Re: Pseudoterminal terminology in POSIX

["Michael Kerrisk (man-pages)" <mtk.lists@gmail.com>]

[repairing CC]


On 8/6/20 6:53 AM, Oğuz via austin-group-l at The Open Group wrote:
> 5 Ağustos 2020 Çarşamba tarihinde Michael Kerrisk (man-pages) <
> mtk.lists@gmail.com> yazdı:
> 
>> On 8/5/20 7:12 PM, Oğuz via austin-group-l at The Open Group wrote:
>>> 5 Ağustos 2020 Çarşamba tarihinde Robert Elz via austin-group-l at The
>> Open
>>> Group <austin-group-l@opengroup.org> yazdı:
>>>
>>>>     Date:        Wed, 05 Aug 2020 11:28:45 -0400
>>>>     From:        "Paul Smith via austin-group-l at The Open Group" <
>>>> austin-group-l@opengroup.org>
>>>>     Message-ID:  <1d8c5e6e96fbdd47ce143a566b57d
>> b2c803d4898.camel@gnu.org>
>>>>
>>>>   | do you consider the pseudoterminal as providing to the terminal, or
>> the
>>>>   | terminal as providing to the pseudoterminal.
>>>>
>>>> How did anyone ever get to a question like that?  - there are a pair of
>>>> devices which between them implement a pseudo-terminal (which is just
>>>> like a terminal, to the application, but isn't one ... hence
>>>> pseudo-terminal).
>>>>
>>>> Personally I'm quite happy with the existing terminology, and see no
>>>> particular need for change (as close to meaningless as the terms are
>>>> in this context - they are well established, anything different will
>>>> just create confusion).
>>>>
>>>>
>>> Couldn't agree more. I don't understand what problem such a change in the
>>> terminology is supposed to solve.
>>
>> The problems have already been widely discussed elsewhere. For a
>> summary, see, for example, https://lwn.net/Articles/823224/
>>
>>
> I see, but changing well established, concrete terms with barely related,
> abstract, far-fetched alternatives just to make a bunch of oversensitive
> snowflakes doesn't make any sense (to me, at least).

Thanks for clarifying your perspective.

> If this change is going to happen no matter what we say, at least add a
> glossary somewhere for us non-native speakers where we can look up what
> each nonsensical alternative term actually means, unless you want to
> exclude us too, of course.

Some kind of change is pretty much inevitable. There are of course
already glossaries, in the form of documentation, and the standard.
The question is simply how to update these.

Thanks,

Michael