PostgreSQL Discussion

Author

FAQ 1.1

Michael Talbot-Wilson

2006-03-27, 8:26 pm

How, really, do people pronounce PostgreSQL?

I've read the politically correct answer, "Post-Gres-Q-L" but it's
such a mouthful, such a day's work to pronounce, that there must be a
real street pronunciation, or a number of them, that are not being
confessed to.

They say that SQL should be pronounced "Sequel" and I've even met
people who do that. The need for a simple pronunciation with many
fewer than 4 syllables seems more urgent for PostgreSQL.

"Pig Swill" is an easy guess. It is quite catchy and simple. But I
wonder if there are other, perhaps more flattering pronunciations.

Do you have a snappy pronunciation and what is it? I'd be interested
in what the babble is at your PostgreSQL site.

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Marc G. Fournier

2006-03-27, 8:26 pm

On Tue, 28 Mar 2006, Michael Talbot-Wilson wrote:

> How, really, do people pronounce PostgreSQL?
>
> I've read the politically correct answer, "Post-Gres-Q-L" but it's
> such a mouthful, such a day's work to pronounce, that there must be a
> real street pronunciation, or a number of them, that are not being
> confessed to.
>
> They say that SQL should be pronounced "Sequel" and I've even met
> people who do that. The need for a simple pronunciation with many
> fewer than 4 syllables seems more urgent for PostgreSQL.
>
> "Pig Swill" is an easy guess. It is quite catchy and simple. But I
> wonder if there are other, perhaps more flattering pronunciations.
>
> Do you have a snappy pronunciation and what is it? I'd be interested
> in what the babble is at your PostgreSQL site.

I pronounce it as above, or just refer to it as 'p-g-s-q-l' ... others
just refer to it as postgres ... and I've heard of 'pig squeal', but had
heard 'pig swill' ...

----
Marc G. Fournier Hub.Org Networking Services (http://www.hub.org)
Email: scrappy@hub.org Yahoo!: yscrappy ICQ: 7615664

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Tom Lane

2006-03-27, 8:26 pm

Michael Talbot-Wilson <mtw@view.net.au> writes:
> How, really, do people pronounce PostgreSQL?

> I've read the politically correct answer, "Post-Gres-Q-L" but it's
> such a mouthful, such a day's work to pronounce, that there must be a
> real street pronunciation, or a number of them, that are not being
> confessed to.

I think most of us just say "Postgres" ;-)

> "Pig Swill" is an easy guess. It is quite catchy and simple. But I
> wonder if there are other, perhaps more flattering pronunciations.

I've always read the names of these mailing lists as "pig-squeal" ...
seems very appropriate for discussion forums, if not for the product ...

regards, tom lane

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Douglas McNaught

2006-03-27, 8:26 pm

Michael Talbot-Wilson <mtw@view.net.au> writes:

> How, really, do people pronounce PostgreSQL?

"Postgres"

-Doug

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Klint Gore

2006-03-27, 8:26 pm

On Tue, 28 Mar 2006 10:10:15 +0930 (CST), Michael Talbot-Wilson <mtw@view.net.au> wrote:
> How, really, do people pronounce PostgreSQL?

we just use postgres.

> They say that SQL should be pronounced "Sequel" and I've even met
> people who do that.

I hate that. It's an acronym not a word - you say the letters.

Who's "they"? The only datbase vendor I've heard call their own product
"sequel" is MS.

klint.

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: Snail : A.B.R.I. : possibilities :
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Steve Atkins

2006-03-27, 8:26 pm

On Mar 27, 2006, at 4:40 PM, Michael Talbot-Wilson wrote:

>
> Do you have a snappy pronunciation and what is it? I'd be interested
> in what the babble is at your PostgreSQL site.

Externally, to customers, "post-gres-kwul".

Internally, "the database".

Cheers,
Steve

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Michael Talbot-Wilson

2006-03-27, 8:26 pm

On Tue, 28 Mar 2006, Klint Gore wrote:

> ...
> Who's "they"? The only datbase vendor I've heard call their own product
> "sequel" is MS.

E.g. Sybex "SQL Instant Reference" (1993), page 2.

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Geoffrey

2006-03-28, 9:28 am

Michael Talbot-Wilson wrote:
> How, really, do people pronounce PostgreSQL?

http://www.serioustechnology.com/postgres.ogg

Or for those of you who have an inferior operating system:

http://www.serioustechnology.com/postgres.wav

--
Until later, Geoffrey

Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little
security will deserve neither and lose both. - Benjamin Franklin

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karly@kipshouse.org

2006-03-28, 11:29 am

On Tue, 28 Mar 2006 12:14:28 +1000 Klint Gore <kg@kgb.une.edu.au> wrote:
>
> On Tue, 28 Mar 2006 10:10:15 +0930 (CST), Michael Talbot-Wilson <mtw@view.net.au> wrote:
>
> we just use postgres.

Post Gress is what I've heard also.

>
>
> I hate that. It's an acronym not a word - you say the letters.

Uh, an acronym _is_ a word. That's the definition. (NASA, WAC,
RADAR, etc.) If it's pronounced as a list of letters, then it's not really
an acronym, even though it is in common usage (cf. TLA, ETLA, etc.)

