I was skeptical that it was a joke since it's quite a big coincidence, but according to Arthur C. Clarke:

> ...about once a week some character spots the fact that HAL is one letter ahead of IBM, and promptly assumes that Stanley and I were taking a crack at the estimable institution ... As it happened, IBM had given us a good deal of help, so we were quite embarrassed by this, and would have changed the name had we spotted the coincidence.

I have a hard time believing it was a coincidence.

:-)

I love this so much. THIS is why CF is one of the only companies I'd ever consider working for.

Facebook’s csrf cookie and token are named dtsg. I hope that’s not the only reason you would also consider working for them.

I was referring more to the context that the CEO is “one of us”, he is regularly on HN, and is available via Twitter/email to constructive criticism. I interviewed with CF earlier this year and ultimately decided the timing wasn’t right.

Love the company but the touch that the CEO gives a ____ really matters to me.

R language is an open source implementation of the original S language from IBM. Its name was a play on S and also based on the fact that both the authors of the R language have first names starting with R, Ross and Robert. I suppose R2 may have been a good choice as well (would have helped with google searches)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R_(programming_language)

and Windows NT and Digital Vax

WNT<-VMS

With many of the main people from the VMS system brought onboard to create NT, too.

Oh I didn't know that. Both the name and relation of VMS and NT. Thanks for sharing.

https://www.itprotoday.com/compute-engines/windows-nt-and-vm... tells some of the story of Dave Cutler and his 20 headcount he brought with him from DEC to MS. Their influence on NT runs deep.