Names
- 1 minNames are always interesting. Depending on which country you’re from, your name means something and usually there’s a story behind it. Mine for example derives from archangel Michael since in Cyprus you are named after some religious saint etc. Names of programming languages are also interesting.
Yesterday a friend of mine was wondering where did the name of the Erlang language come from. Since Erlang was created and mostly used (at least initially) by Ericsson, it made sense that the name is/could be an abbreviation of “Ericsson Language”. We took to Wikipedia to verify this and lo and behold! Another interesting story behind a name.
The abbreviation is only half of the story. Erlang is also the name of a Danish mathematician called Agner Krarup Erlang who was known for inventing the field of telephone network analysis. He was also the creator of the Erlang formula which is a unit used in telephony.
Fascinating isn’t it?
Personal blog of Makis Otman