A name for this OS

[Jordan Henderson]

Richard Coleman writes:
> 
> I've been thinking of a good name for the lispOS.
> It seems pretty simple, but I believe a good name
> is just "LOS".
> 
> In the poetry of William Blake, Los represent a very
> important character
> 
> Los: "The Eternal Prophet", fallen form of Urthona.  He is
>      Prophecy, Poetry, the creative impulse throughout human
>      history; Time; the sun of Imagination.  He is the blacksmith
>      of Man; He is the builder of Golgonooza.
> 
> Golgonooza: "hill of skulls".  The City of Art built by Los
>      throughout human history in the midst of the fallen material
>      of Ulro.
> 
> Ulro would represent Windows 95, et al...
> 
> Ulro: The world of pure materialism and delusion, the basest
>       condition to which Man can sink.
> 
> What do you think?
> 

I LOVE this.  The literary reference is wonderful, it has all of the
makings of a term that team members could use as shorthand for a whole
attitude toward this project.

I personally like Los and not LOS.  It's short, doesn't shout,
can be thought of as Lisp OS, and the Blake reference above.  It 
also could be thought of as Spanish (Esperanto?) Los, as in Los Angeles,
Los Alamos, etc.  Los is the unnamed place.  I like the lower case
os, because I would like to see Operating System deemphasized, or at 
least completely rethought.  When we think of the goal, it should be
a whole environment and philosophy, not just a set of system calls that
implement a set of services.  I think the letters OS have this baggage
of being something on which programs (like user interfaces, object services,
file systems, etc.) run.  I'd like to think we're coming up with an
operating, as in useful, working, reliable, system.        

I'd like to nominate Richard Coleman as the project coordinator.  He
is the one who brought the whole idea together and maintains the list.
I propose that Mr. Coleman would be empowered to form the Steering
Committee (with consent of those on the list) and make official calls
for resources (official web space, official ftp archives, etc.)  I see
that there is a draft manifesto out there (good work Ahmed!), we probably
need to review it and have a Steering Committee bless the final version.

I feel that a single central personality will greatly benefit progress at 
this point.  Anyone can start to develop any code they want to support the
goals of the project, but there should be officially recognized groups working
on specific parts.  We need a person to answer general questions, serve as
liason to other groups (like FSF), etc.  Without a person to head up the 
group, it will be unfocused.

I don't think this is a dictator position.  This person will sit as chair of
the Steering Committee, who will eventually make all decisions.  But, before
there is a formal structure, the project coordinator can start to organize
the efforts.

Any other nominations?  Or is my idea of a project coordinator a bad one?  OR,
is there any reason to believe Mr. Coleman will take on these responsibilities
if elected?  What do you say Richard?

> Richard Coleman
> coleman@math.gatech.edu
> 
> 

-Jordan Henderson
jordan@neosoft.com