From owner-freebsd-newbies Tue Oct 19 4:21:27 1999 Delivered-To: freebsd-newbies@freebsd.org Received: from gw.caamora.com.au (jonath5.lnk.telstra.net [139.130.41.237]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id E265316774 for ; Tue, 19 Oct 1999 04:21:21 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from jon@gw.caamora.com.au) Received: (from jon@localhost) by gw.caamora.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) id VAA28016; Tue, 19 Oct 1999 21:21:19 +1000 (EST) (envelope-from jon) Message-ID: <19991019212118.A27989@caamora.com.au> Date: Tue, 19 Oct 1999 21:21:18 +1000 From: jonathan michaels To: Martin M , freebsd-newbies@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: cron Mail-Followup-To: Martin M , freebsd-newbies@FreeBSD.ORG References: <000801bf1a20$1a2a03e0$3c0ca7d1@lalala> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Mailer: Mutt 0.91.1i In-Reply-To: <000801bf1a20$1a2a03e0$3c0ca7d1@lalala>; from Martin M on Tue, Oct 19, 1999 at 06:52:55AM -0400 X-Operating-System: FreeBSD gw.caamora.com.au 2.2.7-RELEASE i386 X-Mood: i'm alive, if it counts X-Originating-IP: [203.7.226.???] Organisation: Caamora, PO Box 144, Rosebery NSW 1445 Australia Sender: owner-freebsd-newbies@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.org > Why is it called a "CRON" job? I've noticed that there is a reason for > just about every name in UNIX, but I still fail to see what Conan the > barbarian's warrior god has to do with anything... its based on the old greek/latin ergo roman god chronus got of time (basically) abd because cron looks after the systems jobing on a time based timetable ergo the anliisisation is cron this is teh very cut down version of the why it is so routine but i'm sure some one like david wolfskil will be able to provide a more accurate and fleshed out version. > I didn't know Cimmerians even used computers... if you go back in history and know what the word computer used to mean, than yes that group of people imaginary orother wise did use computers. from memory, the word computer is accurate emtomologically derived in teh oxford shorter dictionary, the 25 pound one with thinner than ricepaper pages and about 8 inches thick. again the short version, is that computers were people who manually did the calulations for insurance, acutarial calulations, sales tax etc etc etc they really cam into thier own during the british empire days when navy'd need accurate calulation to make maps and merchants needed tables fro inurance premiums based on probability of certain outcomes. thes computers could perform vastly difficult calulation in thier heads at the blink of an eye .. much fast more accurate than we could today withthe best handheld calulators that hp could build. anyway,some thing to start you on your library search, just go to you library and get any books about british admiralty history and lookup computer who they were and what they did for a living. cheers jonathan -- =============================================================================== Jonathan Michaels PO Box 144, Rosebery, NSW 1445 Australia =========================================================== To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-newbies" in the body of the message