Den McHenry

Front-end Developer. Digital hermit. Ersatz cartoonist. All-around average dad.

Audrey Hepburn in My Fair Lady, saying to Rex Harrison, 'The rain in Spain stays mainly in the plain.'

You're Saying It Wrong

While focusing on JavaScript to level up my web dev skills over the last several months, I’ve waged a silent war in my head over how everyone else seems to pronounce certain things.

Well, here at last is my declaration, and I will countenance no disagreement and no appeals to sensible arguments or respected authorities.

  • var rhymes with bear, not bar
Baloo and Mowgli dancing in Disney's Jungle Book during the musical number the Bear Necessities.
var bear = true, bar = false;
  • tuts rhymes with boots, not butts
  • JSON sounds like Jason, not Khe Sanh
Jason from the Friday the 13th horror franchise sitting on a bed in a weed infested cabin, casually holding a macheteand looking into the camera.
Okay, let’s parse this …
  • in regex/regexp, reg rhymes with leg, not ledge
  • names ending in -ify are consciously and playfully improper. They do not follow normal accentuation rules (i.e., not like PERson to perSONify). Browserify is BROWSer-ify, not brow-ZER-ify. JSONify is JASon-ify, not jay-SAHN-ify
  • jQuery is like, “Hey, Siri,” not “Hey, Jerry”
Jerry Smith from the cartoon Rick and Morty sits at his dining room table playing a game on an iPad.
Hey, Jerry: get a job!
  • favicon is a “fave icon” and does not sound like “have a naan” (but don’t mind if I do)
  • SQL and its derivatives are cooler pronounced “sequel” rather than “ess queue el”

I know it may be difficult to break those habits, but change can happen. After decades on the wrong side of two bitter fights I finally own a Mac and pronounce gif with a soft G.

Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck continuosly tear signs from a tree revealing news signs that say duck season, rabbit season, duck season rabbit season, and so on.

And so can you!