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Post by David on Oct 2, 2020 21:38:35 GMT
A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
A strong nation, like a strong person, can afford to be gentle, firm, thoughtful, and restrained.
It can afford to extend a helping hand to others. It is a weak nation, like a weak person,
that must behave with bluster and boasting and rashness and other signs of insecurity.
-Jimmy Carter, 39th US President, Nobel laureate (b. 1 Oct 1924)
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Post by David on Oct 2, 2020 21:39:33 GMT
scamander
PRONUNCIATION:
(skuh-MAN-duhr)
MEANING:
verb intr.: To take a winding course.
ETYMOLOGY:
After Scamander (modern name: Karamenderes), a river in Turkey.
The river was named after a river god in Greek mythology.
Earliest documented use: 1864. Also see meander.
USAGE:
“She was scamandering about, touching articles with her fingers.”
Jamie O’Neill; At Swim, Two Boys; Scribner; 2002.
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Post by David on Oct 2, 2020 21:40:10 GMT
A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
When I despair, I remember that all through history, the way of truth and love has always won.
There have been murderers and tyrants, and for a time they can seem invincible.
But in the end they always fall. Think of it, always.
-Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (2 Oct 1869-1948)
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Post by David on Oct 3, 2020 23:06:26 GMT
Did you know that parliament is an anagram of partial men? Or, Clint Eastwood an anagram of Old West Action? Someone once said, "All the life's wisdom can be found in anagrams. Anagrams never lie." Here is your chance to discover the wisdom of anagrams. wordsmith.org/anagram/index.html |
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Post by David on Oct 4, 2020 21:59:27 GMT
LISTAT = LIST + STAT
by Anu Garg
A free package to generate interesting statistics on mailing list demographics.
New: Use it online.
WHAT IS LISTAT?
Listat is an Internet mailing list statistics package. It can be used by list owners to generate stats about their lists in text as well as in HTML format, suitable for posting on the web. Listat is written in Perl.
SAMPLE REPORTS
Here are sample reports that illustrate Listat features.
In HTML format
In text format
Also see a report of AWAD demographics
DOWNLOAD
Get the whole package: gzipped tar or zipped (2 MB). Or use it online.
FEATURES
A brief list of features:
Stats in text form and HTML form
Flags for the countries are included in the HTML stats
The report can be sorted by the domain name or by the number of subscribers from a domain name
Reports on unrecognized domains
User configurable domain file: can be extended if more domain names are introduced
Additional miscellaneous statistical information reported: mean, median, mode, standard deviation, longest length, longest email addresses shortest length, shortest email addresses
HISTORY
Listat grew out of a sed, awk and shell hack I put together to generate the stats on A.Word.A.Day, a mailing list I run. It's one of the largest mailing list on the Internet and thus its stats are closely followed by many. A number of other list owners showed interest in generating similar stats for their lists so I converted the scripts to Perl, added more features, and created a self contained package, now known as Listat.
UPDATES
If you'd like to be on the mailing list to receive notification when Listat is updated, drop me a message at (garg AT wordsmith.org). Replace AT with @.
FEEDBACK
Please send your suggestions, comments, and bug reports to (garg AT wordsmith.org). |
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Post by David on Oct 4, 2020 22:02:43 GMT
Wordserver The wordserver is a public access reference server. It offers a set of reference services using email. Electronic mail is the most widely used application on the Internet. Email is the lowest common denominator of net-access. Although many dictionaries and thesauri are available on the Web, etc, for many people, email is the only means of access to the Internet.
Services from the Wordserver Following reference services are available from the wordserver: Dictionary/by/Mail Thesaurus/by/Mail Acronym/by/Mail Besides, following miscellaneous services are also run by the wordserver: Anagram/by/Mail An anagram generator. A.Word.A.Day A vocabulary mailing list. How to use these services To use these services you can send following commands to the wordserver at wsmith@wordsmith.org. A table showing all the commands accepted by the wordserver is also available. Please note that the command should be in the SUBJECT line of the message.
