternative name is new.

To summarize now, my posting-destination error produced this brouhaha;
and I apologize for it.

The response it elicited from Mr Altmark requires another sort of
comment.  Its tone is magisterial.  Its content is radically
inadequate.  He should do his homework before he ventures another
such.  I shall not be so polite next time.

John Gilmore, Ashland, MA 01721 - USA

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Re: "Underscore" character

2012-01-17 Thread Greg Shirey 
And I can't figure out what started it...   

Completely confused,
Greg Shirey
Ben E. Keith Co. 

-Original Message-
From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [mailto:IBM-MAIN@bama.ua.edu] On Behalf Of 
Alan Altmark
Sent: Tuesday, January 17, 2012 12:11 PM


This entire conversation is rather silly   

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Re: "Underscore" character

2012-01-17 Thread Alan Altmark 
On Sun, 15 Jan 2012 18:44:28 -0500, John Gilmore  
wrote:
>The character '_' does not have this function.  It cannot indeed be
>used in this way.  To call it an underscore is thus at once incorrect
>and rather silly.  It is of a piece with Mr Gainford's misuse of the
>word 'anachronistic'.

This entire conversation is rather silly,  but I feel compelled to point out 
that 'underscore' and 'low line' are the official names for that symbol [which 
are not regulated by the OED or other dictionary, btw].  There is a spacing 
underscore and a combining underscore.  And the symbol is _still_ in widespread 
use by the general public in plain text.

Alan Altmark
IBM

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Re: "Underscore" character

2012-01-16 Thread Shmuel Metz (Seymour J.) 
In
,
on 01/15/2012
   at 06:44 PM, John Gilmore  said:

>The character '_' does not have this function.  It cannot indeed be
>used in this way. 

Not only can it be used in that way, it *has* been used in that way
and is still used in that way. The software doing so was very common
at one time.

>To call it an underscore is thus at once incorrect
>and rather silly.

To make such a claim is at once incorrect and rather silly.
 
-- 
 Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz, SysProg and JOAT
 ISO position; see  
We don't care. We don't have to care, we're Congress.
(S877: The Shut up and Eat Your spam act of 2003)

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Re: "Underscore" character

2012-01-15 Thread Gainsford, Allen 
> Regrettably, their forceful expression does not endow Mr Gainsford's
> views with substantive merit.  The OED defines the verb to underscore
> as
>
> to draw a line or score underneath, to underline
>
> The character '_' does not have this function.  It cannot indeed be
> used in this way.  To call it an underscore is thus at once incorrect
> and rather silly.  It is of a piece with Mr Gainford's misuse of the
> word 'anachronistic'.

The underscore character does indeed have this function, and has been
used in this way countless times, on a device called a typewriter.  As
others have pointed out, it has also been used this way, countless
more times, on overprinted lines of computer printout.

The fact that underscoring with a typewriter or a printer is now
nearly a thing of the past (thus making it, in fact, anachronistic) in
no way invalidates the name "underscore".


Allen Gainsford
Info Developer, Banking Shared Services
HP Enterprise Services (South Pacific)
Office +64-4-819-5236  |  Fax +64-4-819-5955  |  Email allen.gainsf...@hp.com

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Re: "Underscore" character

2012-01-15 Thread Rich Greenberg 
In article  
you write:

[...]

>to draw a line or score underneath, to underline
>
>The character '_' does not have this function.  It cannot indeed be
>used in this way.  To call it an underscore is thus at once incorrect
>and rather silly.  It is of a piece with Mr Gainford's misuse of the
>word 'anachronistic'.

Yes, it does provided that your printer has the ability to overprint.
You simply overprint the desired text with the '_' character.

Example using ASA control chars on a line printer:

+The word is underscored.
 ___

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Re: "Underscore" character

2012-01-15 Thread John Gilmore 
A Gainsford writes:


Actually, the real obstacle to the use of "break character" is that,
anachronistic or not, most people already understand what the term
"underscore character" means, while "break character" produces only
confusion.  My expectation is therefore that most will quite sensibly
continue to use "underscore".


Regrettably, their forceful expression does not endow Mr Gainsford's
views with substantive merit.  The OED defines the verb to underscore
as

to draw a line or score underneath, to underline

The character '_' does not have this function.  It cannot indeed be
used in this way.  To call it an underscore is thus at once incorrect
and rather silly.  It is of a piece with Mr Gainford's misuse of the
word 'anachronistic'.

These things said, dubious language is not genocide; and I suspect
that this topic too has been exhausted.

John Gilmore, Ashland, MA 01721 - USA

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