• d3Xt3r@lemmy.nzM
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 year ago

    I always thought those whoe said susa instead of soos are wrong.

    So, how do you pronounce Porsche?

  • thehatfox@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 year ago

    What is with Linux projects and confusingly pronounceable names? Even the name “Linux” itself has a fair bit of spoken variation.

    Then there’s Ubuntu, and GNOME with the hard G to name a few.

    • maynarkh@feddit.nl
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      I guess Linux projects tend to come from around the world, instead of US boardrooms and marketing desks.

      Linux is Finnish, SUSE is German, so is KDE, Ubuntu is South African, GNOME is Mexican (?).

    • flashgnash@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 year ago

      If I hear a YouTuber pronounce it Lynux it immediately makes me skeptical of whatever they have to say

      Unless it’s satire of course

      • LeFantome@programming.dev
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        It depends on your view of history.

        The G comes from the GNU Project. While GNU is an acronym ( GNU is Not UNIX ), the accepted pronunciation is a hard G ( GUH-noo ).

        When the GNOME project was started ( and named ), it too was an acronym where the G was GNU. So, it seems very reasonable to use a hard G.

        GNOME is no longer affiliated with GNU and the project has stated that it is no longer an acronym although it is still capitalized. If the G is not GNU, it makes total sense to pronounce it as the mythical creature of the same name which is pronounced as a soft G.

        I have not seen anything official on how to say it from the project itself. So, it may be a matter of personal preference at this point.

        I use a hard G because that certainly WAS the proper name and I have not seen anything official saying they wanted to change it. They have kept the capitalization.

    • federalreverse-old@feddit.de
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      SUSE originated in Germany, where it’s just the normal pronunciation. “Suse” also pre-existed as a nickname for “Susanne” (of course, the company name was derived from an acronym which isn’t used anymore).

      The issue comes in when non-Germans, especially English-language natives try to pronounce the word. English pronunciation is incredibly inconsistent. Hence English speakers tend to fail (very confidently) when pronouncing foreign-language words.

      (Fwiw, Germans and many others don’t know anything about the silent G in “gnome” and will happily pronounce GNOME the way the project intends without being told. Similar things are true for the I in Linux.)

    • LeFantome@programming.dev
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      Linux variation is simply because it was named after a Finnish person but became mainstream in parts of the world that pronounce those letters differently.

      There are recordings from the early days where Linus clearly says “I say Linux as LEE-nuhks”. That is consistent with how you say his name in Finland. So, some people seize on that.

      More recently, Linus has said that his name is pronounced differently in different languages but that “Linux is always lin-nuhks”.

      Based on that, I thinks his latter guidance is correct. It is also basically the way most people in North America say it by default in my experience. This makes sense as Linus now lives in the US.

      Ubuntu is an actual African ( Zulu ) word. It has a proper pronunciation.

  • bigmclargehuge@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 year ago

    I have a rule about acronyms: if the spelling makes sense to be said as a word, I follow the English grammatical rules. A word that’s spelled s-u-s-e would be pronounced “soos”, so that’s what I say.

    This is why I don’t pronounce GNU as “ga-noo”, it doesn’t make sense as a word. In those cases, I just spell them out.

    • atzanteol@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 year ago

      I add the hard ‘g’ to gnu because saying “new” often sounds confusing in an English context.

      e.g. “New Linux”

    • guy@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 year ago

      So what’s the deal with GNU? When I first saw it, I was sure the G was silent, or formed a dipthong, like gnat or gnocchi or gnaw or gnarly or gnome or just any word starting with gn in English. But IRL, I’ve only heard it pronounced with a hard G, same with Gnome.

      • bigmclargehuge@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        1 year ago

        Well thats the thing, generally if I see an acronym and have to ask myself how it would be pronounced as a word, by my rule I just spell it out.

        For a great example of this (unrelated to FOSS), look at LGBTQIA+. Even though it’s a mouthful to say each letter individually, no one wrestles it into “Leguhbuht’kwia plus”, it just doesn’t make sense and saying it that way would probably ellicit a dead stare from whoever heard it. Unless it’s painfully simple to morph into a word or single syllable, I don’t bother.

        I’m not trying to say this is the right way, mind you. It’s just the way that makes the most sense to me.

        • Melmi@lemmy.blahaj.zone
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          1 year ago

          Except GNU is a great example of an acronym that is pronounceable. It’s even in the dictionary. The GNU mascot is a gnu, in fact.

          LGBTQIA+ is essentially unpronounceable, thus we treat it as an initialism. Not that that’s a requirement, there are examples like VIP where even though we could pronounce it we pronounce each letter individually.

    • BCsven@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 year ago

      The vacation one is a bad example because some people say vuhkation and some say vaykaytion. From the germans I know the E on the end is like uh, like how they say bitte, danke, etc

          • federalreverse-old@feddit.de
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            0
            ·
            edit-2
            1 year ago

            Is not up to SUSE’s marketing department, most of which is from the US, either. The company has a German origin, had German founders (they’re all out of the company at this point though), and the company name used to be a German acronym. The correct pronunciation is the German one.

            (See the update @barbara added. Lisa Sherwell actually took the effort to learn the correct pronunciation. Part of the reason why is that she was actually involved in planning the new German office of SUSE.)

            • Possibly linux@lemmy.zip
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              0
              ·
              1 year ago

              Still doesn’t matter. If the company thinks it should be pronounced “Bob” then it is pronounced Bob.

              At the end of the day the company decides these things, not Germans.

  • southsamurai@sh.itjust.works
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 year ago

    You pronounce it any way other than the way the person saying it does.

    This results in a few possible outcomes.

    The person may get an opportunity to go on at length about why their pronunciation is used, and be entertaining.

    The person may get all het up about it, insisting that you’re wrong, and you can further mess with them by shrugging and continuing to use whatever you were using.

    The person doesn’t care, and y’all have a nice conversation about distros and Linux in general.

    The person switches to your pronunciation, and you now have a stalker.

  • cerement@slrpnk.net
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 year ago

    so, to summarize:

    • German: /suse/ or /zuze/
    • English: should be /suse/ but more often /susa/ but definitely not /sus/