A.Word.A.Day Please visit this web page to subscribe.
Dictionary/by/Mail To find the definition of a word, send a blank email to wsmith@wordsmith.org, and make the subject line as: define myword where myword is the word whose definition you want to find out. To know more about Dictionary/by/Mail, make the subject line as: info Dictionary/by/Mail
Thesaurus/by/Mail To find the synonyms of a word, send a blank email to wsmith@wordsmith.org, and make the subject line as: synonym myword where myword is the word whose synonyms you want to find out. To know more about Thesaurus/by/Mail, make the subject as: info Thesaurus/by/Mail
Acronym/by/Mail To decipher an acronym, send a blank email to wsmith@wordsmith.org, and make the subject line as: acronym myword where myword is the acronym whose expansion you want to find out. To add a new acronym to the database, make the subject line as: addacronym ACRONYM expansion Do not put period between the letters.
For example to add the acronym IBM, the command would be: addacronym IBM International Business Machines To know more about Acronym/by/Mail, make the subject line as: info Acronym/by/Mail
Anagram/by/Mail To find the anagrams, send a blank email to wsmith@wordsmith.org, and make the subject line as: anagram myword where myword is the word(s) whose anagrams you want to find out. To know more about Anagram/by/Mail, make the subject line as: info Anagram/by/Mail A listing of all the above commands is also available in table format.
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Post by David on Oct 6, 2020 2:25:21 GMT
A.Word.A.Day
with Anu Garg
Our planet, this blue planet, is filled with the wonders of nature.
If you haven’t realized it already, you’re supposed to read this in the voice of David Attenborough.
From jellyfish to giraffe to platypus, diversity of animal life on Earth is extraordinary. But sometimes real life is not amazing enough and we have to use our imagination. That’s where legendary creatures come in.
Once you’re creating fiction, you don’t have to be constrained by the laws of nature. That’s how we get mythological creatures like phoenix, the born-again (and again) bird, and Cerberus, the three-headed dog.
Like Phoenix and Cerberus, there are numerous mythical creatures that are now invoked metaphorically in the English language.
Join me as I take you on an extraordinary journey through language. In this intrepid quest, this week we’ll meet five spectacular creatures that have found a place in the dictionary. Creatures as distinctive and unique as, well, languages and words.
unicorn
PRONUNCIATION:
(YOO-nih-korn)
MEANING:
noun:
1. A mythical horse-like creature with a horn on the forehead.
2. Something or someone rare or unusual: highly desirable but hard or impossible to find.
3. A startup valued at one billion dollars or more.
ETYMOLOGY:
From Latin unicornis, from uni- (single) + cornu (horn), ultimately from the Indo-European root ker- (horn, head), which also gave us cornucopia, carrot, cranium, cornea, cervix, and cancer. Earliest documented use: 1225.
USAGE:
“The network president, Tina Perry, called the show ‘a unicorn in the TV universe’.”
Leigh-Ann Jackson; ‘Black Love’ Keeps It Simple: Honesty, not Antics; The New York Times; Sep 3, 2020.
“‘Yes, we are looking for companies that could be unicorns but we’re not focused on that as the sole outcome,’ says Casey.”
Marie Boran; Is Ireland too Risk Averse to Produce Its Own Unicorns?; Irish Times (Dublin); Aug 30, 2018.
See more usage examples of unicorn in Vocabulary.com’s dictionary.
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Post by David on Oct 6, 2020 2:26:38 GMT
A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
Even a purely moral act that has no hope of any immediate
and visible political effect can gradually and indirectly,
over time, gain in political significance.
-Vaclav Havel, writer, Czech Republic president (5 Oct 1936-2011)
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Post by David on Oct 6, 2020 2:28:01 GMT
Anu Garg on words
“Each word comes with a biography.
These words have fascinating stories to tell,
if only we take the time to listen.”
