December 2010 Archives

File under “Native Americans named like an evil corporation from a movie:” Metacom

My friend Ben tweeted the following:

{squal,stup,ranc,tep,rig,cal,sap,vap,torp,fulg,fet,splend,turg,alg,liv,sord,val,horr,langu,pall,cand,ferv,perferv,hum}{or,id}

These are sets of prefixes and suffixes that expand to English words (squalor, squalid, stupor, stupid…). Inspired and curious, I wrote a short script to generate more of these:

[adam@Adam-Hahns-MacBook:~]$ ./suffix.py or id /usr/share/dict/words 
{cand,ranc,splend,flu,am,ac,perferv,horr,uncand,tab,ferv,tep,rig,sap,stup,val,marc,fet,tim,liv,torp,muc,alg,vap,squal,product,flav,fulg,hum,bo,sord,liqu,tum,langu,man,b,d,g,f,m,n,t,cal,turg,pall}{or,id}
[adam@Adam-Hahns-MacBook:~]$ !!|wc -c
./suffix.py or id /usr/share/dict/words|wc -c
     203

Uh-oh, my script generated more than Ben’s grepping! Granted, not all of them would fit in a tweet, so I’ll have to forgive him. What other fun can we have?

[adam@Adam-Hahns-MacBook:~]$ ./suffix.py a e i o u /usr/share/dict/words 
{to,ta,m,t,n}{a,i,e,u,o}
[adam@Adam-Hahns-MacBook:~]$ ./suffix.py ly tty /usr/share/dict/words
{be,unwi,co,pu,sca,wi,pa,po}{tty,ly}

Ben also informed me of a neat shell trick!

[adam@Adam-Hahns-MacBook:~]$ echo {be,unwi,co,pu,sca,wi,pa,po}{tty,ly}
betty bely unwitty unwily cotty coly putty puly scatty scaly witty wily patty paly potty poly

If you’re interested, here’s the source of suffix.py:

I don’t know how I missed this when it happened last year, but now’s as good a time as any: RUN-DMC has a street named after them!

Yes, 205th St @ Hollis Ave is heretofore known as RUN-DMC JMJ Way. If you’re a keen listener, you might know this as their old stomping ground:

My Ahhh-didas, standin on two fifth street / Funky fresh and yes cold on my feet

Merry Christmas (In Hollis)!

Standards are important, but sometimes I read something and can only exclaim, “The rod up that [committee]’s butt must have a rod up its butt.”

I’m talking, of course, about the selection of the IDNA prefix: xn--

Read, and be amazed. Link to the IETF standard (natch) used to publicly generate random numbers.

[via Jeffrey]