Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 22:12:10 -0800 From: "Lal Manavado" <manavado@frisurf.no> To: <FREEBSD-NEWBIES@FREEBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: Hard words [was: Dictionary of Terms] Message-ID: <007c01c2f1cc$52d35840$c9204382@tocom> References: <KAEAKMACDAGFNDDHIBJIOEGPCAAA.davidc@huyett.com> <20030314121550.J67648@welearn.com.au>
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In our considered by not humble opinion, , the example terms provided here should represent a part of the vocabulary of any speaker of English worth his salt. The whole issue, in our view, is inseparable from the fact that some people lack a sufficient command of English and that defficiency spills over to every field when such people try to understand the vocabulary of a new area. We propose that those who find unix terminology dense or obtuse, to take some pains to enhance their own fluency in that tongue in which the Bard spake so well, and we venture to wager that would improve their own perspicacity and perspicuity pertaining to many a thing, FreeBSD included. hth. L. M. ----- Original Message ----- From: Sue Blake <sue@welearn.com.au> To: David Chavarria <davidc@huyett.com> Cc: FreeBSD Newbies <freebsd-newbies@FreeBSD.ORG> Sent: Thursday, March 13, 2003 5:15 PM Subject: Hard words [was: Dictionary of Terms] > On Thu, Mar 13, 2003 at 02:15:59PM -0600, David Chavarria wrote: > > I like the man pages and the handbook, but I was wondering if anyone knew > > of a dictionary that alphabetically listed FreeBSD/Unix terms? > > > > Or, is my best bet to just man a term I don't know when I come across it? > > Some of those words will have man pages, but for a while I've been > concerned about another group of words that newbies might struggle with. > > These are ordinary everyday words that have been adopted with a > specific relevance to unix which isn't always very clear despite > the familiarity of the word. Also it can be a bit hard to translate > from the word's everyday concept to the unix concept. > > Some other words are just plain English words, but not ones we all > use often. Some people would use or hear them in their work or study > while others would never encounter them. Ten years ago the average > computer user had a large vocabulary and was in the habit of growing > it daily, but that is no longer the case. If you're sweating over a > man page about some new complex thingy, the last thing you need is > to be diverted by a difficult word or concept along the way. > > Let me try to think of some examples... > recursive > precedence > canonical > dynamic > architecture > delimiting > collation > primaries > lexicographically > descend > string > precedence > hierarchy > default > operator > spool > traversal > pseudo > cooked > raw > affirmatively > escaped > superseded > interface > verbose > statically > contiguous > append > construct > implicit > adjacent > meta > truncated > indirection > operand > options > argument > parameter > reiteratively > asynchronous > > I bet you're all saying that some of those words are easy, but not > everyone would agree on which are the easy words. New unix users > might find it easier to ask "what does inode mean" ( = I'm new to > this unix stuff) than "what does implicit mean" ( = personally I > don't have a good vocabulary). > > Although all those words can be found in a dictionary, the dictionary > isn't going to help the task at hand very much. Most are not > likely to be found in a dictionary of computing because they're > regarded as ordinary English words. > > You might also encounter concepts which a basic unix book or course > should make clear, though they often don't spell it out in a way > that's easy to look up: > link to/from > mounted on > links are followed > indirected through > soft limit > null string > span filesystems > rooted in > referenced by > mutually exclusive > > > Have other people been stalled by words like those listed above, > or is it not such a big deal after all? > > This sort of problem is sometimes addressed in freebsd-questions, > where all FreeBSD help requests and answers should go. > > On the other hand, in freebsd-newbies we can look at this stuff > preemptively (yikes there's another word!) in order to help > each other navigate the documentation for themselves, and it's > not really a question about FreeBSD after all. > > If anyone has any ideas or resources that might help others to deal > with the general vocabulary, I'm sure your contribution would be > welcome. > > > -- > > Regards, > -*Sue*- > > > > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org > with "unsubscribe freebsd-newbies" in the body of the message > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-newbies" in the body of the message
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