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Vile Lasagna

@aeva I grew up with a language that isn't afraid of words, tho, so I know * is an asterisk and the star doesn't make sense. So I always just read void* as "void pointer".

Gone is the romance, all we're left with it spaghetti code

8 comments
Vile Lasagna

@aeva I've always known the actual name of the * character so English native speakers saying "star" when they read it just always felt super bizarre to me. Still does

aeva

@VileLasagna what part of this is being afraid of words though? English loves words, we keep packing more of them into it.

Vile Lasagna

@aeva eeehhhh... not so sure, especially when it comes to the US. I still haven't recovered from, say, the word literally existing specifically to denote something is not a metaphor or hyperbole and then, y'know, people just more and more using it as such.

It pains my insufferable nerd brain

Aaron

@VileLasagna @aeva Native speaker here. I've always known the name of it too, but I will still say "star" for convenience, just like I say "oh" instead of zero in a phone number. Has nothing to do with not liking words; I'm quite verbose. Expediency of communication is what it's about.

aeva

@hosford42 @VileLasagna I did not get the impression that he's particularly interested in the native speaker perspective on English. Really quite the opposite actually.

Vile Lasagna

@hosford42 @aeva Yeah, I was speaking as a non-native, for sure.

The "not liking words" thing is an intentional hyperbole but the feeling with a lot of English is still a bit Mr Torgue a lot of the time. (not to mention other barely related gripes)

youtube.com/watch?v=50ZXUOnMjf

It doesn't help here that "asterisk" is the same in my native language so the "real name" just comes naturally to me and the whole "star" thing just never clicked, it's like my brain throws a parser warning immediately

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