What timing! I was, quite literally, just preparing to build and upload debram 0.7.0 (probably soon to be debram 1.0.0) for etch, when I met your bug report.
> Package: debram
> Version: 0.6.5a
> Severity: wishlist
>
>
> A counted list of similar neologisms from 'man debram':
>
> 1 metaramification
> 1 misramifications
> 1 misramified
> 1 subramification
> 3 subramifications
>
> ...'ramus' is Latin for "branch". All those are just bigger words to
> signify variations of "tree" and "branch".
>
> "subramification" is needless -- presumably it means "sub-branch", but
> "ramification" itself has meant that since at least 1913:
>
> 2. A small branch or offshoot proceeding from a main stock or
> channel; as, the ramifications of an artery, vein, or
> nerve.
> [1913 Webster]
>
> There are several better words and word roots, ("better" meaning
> shorter and plainer), e.g.: branch, tree, root, index, category,
> class, set, group, family, genus, system, etc.
>
> Caveat: hope it doesn't seem as though I don't appreciate the 'debram'
> package, or its name. Many fine utils are named after less usual
> synonyms. I'd suppose the good intention of the author was to use a
> memorable English word, or portion of one, as the name of the util; yet
> "tree" and all the obvious ones were already used... and 'ramify'
> wasn't.
Precisely. Well, regrettably I have never learned classical Latin, nor
read Cicero, Vergil, etc., which is a real lack in my education; so I
appreciate the correction. For better or for worse, I think that we are
stuck with the honorable package name "debram" now. Can we work within
this constraint, in your view?
The word "neologism" came new to me in your e-mail, incidentally. I
have just looked it up. It is ironic that it is a Greek word, because I
had wanted Latin not Greek for Debram's purpose. Nonetheless, it was
never my intent to neologize needlessly. The very large number of
French-, Italian-, Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking Debian users
recommended a Latin root if practicable.
Is there not a Latin verb "ramere," meaning "to branch?" For some
reason I had thought that there were such a verb. I had admittedly not
even been aware of the noun "ramus;" I had been thinking "ramere," for
which, I had thought, "subramere" made sense.
Is the English verb "to ramify" only a back-formation from the English
noun "ramification?" Has the verb "to ramify" no direct link to the
Latin? If it has none, then clearly you are right; my language is
twisted.
I first got the word from Tolkien's Lord of the Rings,
incidentally---another irony, since Tolkien usually avoided Latin words
when he could. Tolkien describes the ancestral "smials" or burrows of
Brandy Hall as "large and ramifying," which seemed to describe the
Debram catalog about as well as it did Brandy Hall.
> The man page shows good intent by trying to consistently employ the
> utility's word root to memorably describe what the util does. With
> common words that works well:
>
> % whatis tree
> tree (1) - list contents of directories in a tree-like format.
>
> ...it should be avoided when the only way to emphasize the word root
> is to weld on novel prefixes -- unless the task of the util was so new
> and different that preexisting terms weren't adequate.
>
> If it would help, I'd be willing to make a man page patch file
> with some tentative rewordings.
Please begin, but then check back here. Like any other Debian
maintainer not yet acquainted with a new contributor, I would ask you to
begin in moderately small steps. I recommend that you put three hours
or less toward your proposal before posting back here for further
discussion. (One tries to avoid artist's pride, but to some degree it
is unavoidable. Only human, I may need some time to grow used to an
improved terminology.)
Look for debram 0.7.0 after the 21:00 GMT sid refresh Monday night, or
earlier in incoming.debian.com.
> PS: The 'debram' index itself is quite useful, I've found all sorts of
> good stuff with it. Thanks for putting it out there.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> -- System Information:
> Debian Release: testing/unstable
> APT prefers unstable
> APT policy: (500, 'unstable'), (1, 'experimental')
> Architecture: i386 (i686)
> Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash
> Kernel: Linux 2.6.16-2-686
> Locale: LANG=C, LC_CTYPE=C (charmap=ANSI_X3.4-1968) (ignored: LC_ALL set to C)
>
> Versions of packages debram depends on:
> ii debram-data 0.6.5a debram's
> architecture-independent
> ii libc6 2.3.6.ds1-4 GNU C Library: Shared libraries
> ii zlib1g 1:1.2.3-13 compression library - runtime
>
> debram recommends no packages.
>
> -- no debconf information
--
Thaddeus H. Black
508 Nellie's Cave Road
Blacksburg, Virginia 24060, USA
+1 540 961 0920, [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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