Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!helios.ee.lbl.gov!pasteur!ucbvax!GALLUA.BITNET!CADS_COLE From: CADS_COLE@GALLUA.BITNET ("Kevin Cole at Gallaudet U. Washington DC") Newsgroups: comp.os.vms Subject: RE: Explanation Point! Message-ID: <8808030325.AA18452@ucbvax.berkeley.edu> Date: 19 Jul 88 22:14:00 GMT Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Organization: The Internet Lines: 25 Date sent: 19-JUL-1988 17:07:40 Rouben Rostamian writes: >"Explanation point!" I exclamimed. "This should be a newly invented >punctuation mark at DEC world, or a special character created by the >mysterious Compose key." Alas, upon further investigation I discovered >that an ``Explanation Point'' is somebody's idea at DEC of what his or her >grammar teacher used to refer to as an ``exclamation point'' and >write thusly "!". I dunno... I kinda like it better as "Explanation point"... Or just call it BANG! and be done with it. Personally, I never know whether things like that are intentional (i.e. a joke) or not (i.e. a mistake). I cite TECO's "MAKE LOVE" and a debugger named DDT as two examples of the fun and frivolity that makes DEC what they are today. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Kevin Cole | Bitnet: CADS_COLE@GALLUA.BITNET Center for Assessment and | or Demographic Studies (CADS) | KJCOLE@GALLUA.BITNET Gallaudet Research Institute (GRI) | UUCP: ...!psuvax!gallua.bitnet!kjcole Washington, D.C. 20002 | CompuServe: 76167,1406 (202) 651-5575 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Hey Rocky! Watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat!"