From owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Sat Dec 20 18:02:20 2003 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 4B78416A4CE for ; Sat, 20 Dec 2003 18:02:20 -0800 (PST) Received: from mta9.adelphia.net (mta9.adelphia.net [68.168.78.199]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 0772143D48 for ; Sat, 20 Dec 2003 18:02:19 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from wmoran@potentialtech.com) Received: from potentialtech.com ([68.68.113.33]) by mta9.adelphia.net (InterMail vM.5.01.06.05 201-253-122-130-105-20030824) with ESMTP id <20031221020218.LSFL5224.mta9.adelphia.net@potentialtech.com>; Sat, 20 Dec 2003 21:02:18 -0500 Message-ID: <3FE4FF2A.4050902@potentialtech.com> Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2003 21:02:18 -0500 From: Bill Moran User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; FreeBSD i386; en-US; rv:1.4) Gecko/20031005 X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: "Gary W. Swearingen" References: <5.0.2.1.1.20031220224013.02cf25c0@popserver.sfu.ca> <3FE4D580.6050001@potentialtech.com> In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit cc: chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: A bit of trivia: what does usr stand for? X-BeenThere: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: Non technical items related to the community List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2003 02:02:20 -0000 Gary W. Swearingen wrote: > Bill Moran writes: > > >>The urban myth is believeable, though, since it seems silly to abbreviate >>"user" with "usr" ... I mean, you're only saving 1 letter. > > Most programmers back then didn't think it was at all silly. In > addition to the already-mentioned teletype, some of us had to program > on punch cards (eg, my college) and via 110 baud terminals (eg, my > first job). Not only typing was slow; correcting typing errors with > the primative "line editors" was even slower, and the less you had to > type, the fewer errors you had to correct. Abbreviations were > rampant, with "unnecessary" syllables and vowels being dropped > whenever feasible. That "usr" might have been a victim of habit, or, > more likely, the high frequency of typing it was considered. It's easy to forget where much of this comes from. Teletypes were before my time, but I do remember edlin ... and I assume that's the class of editor you're talking about. -- Bill Moran Potential Technologies http://www.potentialtech.com