Realizing this is getting out of hand, Coq mulls new name for programming language After three decades, Coq, a theorem-proving programming language developed by researchers in France, is being fitted for a new name because it has become impossible to ignore that it sounds like bawdy English slang. Once referred to as CoC, short for Calculus of Constructions, the programming language became Coq when work on …
Harder one, not just in computer science.
Getting people to grow up.
I am also fed up of American norms being imposed on the entire IT world.
To me when I grew up the main association of the word master was a male school teacher, but American culture must always trump everyone elses. Cultural imperialism.
Coq is a French language, why should they conform to American norms.
Another language had its name changed from Nimrod to Nim because illeterate Americans did not understand that Bugs Bunny was being sarcastic when he reffered to Elmer Fudd as Nimrod - its a biblical reference to a "mighty hunter".
Can the rest of us stick to our own cultural norms please?
Coq is a French language, why should they conform to American norms.
They don't have to. But it's a bit like free speech. You can say what you want but you have to accept the consequences. They appear to have decided that it's impeding usage. C'est la vie :)
So immature grunts in the world's armed forces are setting the new standard for language? Makes sense, us English speakers are still speaking a weird amalgam of Celtic, Latin, Ænglisc ("Old English"), Saxon, Norse and French thanks to similar activity.
Yes, I know, there are many other loan-words from many other languages in English.
> Still better than "Commander of United Nations Taskforce". (which was a real thing in Gibraltar I think)
In the late 80's/early 90's in Australia, there was a rash of elevating Colleges of Advanced Educations into Universities. One such was the CCAE - Canberra College of Advanced Education, but it became a University, variously called Canberra University or University of Canberra (UC). This resulted in the netball team for what was previously the CCAE becoming, very briefly, the Canberra University Netall Team, before being mysteriously renamed the University of Canberra Netball Team.
“You can say what you want but you have to accept the consequences”
This is a direct quote from an explanation given by Communist propaganda for why people criticising Communist Party rules were punished.
Do you have a link for that direct quote? Which communist party? What country? (Google was unhelpful; as increasingly is the case).
Also, as an idea, self responsibility isn't really a 'dictatorship' only thing is it? (It's also not very 'communist' either).
The woke are pro-dictatorship.
I mean... erm... that's a bit of a stretch isn't it? "Lets rename this thing to stop people focusing on it's unfortunate translation and consider it's merits instead" is a little far away from "Let's invade Poland".
You're going from a very specific instance of Communist party rules (When? Where? What country? What flavour of communism?) Then you quietly equate woke with communist. And then conclude that woke=dictatorship/
Any logician would rip the shit out of that argument. Try harder. It's literally no different from the very old example of saying FIRE! in a crowded theatre. You can say it, but you are accountable (positively) if you save lives, and accountable (negatively) if you said a stupid think in a public place just for the lols and someone gets hurt.
Woke is an irrelevance here. Go back to the Telegraph.
"I am also fed up of American norms being imposed on the entire IT world."
Like it or not, while the American dialect of the English Language (whatever that means!) is not by any stretch of the imagination the de jure language of TehIntraWebTubes, it is, however, the de facto lingua franca of The Internet's technical world. For the moment, anyway. This is subject to change, eventually. It's inevitable.
"changed from Nimrod to Nim because illeterate Americans did not understand that Bugs Bunny was being sarcastic"
This particular "illeterate" American understood the joke. However, quite a few children grew up thinking the term was a pejorative as it was the first place and context they had seen the word used. This is hardly uncommon, see Dunce (from Duns Scotus). But then I'll bet you're a regular Einstein and won't understand the point of this paragraph ...
"Can the rest of us stick to our own cultural norms please?"
Whose cultural norms do you propose "the rest of us" use, Kemosabe?
Until encountering this enlightening thread, I hadn't realized how insulting is 'stopcock'. Most often when we need to call in a plumber he tells my wife to stop the cock, presumably because he's filled with envy and not a little malice.. His question is posed in such a way as to humiliate me -- do you know where your cock-that-needs-stopping actually is -- the possessive in this case attributed to her, never to me.
Getting people to grow up.
Indeed ...
+1
If for some people, the programing language's name (or the associations it conjures up in their imagination/brains) "deters community participation", then so be it.
Maybe that's just the type of dicks you don't need participating in your community.
And yes, pun intended. 8^P
Best,
A.
The perils of being PC, versus the perils of not being PC, versus the perils of being labeled PC.
So, for example, a woman might have no problem with using the Coq programming language. Rather, she has a problem with all the dicks around her who won't stop sniggering about it. Let's just be clear that when she complains (or leaves), who actually is the one being the dick. Calling the woman the dick is just being dick squared.
