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Comment by skeeter2020 | Hacker News Reader

skeeter2020

What camp do you fall into for Structured Query Language? I'm an SssQueEl purist (it's an acronym not an abbreviation) who bristles when I hear (the far more common) Sequel.

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Always as SQL. Historically, SQL was a rename of SEQUEL [1], so there may be some people who say SQL as a word, but most people spell it. That's also how the SQL standard say to pronounce it, "S-Q-L".

But, for Microsoft's WinDbg, the correct pronunciation for those in the know is, "wind bag". [2]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SQL#History

[2] https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/drivers/d...

I am trying and failing to find the entry in the jargon file that says something along the lines of "if you come across a person who pronounces 'SQL' as 'squirrel', you have found a true hacker indeed". Maybe it was not the jargon file. It's been many years.

Along those same lines, I also like to pronounce "varchar" in a way[1] that is guaranteed to put a look of disgust on the face of almost everyone in the room; this is how I find my karass.

[1] if anyone replies asking for specifics because they are "genuinely curious" I will slap them. Use your imagination.

It was the jargon file, but it was about SCSI, and that anybody who spelt it out was clueless.

Go ahead and slap me I guess, cuz I must not be imaginative enough.

  vare-care?
  var-car?
  v-archer?
  var-charr?
  varc-har

I don't get it, none of those seem that bad

> "if you come across a person who pronounces 'SQL' as 'squirrel', you have found a true hacker indeed"

Well, I feel oddly validated, thanks. (In the sense of "squirrelly" - counterproductively idiosyncratic or disfunctional.)

> "varchar"

> < vare-care? var-car? v-archer? var-charr? varc-har

"varker" maybe?

If you pronounce it "char" (as in the word for "to storch") instead of "care", you're as bad as the people who say "jif".

Do you mean as awesome as the people who say jif? ;-)

S-Q-L, except for products that are pronounced with Sequel (Microsoft SQL server, MySQL, SQlAlchemy, etc.)

I pronounce it Squid Lord

That train kind of left the station. With "SQL", you can either try to be correct (and use both in different cases), or to be consistent (and accept you will pronounce some actual product names incorrectly), or — I suppose — to choose chaos (give up, don't care and just choose one at random at any new opportunity).

I think the only possible misstep here is to decide to chide someone else for choosing any of the three paths.

I use it daily and say each letter - everyone else I work with says Sequel.

This all stems from when I originally learnt it 20 odd years ago and read something on the web that proclaimed S-Q-L was correct, and "Sequel" referred specifically to the Microsoft implementation.

(The irony is not lost on me that having started working with MySQL, then Oracle, I've now ended up working daily with SQL Server and so I'm wrong by my own definition, which I probably took as gospel erroneously in the first place!)

Microsoft SEQUEL server and My ESS-QUEUE-ELL. That's how I've always done it and same with all my coworkers even the OG data guys.

Also S.Q.L - but it’s an Initialism, not an Acronym (the latter being pronounceable as words eg NASA).

(Re Doom) To my shame “ID Software” was always I.D not Idd, though! - don’t know how common that was.

ID Software is "Idd" though, isn't it? That was recently confirmed by Tom Hall on Reddit. He came up with the name.

I believe it is. And it's lower case as well!

id Software

Squill. https://xkcd.com/1989/

Squirrel

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