23 Dec
2015
23 Dec
'15
10:05 a.m.
On Tue, Dec 22, 2015, at 21:59, John Cowan wrote:
Wikipedia is by nature a *summary of the published
literature*. If you
want to get some folklore, like what "cron" stands for, into Wikipedia,
then publish a folklore article in a journal, book, or similar reputable
publication. Random uncontrolled mailing lists simply do not count.
The problem is this backronym is the sort of nonsense that attaches to
_all_ computer commands that are not an English word (and a fair few
that are), and that should heavily weigh against the use of people's
willingness to uncritically repeat them in print as a "reliable source".
It may be reasonable, in Wikipedia's role as a "summary of the published
literature", to say something like "some people have suggested" that it
may be an acronym, and to list the sources there, but certainly _not_ to
assert that it was actually intended as one without a source actually
traceable to someone in a position to know.