Style: global configuration data

[John W. Baxter]

In article <8un6fv0g7i at news2.newsguy.com>, "Alex Martelli" 
<aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:

> "Steve Williams" <sandj.williams at gte.net> wrote in message
> news:3A0EF361.4F7FA244 at gte.net...
> > Michael Hudson's sig block says:
> >
> > > 59. In English every word can be verbed. Would that it were so in
> > >     our programming languages.
> > >   -- Alan Perlis, http://www.cs.yale.edu/homes/perlis-alan/quotes.html
> >
> > Lermontov's poem Parus (The Sail) starts out the with Russian word for
> white
> > (Byelo) used as a verb:
> >
> > (Byelyeet Parus odinaky. . .)
> >
> > Maybe Perlis knows how to 'verb' the word white, but I sure don't.
> Shines?
> > Glistens?  Glitters? Coruscates?  Bleaches?  Blanches?  Whites?  I don't
> think
> > so.
> 
> "Whitens" is one possibility -- while the transitive senses of the
> verb "to whiten" are more common, it does have intransitive use,
> too.  (Actually, "glistens" sounds better to me in this context,
> but it's less literal, I think).

Perhaps it is time to "unretire" good old...
    glisters

  --John

-- 
John W. Baxter   Port Ludlow, WA USA  jwbnews at scandaroon.com