
Go! -- the non-Google programming language by Keith Clark and Francis McCabe. - amichail
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go!_(programming_language)
======
akamaka
This Wikipedia article was written today. There's links to a few publications,
but no compiler, no homepage.

I'm not a big fan of Wikipedia's deletionists, but I hope they go after this
page. Musing about something in a few research papers doesn't make it notable.

~~~
jacquesm
> I'm not a big fan of Wikipedia's deletionists, but I hope they go after this
> page.

How is that for a contradiction... Google launched their 'Go' language today,
and it definitely is great that someone took the trouble to put this stake in
the ground. Whether it is notable or not is debatable, I think the simple fact
that there is a namespace collision between two programming languages is
reason enough to make it notable.

It is all over the web, thanks to the efforts of the author, if it wasn't
'notable' yesterday it certainly is now.

[http://econsultancy.com/blog/4954-google-go-was-the-name-
alr...](http://econsultancy.com/blog/4954-google-go-was-the-name-already-
taken)

~~~
rdtsc
I have to agree. Google should have known better before naming a new language
"go" in 2009.

It is hard to believe, they didn't think by now someone else would have come
up with that name for a language.

Or did assume they would just throw a bunch money and lawyers at whoever comes
out claiming the name.

Something similar happened to <http://www.wxwidgets.org> (ex-wxWindows).
Microsoft payed the author some money and he changed the name of the project.
I don't think that would be such a bad outcome.

~~~
shpxnvz
I'm not sure there's any reason for lawyers and money to be involved. A
trademark in the U.S. protect marks used _in commerce_ , so I would think that
the authors of Go! would have to have used the name in a commercial venture
prior to Google's announcement.

It appears that Google is not asserting trademark protection on the name,
either, so there really doesn't seem to be any legal case at all - it looks
like both parties can use it.

From uspto.gov:

 _A trademark includes any word, name, symbol, or device, or any combination,
used, or intended to be used, in commerce to identify and distinguish the
goods of one manufacturer or seller from goods manufactured or sold by others,
and to indicate the source of the goods._

------
barrkel
RemObjects had a compiler for Object Pascal targeting .NET called... Chrome.
When the browser came out, they ended up renaming it Oxygene.

~~~
sjs
lesson: pick your battles

------
tibbon
Seems that Google didn't well... 'Google' for 'go programming language' first.

This type of stuff happens. As per a thread suggestion on the issue tracker,
they've already registered Golang.org and its redirecting to their site. For
all we know, they are reworking the graphical and text assets right now to
make this a full switch.

------
dschobel
Is this language significant for any reason other than sharing a name with
Google's new language?

~~~
huhtenberg
Its notability is in that it existed well before Google's Go, and so latter
would've been better off selecting a different name.

~~~
ebrenes
There are several languages that have great similarity in names and some only
differ by a character or few characters: C, C++, C#, Cω, Ch; X++, XL, XSL; Go,
Go!, Goo.

So why again should Google make the name change?

~~~
gojomo
A standard for trademarks is risk of confusion; as the "!" is not pronounced
(or typically indexed), the collision between 'Go!' and 'Go' is much stronger
than the others you list.

 _If_ the 'Go!' creators had any hope for using that name on a series of
offerings (tools, books, etc.), they have to object to Google's use, to retain
the presumptive rights they'd established so far via use.

~~~
moosecake
"'Go!' pronounced 'Go bang'"?

~~~
wrinklz
Yes, I'm starting an internet company called "Yahoo", which shouldn't cause
any confusion with that other company, "Yahoo!", widely known as "Yahoo Bang".
Right, give me a break. :)

------
amichail
Also see: <http://code.google.com/p/go/issues/detail?id=9>

~~~
amichail
It's funny how McCabe appears to be upset.

This is the best thing that could have happened to popularize his research.

~~~
stevejohnson
McCabe's response, from the Issue 9 thread:

"I am very grateful for the support I have received on this thread. It seems
to have hit a nerve.

I want to make one particular point, some people have suggested that "I should
be grateful" for the extra advertising. My response to that is that I was not
actively looking for this advertising. It was not me who picked a clashing
name.

I fully understand that it is possible that insufficient search was done
before hand. However, when I picked the name Go! I did try to find out if
anyone else was using it. In fact, I was kind of surprised that no one was!;
since it was clearly a great name.

For those interested, Go! is a bi-lingual pun. My previous work focused on a
language called April. In Japanese, the literal back-translation of April is
"4th Month". Go is Japanese for 5."

------
rwhitman
According to <http://code.google.com/p/go/issues/detail?id=9> Google's "Go"
has now been renamed by the people to "Issue 9" spread the word

~~~
techiferous
<http://issuenine.com>

------
raghus
How is this authoritative? This page was created today

~~~
techiferous
Doesn't authority come from accuracy, not recency? If you see any part of the
article that is inaccurate, you should edit it and make it more authoritative.

~~~
raghus
True, but at the heart of this assertion is that Go was already a language
name that was taken _before_ Google used it.

Which might entirely be true.

But that assertion would be strengthened by pointing to a link/post that was
somewhat _older_.

~~~
finin
I remember seeing papers and presentations on go! from eight or so years ago.
Fujitsu Labs of America used it to build some multiagent systems. It drew on
many years of previous work by Clark and McCabe, which I first came to know of
in the mid 1980s.