As for the English vs French angle, I have no doubt some of the sniggerers are French. As a male who speaks both English and French, I have heard plenty of sniggering in both languages. I have also done it myself, but these days only in private.
No one is imposing anything. They're just trying to make their name a bit less joke-friendly and avoid it being misunderstood in voice communications. There's a reason names today tend to be made-up words.
As an American, I have no problem telling someone that I like coq au vin but I would be hesitant to talk about Coq in a professional setting.
As a cook, I'm pretty certain you've never actually eaten coq au vin. (I've got a cantankerous old rooster I'm allowing to live just a little longer in order to make this treat for my birthday ... ).
As a Professional, I question your professionalism if you have issues using technical terms in a technical setting. Shirley knowing how and when to use technical terms properly is one of the very definitions of being a Professional?
"Can the rest of us stick to our own cultural norms please?" Not according to mose Septics, and especially the Trumpstan ones.
I do get a giggle when they don't see the funny side of someone called minge, or Pence Trump, they're all a bit Hyacinth Bucket
"To me when I grew up the main association of the word master was a male school teacher"
Which is because the UK school system was deliberately designed to instill much the same sense of a disciplinary hierarchy based on race and social position.
The British were less keen on slaves than the US - to put it mildly - but still had very similar ideas on the 'just' treatment of 'natives'.
It isn't just America which finds those words deeply offensive these days. Former British-colonies often have absolutely terrible customer service because the locals find 'customer service' too reminiscent of 'servility'. Similarly, any reference to 'master' except in very specific contexts.
"False. It was based entirely on teachers being in charge in the classroom."
That simply isn't true. There is explicit documentary evidence that there was a _deliberate_ decision to instill certain ideas about how to run the world. It is _directly_ related to colonialism.
So how come school masters were around long before colonialism?
School master comes directly from magister, the person in charge. Which, incidently, is why the US President is occassionally refered to as the Chief Magistrate - the topmost person in charge.
I would agree, but then again the language is called "Calculus of constructions" and not "Calculus des constructions". If the name is basically English, you really have to consider the other things about Anglophone culture.
Et oui: mon français est superbe ; ainsi j’ai bien sûr le droit de dire ce que je viens d‘écrire.
@Robert-Carnegie
On the basis of the imperial unit the standard British handful I expect a single well chosen individual would be sufficient to support my Bosoms [proposal].
As for pencils, these days let's just say "more than one". And remember I am holding a wooden ruler, and I'm not afraid to use it.
...and others getting harassed when they said they were working on Coq
This says more about those doing the harassing than those who work on Coq. There is no word or sound in any language that cannot be (ab)used to have some other meaning. Trying to please the zealots only results in more problems.
Or, we can just agree that one word remains: blank. Then we can have meaningful conversations like this:
Blank blank blank, blank blank. Blank blank blank blank blank blank, blank blank blank, blank blank blank. Blank blank blank blank blank. Blank blank blank blank blank blank blank blank blank. Blank blank blank blank blank blank. Blank, blank blank blank blank blank blank, blank blank blank blank blank blank blank. Blank!
How many references to reproductive organs did you find in that text? <blank>
@b0llchit
It says all you need to know about the current members of the Eternally Offended cult.
They seem to spend their time searching for reasons to be either offended personally or by proxy on the behalf of people they don't know but make the assumption those people would be offended.
I find those who are easily and constantly offended, to be offensive and I protest!
"So please put on something of a highly offensive nature."
Many years ago David Frost had a TV show that possibly introduced the sketch with the Two Ronnies and John Clees making a satirical point about the UK class system.
Another sketch was equally biting. David Frost was interviewing a "Clean Up TV" activist. The latter said he didn't need to watch a programme - he could determine the offensiveness of its content from the title.
His rating for the most sexually offensive was for the children's programme "Blue Peter".
What is truly offensive are the fuckwits who presume to be offended on the behalf of others. It's getting to the point where nobody can say anything about anything without somebody pretending to get upset about it in somebody else's name. Frankly, I find it grossly offensive that somebody might presume to be offended in my name. Be offended for yourself, by all means, but keep my good name out of your fantasy.
What is truly offensive are the fuckwits who presume to be offended on the behalf of others.
And that one is about as old as speech, the worst (and first) being the fuckwits that get offended by blasphemy (and if that god of them were as omnipotent as he is reputed to be, he could take care of it himself).
"Blank blank blank, blank blank. Blank blank blank blank blank blank, blank blank blank, blank blank blank. Blank blank blank blank blank. Blank blank blank blank blank blank blank blank blank. Blank blank blank blank blank blank. Blank, blank blank blank blank blank blank, blank blank blank blank blank blank blank. Blank!"
