On Mon, 2006-07-10 at 08:55 +0100, Joachim Noreiko wrote: > --- Shaun McCance <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Now here's everybody's first chance to get in on the > > fun: > > The code name for the project-as-a-whole is Project > > Mallard. > > This is sort of an inside poke at DocBook. > > Ohhhhhhhh. > NOW I get it. > I thought Mallard was just a reference to speed (the > steam engine). In a British accent, 'Doc' and 'Duck' > don't sound the same.
They don't sound exactly the same in American English either. The inside poke is actually much more esoteric than a play on words. As can be seen here: http://docbook.org/ The animal used on the front of the DocBook book is a wood duck, Aix sponsa[1]. While nobody quite knows what goes on in the minds of Edie Freedman and company when selecting an animal for a book[2], it seems likely that the choice was due to the near-homonym of duck/doc. I just picked another duck: the mallard, Anas platyrhynchos[3]. If I can apply retro-reasoning, the wood duck is fat and ugly, while the mallard is about as beautiful as a duck can get. But then, if I were really looking for a beautiful water bird, I'd have chosen a heron or some such. Mallard made for a good project name, better than any other duck I know of. Joachim, nobody knows about your Mallard steam engine over on this side of the ocean. After reading the Wikipedia entry, though, I think it makes a fine namesake. Can I rewrite the history of my naming decision? [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wood_duck [2] http://www.oreilly.com/news/ediemals_0400.html [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mallard -- Shaun _______________________________________________ gnome-doc-list mailing list [email protected] http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gnome-doc-list
