Is it GIF or JIF? And other pronunciation questions...

Megan's picture

She has: 11,421 posts

Joined: Jun 1999

I came across this site today which insists that GIF should be pronounced JIF (Period, no question):

http://www.olsenhome.com/gif/
(some of the comments are pretty funny!)

What do you think? Which pronunciation do you use? I thiink I use both, but most often the hard G... or maybe not. Now I'm thinking too hard about it so I don't remember what my natural inclincation is.

What other web acronyms do you have prounciation questions about? Jeeves had to teach me to say My SEQUEL and not My S-Q-L Smiling

demonhale's picture

He has: 3,278 posts

Joined: May 2005

Hmmm it made me think there... I use hard GIF and MyS-Q-L , but I usually spell-out the acronym...

Abhishek Reddy's picture

He has: 3,348 posts

Joined: Jul 2001

Some of those comments are absurd. Especially this one:

Quote:
Sam Mefford writes:
Just thought I'd point out that in the english language, when a g is followed by an a, o, or u, it is supposed to be hard. When followed by an i or e, it is supposed to be soft.

Girl? Get? Git? Gimp? Girth? Gecko? Geese?

Edit: whoops! The following comments say exactly that ^. Shocked

I pronounce GIF with a hard G. No rationalising it, that's how I felt like saying it when I first said it, so that's how I kept saying it. Smiling

I used to say MySQL until I encountered the proper 'sequel' pronunciation around the time of the MySQL dolphin naming contest ('Sakila').

Smiling

JeevesBond's picture

He has: 3,956 posts

Joined: Jun 2002

Well Jif to me is still: http://www.orderpoint.co.nz/stock_img/2216450.jpg

So saying that would just be daft!
Wow, that banner is so 1990's!

Quote:
Words are meant only for communication. The salient question is on "Do you understand my meaning when I say 'GIF'?" If the answer is "Yes." Then the dispute over "proper" pronunciation is absolutely absurd.

Now this guys got a point, maybe we should invite all those people who've got nothing better to do to come and help with the mountains of work we've got going on at the moment. Smiling

a Padded Cell our articles site!

timjpriebe's picture

He has: 2,667 posts

Joined: Dec 2004

Personally, I use the soft g in GIF. My dad does the opposite. And I've also corrected people saying S. Q. L. instead of 'sequel' for SQL.

Of course, I have a friend who pronounces Linux with a long 'i' as in Linus, because the guy who created the Linux kernel is named Linus. Although I just discovered that Linus doesn't pronounce it that way.

http://www.jx90.com/linux.html

Abhishek Reddy's picture

He has: 3,348 posts

Joined: Jul 2001

timjpriebe wrote: Personally, I use the soft g in GIF. My dad does the opposite. And I've also corrected people saying S. Q. L. instead of 'sequel' for SQL.

I feel like correcting people about this but every time I begin trying, it just seems so inane and insignificant. Partially, I'm sure, because it would require derailing whatever interesting conversation is going on.

I've heard some unusual versions of SQL pronunciation. One I heard recently is probably best approximated as 'squill'.

Smiling

Busy's picture

He has: 6,151 posts

Joined: May 2001

I think I say with hard G - gif

What about .jpg ? said j-peg (from the outdated .jpeg)

I suppose some of it (maybe not these words) depends on where you come from, like here 'wh' is pronounced 'f' so whaka is said faka (whch is actually part of a place name - is Moari)

teammatt3's picture

He has: 2,102 posts

Joined: Sep 2003

How do you guys say meta and beta?

I say beta like bay-ta (hard a) and meta like met-a (soft e)

demonhale's picture

He has: 3,278 posts

Joined: May 2005

bayta with a sqa "a" ... and meta with a straight "e" ... I used to say sequel for sql, a teacher corrected me once and I carried the S-Q-L around... Anyways i didnt dispute since i didnt know better that time... Why dont we make a quick proper pronunciation table,?

The Webmistress's picture

She has: 5,586 posts

Joined: Feb 2001

Definitely hard G in gif - agree with Liam that jif is and always will be a cleaning fluid!

Problem is that American's mispronouce words all the time! Wink

Julia - if life was meant to be easy Michael Angelo would have painted the floor....

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