[ih] What is the origin of the root account?

[LarrySheldon at cox.net (Larry Sheldon)]

On 4/14/2013 5:01 PM, John Day wrote:
> At 3:11 PM -0500 4/14/13, Larry Sheldon wrote:
>> On 4/13/2013 6:28 AM, John Day wrote:
>>> I think you are getting close to what we are discovering:  There was a
>>> root, and there was an account built-in that gave one access to the
>>> root, and it was natural to refer to it as the "root account," but the
>>> documentation didn't call it that.  ;-)
>>
>> That is where I started, pretty much.
>
> ;-)  Funny how that works!
>
>>> Common usage created the concept (phrase) in the community and it
>>> becomes so used it seems it should be there.  This is not uncommon.
>>
>> Indeed--I believe that a lot of things get an explanation for their
>> name (and for their very existence) long after the existence and usage
>> is long part of the innate lore of what ever environment we are
>> looking at.
>>
>> I think there is a (semi?) formal name for the process in some
>> circles--"back formation".
>
> Indeed.

The thing here that might be useful to engineers and other managers that 
an awful lot of the detail that should be recorded in the as-builts (but 
almost never is) never saw light of day in a design document--the 
front-line people actually making it work apply the necessary reality. 
(Ask somebody that knows, about "front (or "first) line veto".)

-- 
Requiescas in pace o email           Two identifying characteristics
                                         of System Administrators:
Ex turpi causa non oritur actio      Infallibility, and the ability to
                                         learn from their mistakes.
                                           (Adapted from Stephen Pinker)