Re: pronunciation of daemon
On Thu, Feb 10, 2000 at 09:09:07AM -0000, Patrick Kirk wrote:
> accent. Finns say it one way; English speakers another; both are equally
> valid as would any other accent.
An old anecdote deserves to be retold in this context.
Niklaus Wirth, swiss and inventor of Pascal, on being asked
how to pronounce his name, said something like this:
pronounced by name is like english 'weird', but
pronounced by value it is english 'worth'.
Afterthought: only programmers understand this.
However there is more.
I don't mind my heavy dutch accent. But all the same
I try to pronounce my english in a way that the natives
(1) understand me
(2) don't laugh at me
(3) are not distracted from what i say by my pronunciation.
It is not always easy, because there are large discrepancies
between the spelling and pronunciation of english,
as yoy may have discovered yourself.
When speaking english I try to find the greatest common divisor.
The opinion 'everybody has his accent, so do what you like'
is not very helpful in this respect.
I think (but who am I) that the following pronunciations have
the oldest rights and the largest number of followers:
the i in linux not as in 'mind' but as in 'bitter'
the ae in daemon not as ea in 'easy' but as the a in 'hate'.
egbert
--
Egbert Bouwman - Keizersgracht 197 II - 1016 DS Amsterdam - 020 6257991
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