greek

One thought that cracks me up every now and then is about Greek programmers. In Greek language, instead of a question mark a semicolon is used.

In many programming languages, a semicolon is used to represent the end of statement. So, this:

$a = $b + $c;
print $a;

to Greek programmers must be looking like this:

$a = $b + $c?
print $a?

I don’t know about you, but to me this would be a constant confidence issue. It’s almost like I’m not sure what I’m going and asking the computer to confirm.

I’m sure though they have their ways of working around this …

By the way, while reading through the Wikipedia article linked above, I thought that the possible origins of the question mark were quite interesting:

That would also explain why not all the languages are using the question mark character.

The bright one among you have probably guessed by now that my name is Leonid. Well, in Greek and Cypriot culture there is no such name. There is a variation though. It is Leonidas.

As with many other names there was once a hero named Leonidas. In Greece, he was called Big Leonidas. I suspected it, but never got to learn the story until recently.

One of the aging Cypriots asked me if I know the story of Big Leonidas after he learned my name. I had to answer negative. The guy looks at me, relaxes in the armchair preparing to tell a long and noble story and tells me this (word in word):

Once there was a warrior. His name was Big Leonidas. Five hundred… no… one thousand Persians attacked him. And they all died.

He than gave me one of those looks that demanded appreciation. He spent the whole twenty freaking seconds educating me. Wow. It took me another twenty seconds to realize that the story was over. I thanked him afterwards…

Tag: greek

Programming and Greek

The story of Big Leonidas