Though after reading the Wiki on TLA, I see that we languaage
purists have tried to reclaim acronym by retrofitting the
definition of TLA to be three letter _abbreviation_.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tla

Sorry for the digression. {-;

-karl

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Ron Mayer

2006-03-28, 8:26 pm

ANSI has declared that the official pronunciation for SQL is /ɛs kjuː ɛl/

Klint Gore wrote:
>
> Who's "they"? The only datbase vendor I've heard call their own product
> "sequel" is MS.

SEQUEL (pronounced sequel) was a predecessor to SQL in IBM's 1970's
System R database; but isn't really the same thing as SQL.

[both statements from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sql ]

Bruce Momjian

2006-03-31, 3:30 am

Douglas McNaught wrote:
> Michael Talbot-Wilson <mtw@view.net.au> writes:
>
>
> "Postgres"

The first sentence of the FAQ is:

PostgreSQL is pronounced Post-Gres-Q-L, and is also sometimes
referred to as just Postgres.

Is that unclear?

--
Bruce Momjian http://candle.pha.pa.us
SRA OSS, Inc. http://www.sraoss.com

+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +

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Tino Wildenhain

2006-03-31, 3:30 am

Bruce Momjian schrieb:
> Douglas McNaught wrote:
>
>
>
> The first sentence of the FAQ is:
>
> PostgreSQL is pronounced Post-Gres-Q-L, and is also sometimes
> referred to as just Postgres.
>
> Is that unclear?
>
Maybe it would be better to write it like that in logos and stuff:
PostGresQL or something like that ;)

++Tino

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Dave Page

2006-03-31, 3:30 am

> -----Original Message-----
> From: pgsql-general-owner@postgresql.org
> [mailto:pgsql-general-owner@postgresql.org] On Behalf Of Tino
> Wildenhain
> Sent: 31 March 2006 09:51
> To: Bruce Momjian
> Cc: Douglas McNaught; Michael Talbot-Wilson;
> pgsql-general@postgresql.org
> Subject: Re: [GENERAL] FAQ 1.1
>
> Bruce Momjian schrieb:
> is also sometimes
> Maybe it would be better to write it like that in logos and stuff:
> PostGresQL or something like that ;)

Given the tendency people have to remove the capitalised bits to get
'postgre', we'd probably end up with 'ostres'

:-)

/D

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Jim Nasby

2006-04-03, 8:26 pm

On Mar 31, 2006, at 4:17 AM, Dave Page wrote:
> Given the tendency people have to remove the capitalised bits to get
> 'postgre', we'd probably end up with 'ostres'

Man I hate when people do that.

I think we should just rename the database to 'Fred'. :)
--
Jim C. Nasby, Sr. Engineering Consultant jnasby@pervasive.com
Pervasive Software http://pervasive.com work: 512-231-6117
vcard: http://jim.nasby.net/pervasive.vcf cell: 512-569-9461

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Chris Browne

2006-04-04, 3:27 am

jnasby@pervasive.com (Jim Nasby) writes:
> On Mar 31, 2006, at 4:17 AM, Dave Page wrote:
>
> Man I hate when people do that.
>
> I think we should just rename the database to 'Fred'. :)

Yeah, someone at the office was asking me on the elevator about
whether some Post-something was somehow up and coming.

In retrospect, I think he was trying to pronounce Postgre, and arrived
at something I had never heard before...
--
(format nil "~S@~S" "cbbrowne" "acm.org")
http://www3.sympatico.ca/cbbrowne/lisp.html
"When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could
hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be
twenty-one, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in
seven years." -- Mark Twain

Jim Nasby

2006-04-06, 11:29 am

On Apr 3, 2006, at 11:23 PM, Chris Browne wrote:

> jnasby@pervasive.com (Jim Nasby) writes:
>
> Yeah, someone at the office was asking me on the elevator about
> whether some Post-something was somehow up and coming.
>
> In retrospect, I think he was trying to pronounce Postgre, and arrived
> at something I had never heard before...

And it doesn't help when "post-something" could also mean a very
popular MTA...
--
Jim C. Nasby, Sr. Engineering Consultant jnasby@pervasive.com
Pervasive Software http://pervasive.com work: 512-231-6117
vcard: http://jim.nasby.net/pervasive.vcf cell: 512-569-9461

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User Roman

2006-04-07, 7:34 am

# jnasby@pervasive.com / 2006-04-06 12:03:18 - 0400:

> On Apr 3, 2006, at 11:23 PM, Chris Browne wrote:
>
> And it doesn't help when "post-something" could also mean a very
> popular MTA...

Looks like a missed opportunity for a April 1st announcement
of disambiguating the two by renaming "postgres" to "pregross". :)

--
How many Vietnam vets does it take to screw in a light bulb?
You don't know, man. You don't KNOW.
Cause you weren't THERE. http://bash.org/?255991

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Michael Fuhr

2006-04-07, 7:34 am

On Fri, Apr 07, 2006 at 10:26:32AM +0000, User Roman wrote:
> Looks like a missed opportunity for a April 1st announcement
> of disambiguating the two by renaming "postgres" to "pregross". :)

Not exactly that change, but....

http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsq...04/msg00023.php

--
Michael Fuhr

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