Phwoar! Don't stop now!
"Blank blank blank, blank blank."
I used to work, long ago, at a nursing home where the barely-trained had pretentions, so it wasn't uncommon to hear a sentence like "Staff has asked me to get (something) from Staff because Staff needs it for Staff." I doubt anybody actually knew who the hell was being referred to, but they were "promoted" to Staff Nurse (by the standards of the home, not anything at all related to actual NHS qualifications) and by god were they going to make sure everybody lower on their perceived totem pole (including my mother, a real nurse but didn't let on) was aware of it.
Me? I was just "the agency".
No IT angle at all. Just the blank blank blank made me think of this.
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Since that's the first thing that comes to mind, Coq au vin.
I don't think there's a programming language called Vin, and who wouldn't want to use a language named after liquid coding inspiration? I can see some confusion might arise visually with "Vim", but only after a few glasses.
It also keeps the French slant, is memorable and slightly whimsical, just as long as it's pronounced correctly.
I was going to come here to say exactly this (before I read past the advert and started giggling), so take my upvote.
Well, almost exactly.
I would have suggested the full suffixual portion: "au Vin" (pronouncing it properly as awVAR+plus a swallowed but distinguishable n). Keeps the link closer to Coq, the "au" makes it clear even to Americans that it's pronounced differently, lets the Parisians still get snotty about cons* mangling French -- everyone wins!
.
.
* "Con" (sing.), "Cons" (pl.): haven 't heard a female anatomy version; only the Stupid/LowClass/Ignoramus/SneerAtTheFool meaning. E.g. the movie Le Diner de Cons.
>>haven 't heard a female anatomy version;
fyi....
Con acquired its vulgar connotation in the 12th century, and became an insult during the 19th. its original meaning of female genitalia is today completely forgotten, except among people who enjoy old books. Still, if the adjective used with the word can strengthen or weaken its meaning, it is important to note that who says it can also modify its strength. Remember Sarkozy’s “casse toi pauvre con”, which was perceived as much more injurious in his mouth than in any other.’
from here
espèce de con = (literally) species of idot (or vulva depending on if you are modern of 12thC!) so a better translation could be You Idiot! or You C***! depending on context.
oo ta. I like me some etymological goodness, I do.
.
On a related note: the name "mean" for what most people regard as a normal average, comes from the French "moyen" meaning "middle". The original English statistical term was "middle" and the posh language in England then (eg, used in the law courts) was French.
Ay walla! (A German phrase meaning to have fun in mud)
Would the policy on renaming extend to people who have amusing or offensive names in other languages ?
I once had a colleague whose second name was "Dikshit". And I'm certain much amusement was had at his expense however I don't think anybody would suggest to him that he should change his name to something less offensive in the language which is not his own.
Coqvin concatenating two words to make a new proper noun as a name for a project is a tried and tested good practice. Naturally check Google for uniqueness if it's a public project.
I wrote this idea up as sanename.org so I don't forget the rules. Since doing this, naming things has never been a problem for me.
oh and push to the cache, don't write read-through caches and the invalidation thing is fixed too.
your welcome.
They need a silly name so they can be trademarked and Googled.
Eg Vulkan is called that entirely to prevent the problem OpenGL has, where almost all the top hits were showing how to use long deprecated parts of the API.
Sadly some marketeers still don't understand this and insist on inserting punctuation to make it different, thus making the product trademarkable, but impossible to Google as it coerces all punctuation to a space.
... Coq. It's what it's always going to be called anyway.
Treat anyone who insists on having a fit of giggles when discussing it as the children that they are, and invite them to return to the conversation after they grow up.
Likewise, also treat anyone who is offended by the name as children. It's a fucking programming language, you pampered, overly protected little precious babies.
It's all in the context ... If you are talking about a programming language, what kind of dirty minded twit automatically assumes it has to do with a penis? Why should anyone using said language change their behavio(u)r just to keep these very few and far between hand-wringers and namby-pambys happy?
Unfortunately, treating everyone you might want to get involved with your Coq project like children seldom goes down well, regardless of necessity. And how many times do you want to go through the "It's a fucking programming language..." conversation before you think "sod it, it's just going to be easier to change the name?"
Some challenges or problems are best to meet head-on. Other times, it's just more practical to side-step.
"Unfortunately, treating everyone you might want to get involved with your Coq project like children "
Where, exactly, did I suggest that?
"And how many times do you want to go through the "It's a fucking programming language..." conversation before you think "sod it, it's just going to be easier to change the name?""
