*BSD News Article 96294


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From: Allen Kirby <akirby@att.com>
Newsgroups: comp.unix.shell,comp.os.linux.misc,comp.os.linux.x,alt.os.linux,comp.unix.bsd.misc,comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc,gnu.misc.discuss,comp.unix.solaris
Subject: Re: unix acronyms -collecting a list?
Date: Tue, 27 May 1997 11:43:40 -0400
Organization: AT&T - ITS Production Services
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References: <5kd2ng$c8b$1@rzsun02.rrz.uni-hamburg.de>
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		<Pine.SUN.3.95.970513170134.19438A-100000@omni2>
		<Pine.GSO.3.96.970513200952.7143D-100000@tree.Stanford.EDU> <sejaflix4fw.fsf@ethanol.gnu.ai.mit.edu>
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To: Joel Ray Holveck <joelh@gnu.ai.mit.edu>
Xref: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au comp.unix.shell:45459 comp.os.linux.misc:177216 comp.os.linux.x:62642 alt.os.linux:21619 comp.unix.bsd.misc:3423 comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc:41701 gnu.misc.discuss:31498 comp.unix.solaris:107704

Joel Ray Holveck wrote:
> 
> > > > dd = Data Dump (At least I always thought so)
> > > Device Dump
> > Sure about that one? The functionality of
> > dd if=/tmp/myfile conv=ascii of=/tmp/newfile
> > wouldn't make sense if the command were truly a device
> > level operator.
> 
> The functionality of 'cat .profile' makes little sense for a file
> concatenator, but cat found uses other than concatenation.
> 
> --
> http://www.wp.com/piquan --- Joel Ray Holveck --- joelh@gnu.ai.mit.edu
> All my opinions are my own, not the Free Software Foundation's.
> 
> Second law of programming:
> Anything that can go wrong wi
> sendmail: segmentation violation -- core dumped

Ken Thompson confirmed that the origin of 'dd' was a joke on the IBM
'dd' mainframe command, which I believe stood for 'define data'.
-- 
---
Allen Kirby			AT&T ITS Production Services
akirby@att.com			Alpharetta, GA.