Dan Rue wrote: >On Wed, Mar 09, 2005 at 10:30:28AM -0600, Chris Smith wrote: >> the Guh-Nome part i was pretty sure about, though that is helpful. >> >> I remember reading about it in some Linux mag. Stallman basically said >> anything starting with gnu should be GUH-NU-whatever. >> hard to do though, espcially around casual linux users... they look at >> you funny, and you feel compelled to explain, and then you end up >> looking like a bit of jerk.. (at least i seem to...) >> >> Oh, and Suse,,, that one is like Dr. Suess, not Suzy.... since we are >> expanding the list. >I personally think that in the spirit of open source and >there's-more-than-one-way-to-do-it, pronunciation should be an open >sport. Nobody cares what Stallman says, anyway (ain't no way i'm saying >Guh-Nome). "Nobody cares what Stallman says" is equivalent to "Everyone doesn't care what Stallman says". Sorry, Dan, you don't speak for everyone. Some people do care what Stallman says. Stallman and GNU software are the main supporters of free software and in large part the reason open source exists the way it does today. Without Stallman's decades of work and the GNU project there wouldn't be any free software or open source software (at least to the extent and with the freedom that such software exists today). Dan, your phonetic spelling of GNOME looks good to me. Is it really that hard to pronounce or too funny sounding. How do you pronounce GNU? GUH-NU? Or do you pronounce it with the G silent? GNU is pronounced NU (new) and GNOME is pronounced NOME (as in the northernmost town in Alaska)? The above being said, we are all free to pronounce words (technical or not) the way we want, but people that know the correct pronunciation may laugh out loud (or at least silent [G] ly) at our mispronunciation. GNOME is part of the GNU project: http://www.gnome.org/about/ Look at the second paragraph after the title "Free". See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNOME. I couldn't find gnome.org's own definition of the acronym GNOME. (Did I forget the G in my last google search of NOME, er I mean GNOME?) Can there be any doubt now how GNOME is pronounced? "GNU Network Object Model Environment" or GUH-NOME Well, at least Stallman says so and GNU can be said to be his project and GNOME is part of the GNU project. So the correct pronunciation of GNOME is reasonably clear. Just be glad that Stallman doesn't insist that GNOME be pronounced GUH-NU-NOME rather than the current GUH-NOME. Next time someone asks me to pronounce Linux, I'll say UNIX. Note, that Linux Torvalds says Linux can be pronounced anyway you want. However, The Open Group may insist that I say "UNIX Trademark". Ok, GUH-NU-LEE-NUCKS then. Now that I'm on a roll or a tangent, can we change GNU/Linux to Gnux (pronounced GUH-NUCKS) as GNU/Linux is a bit long? My intent was to add a touch of humour while making my point. Please let me know if I succeeded or simply wasted your time and mine. GNUcerely, Ken Fuchs <kfuchs at winternet.com> P.S. BTW, SUSE is still pronounced SUE-SA, unless Novell has recently changed it's pronunciation from the orginal German to English.