Talk:X/Archive 1

Salutation?

A very respected man I know (in his 80's) signs his emails X[initial]. (e.g. "Hi There, See you soon. XH") I asked a friend of mine about it, and he said it was an old convention. Should this be included on this page?

The practice of placng an X to sign one's name comes from when people could not read or right. This practise can be seen on marriage certificates and other documents requiring a person to sign, until around the early 20th cetnury when most people were taught to read and write.

Example: Mr. A cannot read or write. He needs to sign his Marriage Certificate to Miss B. Due to the fact he cannot read or write, the regitrar (Mr. Y) writes down Mr. A's name and to confirm it his name, Mr.A places an X next to it. SKC

Bands

I submit that the pointers to band articles should be left alone until the VfD on X (band) is complete. The present page reflects the current situation; it shouldn't be changed until the situation does. - David Gerard 13:11, May 5, 2004 (UTC)

And immediately you started redirecting loads of pages. This is simply vandalism. Mackerm 17:37, 5 May 2004 (UTC)

Your concern was the redirects, so I disambiguated them. If I hadn't, you'd still be pointing at them as your concern. - David Gerard 20:15, May 5, 2004 (UTC)

KiB vs KB, MIB vs MB

Seems to me that the KiB notation hasn't caught on, and KB is widely understood; shouldn't we be using the one that's understood, rather than the little-used one that is being promoted? --jpgordon{gab} 17:40, 21 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Yes. Yes we should. --Ben Brockert 23:11, Nov 21, 2004 (UTC)

DVD speed

Likewise, I'm seeing various definitions of "1x" DVD speed. Some articles say 1,385,000 bytes per second, exactly. Others talk in terms of MB and give a number of 1,352.54 MB/sec. Which one is exact? The more or less precise one? --jpgordon{gab} 17:45, 21 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Just FYI: 1,385,000 B/sec is exactly 1352,5390625 kiB/sec (divide by 1024) and exactly 1,32083892822265625 MiB/sec (divide again). I think you mistook MB for kB. However, I dont know what the official standard is, but I would go lean towards the bytes per second -figure. --kooo 05:05, 2004 Nov 26 (UTC)

This information does not belong on this page (which is about X, not DVDs), and X is not a unit of transfer speed, anyway. I have deleted the points and replaced them with an explanation of the incorrect usage with links to CD and DVD, where the transfer speed information properly belongs. 194.47.144.5 14:40, 28 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The context of x

That is debatable. Since interpeting the x a as multiplication symbol yields a broken expression, i've always tended to regard the x in CD & DVD speeds, as well as in the magnification figures of optics to be a token algebraic variable (or perhaps constant would be more apropriate). From this perspective, in the case of optics, x represents unity magnification (i.e. 1x = no magnification), and for a CD drive, x represents the base 16-bit stereo audio speed of 1,411,200 b/s.—Brian Patrie 09:24, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

Katakana "me"

I disagree that katakana "me" resembles an X. The first stroke is too curved and the second stroke is too short. (Or is it the second stroke that's long and curved? I'm not sure which is the proper stroke order, and I've had conflicting sources on this.) - furrykef (Talk at me) 23:20, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)

It looks an awful lot like it could be a stylized X to me. To me, the essence of 'X-ness' is the angle of crossing, not the length or straightness of either of the strokes.Nohat 08:36, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I agree that it looks like an X: メ. I've seen much less x-like things in people's handwriting. —Ben Brockert (42) UE News 17:55, Jan 23, 2005 (UTC)

Just for reference, the stroke order for メ is: 1) start top-right, go bottom-left in a slight curve; 2) cross #1 from top-left to bottom-right. #2 should be shorter and straighter. --Pablo D. Flores (Talk) 14:58, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Latest revert by Brockert

Hi Brockert, I understand that I may be wrong with the "Subject <-> Object" edit as I was not sure. But you reverted one more addition of me, i.e.

• • x is the repetition operator in Perl programming language.

