GIF Proununciation

[Pariah Burke]

EXACTLY. Now, I know what the creator of GIF said, but he's wrong. The acronym inherits its sounds from the sounds of the first letters of its constituent words.

[Nancy OShea]

How do you say SQL?

Is it es-queue-el  or sequel?

Nancy O.

[Pariah Burke]

The first time I heard anyone speak "SQL" aloud it was with the "sequel" pronunciation, so that's the one I started using. However, es-queue-el seems more correct.

[Szalam]

What, nobody says "squirrel"?

[John Waller]

I'm still confused about "Cache".

Cash?

Cay-sh? (this was in my head for 20 years until I heard it spoken as "Cash" few years ago)

Cash-ay?

[Szalam]

It's cash.

And meme is pronounced meem for whoever asked that question and then deleted it

[John Waller]

It's cash.

Not sure there's a definitive pronunciation. Seems to vary by region. Aussies often say "kaysh".

Cache (computing) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Pariah Burke]

Yes, "meem"! For years a friend has been asking me things like "have you seen that 'mehm-ay' on Facebook," and he would say it with a bit of a strange inflection on the "mem." For years I had no idea what he was saying until just recently I saw him type "meme" as he said "mehm-ay."

[Nancy OShea]

I say Cash.

How about PNG?

Is it a "Ping" a "pee-en-jee" or a "pee-en-gee"?

[John Waller]

I've always said "Pee-en-jee".

I've read about the others but never heard them used.

[Pariah Burke]

I always say "ping" for PNG. And "cash," though I've heard British English speakers often pronounce it as "cash-ay".

[melissapiccone]

ping and jif... I'm not changing it now!

[AriEss]

How about "data"?

Is it 'dayta' or 'daataa'?

[Nancy OShea]

It's Latin -- datum (singular), data or datas (plural). 

Correctly pronounced  'daytoom' , 'dayta' or 'daytas'.

Nancy O.

[Paul Wilson CTDP]

I believe there is something to do with Jiff Peanut Butter but I still use a hard g because that's what I first heard.

[Sockratease]

I never knew people tried to pronounce file extensions as words!  I always thought you were supposed to just say each letter one at a time.

Ya learns su,pim' new alla da times 

[Nancy OShea]

Do you say N-A-S-A or Nasa?

[Sockratease]

I think of acronyms as something wholly other than file extensions.  They have similarities, but I never equated them.  Doing so is neither right nor wrong.  It just never even occurred to me that anybody would even consider doing such a thing.

But like I said (even though I missed the "M" key and it looks funny) Ya learns sumpim' new alla da times!

EDIT - Now I'm getting very rude ideas about how to pronounce "PSD" 

[gener7]

My first graphics viewer program was Cshow for DOS (pronounced "doss" which rhymes with loss). The programmers set a reminder that it was pronounced "jif"). We can use the soft g for the extension and the hard g for "graphics".

These are what are called "trade" or "in house" terms. We accept the in house usage to get on with our work and to communicate with others in or about the computer sciences.

Render to the Computing Department what is theirs, and to the English Department what is theirs.

[Nancy OShea]

Gene generated a gigantic GIF of a genuine gypsy on a gingersnap-eating giraffe in a gymnasium.

[Sockratease]

Gosh!

[Pariah Burke]

Back on CompuServe (pre-Web), which was the first major system to make use

of GIFs, I remember the general consensus being the hard G (GIFt). That's

how I've used it ever since. It also makes more sense to because of what I

said before about GIF being an acronym of Graphical Interchange Format.

[Nancy OShea]

You say potato, I say Tater Tots.

[gener7]

It's how the author of the GIF spec and Bobby Berry who programmed the viewer decided it would be. They are not speaking for the use of g or j anywhere else. So when I got my copy of Cshow, I went along with it.

Just for fun, here is the page for the Compuserve GIF viewer The GIF Pronunciation Page

The point is that if you invent something and you give it a name or pronunciation that is non-standard English usage, it only applies to your invention, it does not mean the rules of grammar, usage, and pronunciation in English are changed.

[Pariah Burke]

So even CompuServe was pronouncing it "JIF" officially? Interesting. I sit corrected. I'm still going to call it GIFt for the afore mentioned reasons.