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Post by David on Oct 7, 2020 0:14:15 GMT
bunyip
PRONUNCIATION:
(BUHN-yip)
MEANING:
noun: An impostor.
adjective: Counterfeit; phony.
ETYMOLOGY:
After bunyip, a large mythical creature of Australian Aboriginal legend, who lives in swamps, riverbeds, etc.
The word is from Wemba-Wemba or Wergaia language of the Aboriginal people in Victoria. Earliest documented use: 1848.
NOTES:
The most popular usage of the word is in the term “bunyip aristocracy” to refer to people pretending to be socially superior.
It was first used by the journalist and politician Daniel Deniehy satirizing an attempt to establish a hereditary peerage in Australia.
The label “bunyip aristocracy” stuck and the proposal was dropped.
USAGE:
“Greens leader Christine Milne said Mr Abbott was trying to create a fake class system in Australia, a ‘bunyip aristocracy’.”
Labor Likens Tony Abbott to Marty McFly; AAP General News Wire (Sydney, Australia); Mar 26, 2014.
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Post by David on Oct 7, 2020 0:15:00 GMT
A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
It's said that "power corrupts", but actually it's more true that power attracts the corruptible.
The sane are usually attracted by other things than power. When they do act, they think of it as service, which has limits.
The tyrant, though, seeks mastery, for which he is insatiable, implacable.
-David Brin, scientist and science fiction author (b. 6 Oct 1950)
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Post by David on Oct 8, 2020 2:45:12 GMT
gremlin
PRONUNCIATION:
(GREM-lin)
MEANING:
noun: A source of trouble, especially problems of technical nature.
ETYMOLOGY:
Of uncertain origin. Perhaps from an alteration of the word goblin or from Irish gruaimin (a gloomy person). Earliest documented use: 1929.
NOTES:
Originally, the word gremlin was Royal Air Force slang for a low-level employee. From there it evolved to refer to a mythical creature responsible
for problems in aircraft. The word was popularized by the novelist Roald Dahl, a former fighter pilot with the RAF, when he published his children’s book
The Gremlins in 1943. It’s not certain how the term was coined.
USAGE:
“Nobody who has watched the virtual assemblies could hail them as a success, troubled as they have been with technological gremlins.”
John Ivison; Time to Cancel the “Morning Show”; The Vancouver Sun (Canada); May 22, 2020.
See more usage examples of gremlin in Vocabulary.com’s dictionary.
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Post by David on Oct 8, 2020 2:45:57 GMT
A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
An expert is a man who has made all the mistakes
which can be made in a very narrow field.
-Niels Bohr, physicist, Nobel laureate (7 Oct 1885-1962)
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Post by David on Oct 8, 2020 2:47:20 GMT
Anu Garg on words
“There are exotic species of words jumping out inviting me to play.
I weave them into a theme, a garland of words.”
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Post by David on Oct 8, 2020 21:10:31 GMT
snark
PRONUNCIATION:
(snahrk)
MEANING:
noun: 1. A mysterious, imaginary animal.
2. Something or someone hard to track down.
3. A snide remark.
verb intr.: To make a snide remark.
ETYMOLOGY:
For noun 1, 2: Coined by Lewis Carroll in the poem The Hunting of the Snark in 1876. Earliest documented use (outside the poem): 1879.
For noun 3, verb: Of imitative origin, formerly used in the sense to snore or snort. Earliest documented use: 1866.
USAGE:
“But [John Cage’s] snark hunt proved rather dull. Takis’s own search ends more happily.”
Simon Ings; Exhibitions: Takis; The Spectator (London, UK); Jul 13, 2019.
“That is why the quest for evidence that infallibly indicates guilt (or innocence) is a snark hunt.”
Larry Laudan; Eyewitness Identifications: One More Lesson on the Costs of Excluding Relevant Evidence; Perspectives on Psychological Science; May 16, 2012.
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