Re: [9fans] The mother-of-all-gnot?

[jmk@plan9.bell-labs.com]

I was about to ask what AJAX was, since it's clearly none of the
three I'm familar with. However, the OED is illuminating:

†aˈjax. Obs. 

  Jocularly for a jakes; see jakes. 
  1588 Shakes. L.L.L. v. ii. 581 Your Lion that holds his Pollax
sitting on a close stoole, will be giuen to Aiax. 1596 Harington
(title) The Metamorphosis of Ajax. 1611 Cotgr., Retraict, an
Aiax, Priuie, house of Office.

and then

1	
jakes (dʒeɪks). Forms: 6 iacques, 6–7 iaxe, iakes, iaques, 7
jacks, 7–8 jaques, 7– jakes (also 6 iake, 8 jack).  Plural, 6
iaxes, 7 jakeses, jaqueses, 8 jakes's; also in same form as sing.
[Origin unascertained; it has been suggested to be from the proper
name Jaques, Jakes; or from Jakke, `Jack', quasi Jakkes, `Jack's'.
(`Gakehouse' in 1438 Tintinhull Churchw. Acc. (Som. Rec. Soc.)
p. 179, is an editorial misreading of `Bakehouse'.)] 

  1.  

  a.  A privy.  
  153. in Ellis Orig. Lett. Ser. iii. III. 84 The Iaques was
very well doon. 1538 Inv. in J. W. Clark Barnwell Introd. 24
The jakes of the dorter. 1549 Bale Journ. Leland Pref. B j, A
great nombre of them whych purchased those superstycyouse mansyons,
reserued of those Lybrarie bokes, some to serue theyr iakes,
some to scoure theyr candlestyckes. 1552 Huloet, Siege, iacques,
bogard, or draught, latrina. 1570 Levins Manip. 12/13 Iake, forica.
1596 Harington Metam. Ajax Pref. (1814) 14 Because I will write
of a Jakes. 1620 Naworth Househ. Bk. 145 To a tyller for tylling
the jacks, vjd. 1634 Documents agst. Prynne (Camden) 12 They..dragged
his carckesse throughe the cittye, and cast it into the common
jakes. 1649 R. Hodges Plain Direct. 12 Let the hous bee made
a jakes for Mr. Jaques. 1657 Manchester Crt. Leet Rec. (1887)
IV. 202 Noe close stoole, Jackes, Carrion or garbage be cast
vpon the Ackers Middinge. 1701 C. Wolley Jrnl. New York (1860)
26 The more unhealthful it may prove, by reason of Jaques, Dunghills
and other excrementitious stagnations. 1727 P. Walker Life of
Peden in Biogr. Presb. (1827) I. 144 He [Arius] went..into a
common Jack and purg'd out all his Inwards. 1788 V. Knox Winter
Even. I. ii. xv. 211 His book is a nasty book, and fit only for
the jakes. 1855 Kingsley Westw. Ho (1861) 168 The fox..that..jumped
down a jakes to escape the hounds.1913 L. Woolf Village in Jungle
iv. 54 The headman's brother is to marry a sweeper of jakes!
1922 Joyce Ulysses 68 He kicked open the crazy door of the jakes.
1969 Listener 26 June 902/3 He is at his best when not occupied
with symbols..but concerned to tell how the keeper of an `underground
jakes' mistakes a police stool-pigeon for a real poof.

  b.  transf. and fig.
  1579 Tomson Calvin's Serm. Tim. 967/1 What vermine, I pray
you, is there of Monkes, and Priestes, and all that Cleargie?..that
filthie and stinking iaxe hath filled the world so full. 1637
Gillespie Eng. Pop. Cerem. Ep. B iij, Cast forth as things accursed
into the Iakes of eternall detestation. 1660 Life & Death Mrs.
Rump 2 Hell..that stinking poysonous place called the Ile of
Jaqueses. 1701 De Foe True-born Eng. 194 We have been Europe's
Sink, the Jakes where she Voids all her Offal Out-cast Progeny.
1753 Smollett Ct. Fathom (1784) 13/1 Who eagerly explore the
jakes of Rabelais, for amusement. 1829 Bentham Petit. Justice
173 The jakes, of late so notorious by the name of the Secondary's
Office in the city of London.

  2.  Excrement; filth.  s.w. dial.
  1847–78 Halliw., Jakes..applied in Devon to any kind of filth
or litter. 1880 in East & West Cornw. Glossaries. 1886 in Elworthy
W. Somerset Word-book.

  3.  attrib. and Comb., as jakes door, jakes-like adj.; jakes-barreller,
jakes-farmer, jakes-man, a man employed to clean out privies;
so jakes-farming; jakes-house = jakes.
  1596 Nashe Saffron Walden 155 Like a *iakes barreller and a
Gorbolone. 1557–8 Louth Rec. (1891) 110 One locke to the *Jakes
dore. 1591 Percivall Sp. Dict., Privadero, a *iakes farmer. a1618
Sylvester Tobacco Battered 267 Iakes-farmers, Fidlers, Ostlers,
Oysterers. 1639 Horn & Rob. Gate Lang. Unl. lviii. §624 The common
draught-house..which the jakes-farmer..makes cleane. 1577 tr.
Bullinger's Decades (1592) 890 A doonghill God,..a god of the
*iakeshouse. 1606 Sylvester Du Bartas ii. iv. i. David 1251 Flames
from his eies, from's mouth coms *Iakes-like fumes. 1630 Davenant
Cruel Brother Wks. (1673) 475 On that branch appears a Hang-man,
Then a *Jakes-man, then, a Tinker.


On Tue Jan  3 14:56:13 EST 2006, plalonde@telus.net wrote:
> 
> On 3-Jan-06, at 12:07 PM, Skip Tavakkolian wrote:
> > If it is a Gnot-thingy and it is only connecting to Google, why would
> > they muck with AJAX when they can use a file protocol?
> 
> User-base and user-acceptability.
> The user base comes from people already running AJAX boxes.
> User acceptability comes from addressing a key shortcoming of Gnot.
> I like Gnot --- I don't think Rob has gotten nearly the recognition  
> from the HCI community on this interface breakthrough and interfaces- 
> for-programmers in general --- but I continue to doubt that the  
> public is ready to put all their files on a remote server without  
> being able to get to them when the umbilicus is severed.  Servers  
> make people anxious; by adding local disk Google can ease that while  
> still mirroring people's data on their network/computer.  Gmail was  
> just the start of that particular slippery slope.
> 
> Paul