Date: Fri, 16 Dec 2005 13:17:54 +0100
From: Erik Mouw <erik@harddisk-recovery.com>
To: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>
Cc: linux@horizon.com, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [PATCH 1/19] MUTEX: Introduce simple mutex implementation
Message-ID: <20051216121754.GC18210@harddisk-recovery.com>
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On Thu, Dec 15, 2005 at 05:52:55PM +0100, Erik Mouw wrote:
> Just FYI, according to Dijkstra[1] V means "verhoog" which is dutch for
> "increase". P means "prolaag" which isn't a dutch word, just something
> Dijkstra invented. I guess he did that because "decrease" is "verlaag"
> in dutch and that would give you the confusing V() and V()
> operations...

Last night I've been browsing a little more through Dijkstra's papers,
and in a completely unrelated paper[1] about a now obsolete computer I
found that "prolaag" is a neologism coming from "probeer te verlagen",
which means "try and decrease".


Erik

[1] http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD00xx/EWD51.html

-- 
+-- Erik Mouw -- www.harddisk-recovery.com -- +31 70 370 12 90 --
| Lab address: Delftechpark 26, 2628 XH, Delft, The Netherlands
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