how do you pronounce 'tuple'?

Erik Max Francis max at alcyone.com
Mon Feb 13 01:52:30 EST 2006


John Salerno wrote:

> Yes, silly question, but it keeps me up at night.  :)
> 
> I know it comes from the suffix -tuple, which makes me think it's 
> pronounced as 'toople', but I've seen (at m-w.com) that the first 
> pronunciation option is 'tuhple', so I wasn't sure. Maybe it's both, but 
> which is most prevalent?
> 
> Thanks! Now time to go back to reading the chapter on tuples...

I believe both is right.  Those who come from a pure mathematics 
background are more likely to pronounce it _toople_.  Those who have 
encountered it in the wild are more likely to pronounce it _tuhple_.  I 
had enough of an understanding of mathematics to recognize where it came 
from when I encountered it in Python, but I pronounce it the latter way.

Even in mathematics, a tuple, or formally an n-tuple, makes more sense 
to me pronounced the latter if you list out the various pronounciations 
for large n, seems me the _uhs_ outweigh the _oos_.  (There's quadruple 
on one side, but then quintuple, sextuple, septuple, heptuple, octuple, 
etc., etc., etc.)

-- 
Erik Max Francis && max at alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
San Jose, CA, USA && 37 20 N 121 53 W && AIM erikmaxfrancis
   We are victims of our circumstance.
   -- Sade Adu



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