[LLVMdev] Compiler name: Nāga

[Patrick Meredith]

On Apr 12, 2007, at 12:57 PM, Michael McCracken wrote:

> Hi, the idea of a dragon theme reminded me of the dragon-like serpents
> called "Nāga" from Cambodian mythology, among other places.

Interesting, my only comment is if we pick this we need to just spell  
it Naga.
Naga are also snake people in D&D (yea... I know).

>
> Here's a brief link explaining the specific Cambodian meaning -
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naga_(mythology)#N.C4.81gas_in_Cambodia
>
> I like this as a name, because it's unique  short and easy to type and
> remember (as long as you omit the accent, which is commonly done),
> it's basically a southeast-asian dragon, so we're sticking with
> traditional compiler iconography, and it's seven-headed, so it nicely
> represents the many different uses LLVM can be put to.
>
> It's also pretty easy to imagine a logo, because Cambodian Nāga
> sculptures are pretty memorable as is:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:NagaPhnomPenh.jpg
> They're all over Angkor, too. I picture a simplified line-drawing of a
> seven-headed serpent like the one in the image.
>
> For what it's worth, there are also a couple other good-sounding Asian
> dragon names on the wikipedia page for Nāga: "Lóng" (Chinese),  
> "Ryū"
> (Japanese), and my second-favorite after Nāga, "kyo" ("Korean  
> mountain
> dragon"), which has nice consonance with "compiler".
>
> -mike
>
> -- 
> Michael McCracken
> UCSD CSE PhD Candidate
> research: http://www.cse.ucsd.edu/~mmccrack/
> misc: http://michael-mccracken.net/wp/
>
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