To date, when discussing ANY programming language with programming professionals, I have never, not once, had to remind anyone it was a programming language that we were discussing. Professionals are funny that way, they understand what words mean in a given context.
"Some challenges or problems are best to meet head-on. Other times, it's just more practical to side-step."
I flat refuse to allow namby-pamby hand-wringers to pervert perfectly good technical terms just to make them feel all warm and cozy inside. THEY are the ones with the problem, not the technical language.
"Where, exactly, did I suggest that?"
My apologies. Perhaps I should have used the phrase "some people" rather than "everyone".
By and large, I agree with your general sentiment. Most educated people know what terms like "blacklist" and "whitelist" mean in a technical context. However, it is clear that the name of this particular programming language is a barrier to those who maintain it. I've been developing software for close to a decade, and I'd never heard of Coq. I suspect that most of my immediate colleagues haven't either. If you dropped that name into a sentence, I would think you were using the slang term. I know at least a couple of my colleagues would have a snigger (one of whom is the IT director here, and I don't think that treating him like a child is a particularly good career move).
Looking for a name with fewer negative connotations doesn't seem unreasonable in this case.
If I were to drop that name in a sentence, it would be blindingly obvious from the context that I was talking about a programming language you were unfamiliar with. Hopefully you and the professionals you work with (including your IT Director) would ask what the language was, instead of sniggering like schoolboys.
The name has never had negative connotations to me, nor anyone I've discussed it with.
It's mind-boggling the extremes that people will go to force this kind of thing to become offensive. It's a technical term used by technical people in a technical context. The only thing offensive about it is the way non-technical people abuse it out of that context.
"It's a technical term used by technical people in a technical context. The only thing offensive about it is the way non-technical people abuse it out of that context."
Right. It sounds like the language maintainers tried to keep that perspective for as long as they could, but have now admitted the language abusers are winning, at real cost to the language. "Offensive" is not just in the listener, it's also in the speaker. Communication happens on both ends, and trying to be all mature and enlightened when someone else is being abusive is not productive. Maybe in your meetings the mature people vastly outnumber the immature ones, and you can get away with an icy stare, but I'm sure that's not the same everywhere.
They are giving in to people who bitch for the sake of bitching. That is grossly offensive to me, not least because it gives the bitchers a sense of power, and thus enables them to move on to the next thing to bitch about. Better to nip it in the bud.
I don't need an icy stare. I fire dumbshits simply because they are dumbshits and I see them as more of a liability than a resource in ANY given organization.
“It's all in the context ... If you are talking about a programming language, what kind of dirty minded twit automatically assumes it has to do with a penis? ”
Judging by the many coq jokes, puns, and single-entendres in these comments, the answer to that question might be “an El Reg commenter”. Which kind of proves the point, to the extent that El Reg readership is representative of the IT community at large.
This is hardly a meeting or a board room at a Fortune 500, now is it. Rather, it's a forum where people go to blow off steam in a safe place. Like it or not, this is absolutely normal professional behavio(u)r. It even has a name ... "Hospital Humo(u)r".
There is a reason we watched M*A*S*H and Blackadder ... pointing out the idiocy of reality helps everybody sane get through life without going quite insane.
Blowing off steam is important in any high-stress environment. It happens everywhere, you can't get away from it. Usually it's just among peers who grok. Me, I shrug it off if I don't see the humor. Throwing a hissy-fit is pointless.
> "This similarity has already led to some women turning away from Coq and others getting harassed when they said they were working on Coq," the project wiki, last updated on Friday, explains. "It also makes some English conversations about Coq with lay persons simply more difficult."
...this paragraph gave me the giggles despite knowing the actual situation. Well done, Thomas, well done.
Face it. English is not the only language of the Universe. The fact that a foreign word sounds bad in English, and one can't understand it's a foreign word, just means that person is an ignorant English supremacist. And they should be shamed as such.
If they can't understand differences, have to destroy them because they can live only in their little poor world it's they that have to change, not the others.
For a far older example of the French doing this, consider the name of Merlin (Arthur's magician). He was called Myrddin in the Welsh folk-tales (Carmarthen, or Caerfyrddin, means Merlin's fort). When the French romance-writers started using them as source material, they altered the name to avoid the pun on merde.
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Smut names make everything better. Even more so if unintentional!
This was another good one:
http://aliprandi.blogspot.com/2013/03/inkulator-sounds-funny-for-italians.html
I guess that was one of the very first times that being born there ( and speaking the language ) turned out to be an advantage :-)
Back in the '70s there was a butcher on Cold Bath Road in Harrogate that made really, really good growlers ... I can't for the life of me remember the name, but it was a family owned business, third generation I think. Probably long gone now, alas.
