From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
From: cowan@mercury.ccil.org (John Cowan)
Date: Wed, 16 Sep 2015 16:11:45 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] Why root user name?
In-Reply-To: <20150916195039.GA27635@www.oztivo.net>
References: <20150916195039.GA27635@www.oztivo.net>
Message-ID: <20150916201145.GA12717@mercury.ccil.org>

Warren Toomey scripsit:

> There's a hierarchy of directories and files beginning at the tree root /.
> There's a hierarchy of processes rooted with init. But there's no hierarchy
> of users, so why the moniker "root"?

Either because / was root's home directory (until /root was invented),
or because only root could typically write /.  If anybody remembers otherwise,
they are not talking.

-- 
John Cowan          http://www.ccil.org/~cowan        cowan at ccil.org
Andrew Watt on Microsoft:  Never in the field of human computing has so
much been paid by so many to so few! (pace Winston Churchill)