I'm right hungry now, too.
Given the sounds that cover up four-letter words on TV, how about using the name *Bleep*? I'm sure a suitable backronym can be found. "p" could obviously stand for "prover", and "l" could stand for "logic", but the people behind the language would probably prefer French words. Any suggestions?
The French equivalent to “bleep” seems to be bip (which is pronounced like English “beep”).
Is there a standardized pronunciation for the programming language Coq? If it should be pronounced as the French common noun is, then its pronunciation would be closer to English “cuck” than to “cock” — but perhaps the pronunciation “cuck” would also be unacceptable to some anglophone ears.
I’m surprised that no one here (at this writing) has suggested replacing the rooster with a seal (pinniped) — renaming the language from Coq to Phoque.
If the connection to Gallus gallus domesticus is preferred, then perhaps expanding Coq to Coquelet (“cockerel”) would be acceptable.
The former is Windows Installer XML, an XML description of Windows Installer packages, the latter a web site hoster with easy editors. Both have in common, that the name very closely resembles the German "wichs", which is the imperative form of the verb "wichsen" which means (in the old fashioned meaning) to rub something and (in the current meaning) to rub the male reproductive organ.
Shakespeare would be appalled at this Coq-up.
Arguably the greatest writer in English, Shakespeare demonstrated mastery of double entendre in all his works, but the title of Much Ado About Nothing is perhaps a triple entendre. "Noting" and "Nothing" had quite simimal pronunciations in his day. "Noting" or carefully observing others' behaviors would lead the main characters far astray. "Nothing" foreshadows the silliness of the conflict to come. "Nothing" was also slang for lady parts ...
Yes, Signor Mountando has indeed returned from the wars...
The portion is the vulva, if anyone has a need to know. Very specific to the rural poor in the Mississippi River Delta. The only reason I know this is because I'm quite fond of Delta Blues and a few songs didn't make much sense. Apparently it's from the 17thC British use of the term cock as a non-gendered passive verb, as appropriated by the slaves in that area. I know an old black guy in Slidell, Louisiana who uses it in this manner, but outside some old Bluesmen I have never heard it used like that anywhere else in the wild.
"How about "Bando," Portuguese for a group of roosters? Er, no. Another male anatomy reference in French slang."
Frankly, they're being extra-cautious on this one. Its pronunciation is similar to "bander", but identical to "bandeau" (banner, headband), which is readily usable with no sexual connotation. It's merely the context that could suggest otherwise.
Here's a little story, written in common UNIX terminology:
gawk, grep, unzip, touch, strip, init, uncompress, finger, find, route, whereis, which, mount, fsck, nice, more, yes, umount, head, expand, renice, restore, touch, whereis, which, route, mount, more, yes, umount, ping, make clean, sleep
Presumably the hand-wringing namby-pambys are planning on ultimately making this kind of thing impossible, right? No? Then what's their fucking point?
If you look at the programming language league tables then Coq doesn't exist, its obviously an important tool but hardly one that's going to be used to code a web page or 'app' So I figure any controversy about the name is manufactured -- the people who use it are way beyond playing sophomoric double entendres with its name.
I know about the English colloquial usage but if someone mentions 'cock' to me I picture a small, relatively flightless, bird that has a huge attitude problem. It thinks its bossing me about. I see it upside down in a roasting pan, golden brown skin weighed down with strips of bacon with ample supplies of roast potatoes sizzling beside it. The cockerel is also a symbol of a nearby country, something I associate with rugby.
Does this term get used in today's woke society? When I was at school in the 70's there was always a "cock of the school" who was considered the 'hardest kid' in the playground. This either made him a target or a person of awe to be revered. He was usually in the final year of high school and had a lot of hangers on whose reputation was far higher than their capabilities. By association of course.
I once had a run in with our resident "cock" and his posse of council estate honchos. Took a few slaps and was derided for it amongst my peers for a few weeks. The same guy actually came to a school reunion about 10 years ago and oddly had the same attitude. Took offence to my car when I arrived and the "bullying" continued every time we passed at the bar. Went to the bathroom and had a little more of the same. Left the bathroom, he was asleep in the urinals. Nobody told him I fought competition pak mei kung fu into my mid thirties. Slowly slowly catchy monkey.
Where was I, oh yeah coq. Not a good name for a business of any kind.
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Back in the 90s in an Oil tech company we would not start a project until we had a worked out a rude name for the project.
it was the only we we could get the documentations done.
that was before we had project managers and all that bollocks
still the manuals looks lovely on the shelve.
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