Was that accidental or does it have any reason? -- Sundar 05:08, Feb 10, 2005 (UTC)

Ah, no, sorry. The rollback function has some quirks to it. To explain the revert that I intended: if you were to read the text "XOB" over the radio in a military situation, you would say "x-ray oscar bravo". I rearranged it, does it seem more clear now? —Ben Brockert (42) UE News 05:35, Feb 10, 2005 (UTC)

No problem. The current version is clear to me. Thanks. -- Sundar 06:05, Feb 10, 2005 (UTC)

X for kiss

Now, I know it kinda makes more sense phonetically that X should be "kiss", but how I was taught was that in XOXOXO... X = "hug" (because the hugger's hands are crossed) and O = "kiss" whence the O represents the mouth. I guess in that case, it's a french kiss ;-) Googleing gives me both interpretations, perhaps leaning more towards the X = "kiss" hypothesis; however, the other interpretation might be preferable, if only in that it gives you a half-decent explanation for the "O". It would be nice if we can see a definitive etymology on this expression.

Linguistically speaking, I'm of the opinion that "xo" can't be reduced into its constituent parts. Just an "x" or an "o" by itself won't convey the same meaning. Though it's possible that a single "x" in some situations where "xo" is familiar might be recognized as a terse version of the more usual combination, it's not common usage. I'd like to note that personally I've also always thought of the "x" to mean hugs, but only because that if "xo" means "hugs and kisses", "x" = "hugs" and "o" = "kisses". Lacking any solid evidence one way or the other, I've modified the main article to explain only the letter's part in the "xo" pairing. Ehinzpeter 04:17, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

X has meant 'kiss' since at least 1765:

http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?search=x&searchmode=none

Dab14763 (talk) 01:34, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

---

Jouni Paakkinen's book about mistranslations in subtitled TV series mentions someone translating "Love, Sheila. XOXO" from English to Finnish as "Sheila Xoxo". — JIP | Talk 06:53, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

X in Italian

"The letter X is not used in the Italian language, except for words borrowed from other languages, or names of foreigners." — This would have come as news to Bettino Craxi, I should think! Kelisi 21:05, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)

he is of Sicilian heritage though.--Greasysteve13 11:40, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

disambigation

Most of the content of this article should be moved to X (disambiguation). At the top of the article, it says to go there for "other" meanings. However, there's actually more "disambiguation" on this page, then there is at X (disambiguation).

Can you be a little more specific about what you mean by "most of the content"? Do you think "In mathematics x commonly represents an unknown variable" should be moved to a disambiguation page? Or how about "In economics, X is usually used to represent exports"? PrimeFan 01:00, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

As similar page at V (disambiguation) was deleted following a discussion Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/V (disambiguation). I removed the link to the X (disambiguation) as it doesn't add to the page. -- User:Docu

Infinite joy of creation

"In art, x alludes to the infinite joy of creation"? Does it now? This sounds kind of odd - any grounds for this? If not, I propose removal. Hardwick 19:21, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

Latin X and Greek Chi

Some people claim that Latin X and Greek Chi are unrelated?? How is this possible?? They look alike and have identical alphabetizations, so what else is possible about the origin of Latin X?? Georgia guy 00:47, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

That part was already commented out, but I agree it sounded confused, since the obvious relation with Etruscan and Western Greek is already explained; so I removed that sentence... ፈቃደ (ውይይት) 01:39, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Xylophone

Would xylophone count as Basic English? 67.188.172.165 17:25, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

x meaning in x games

Thinking about how e means 'electronic' for email and 'g'mail is google's version. i seems to have been taken by Apple, (e.g. iMac, iPhone)

X evokes generation X with xgames and things that have that connotation. Not sure how to fold this into the article, but if somebody knows the exact origin that might be helpful.

Drumorgan 23:03, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

The big red image

Is that really necessary? What is it there for? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.212.199.222 (talk) 20:23, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Anime?

Today I heard that there was a really good anime named X and was wondering if anyone knew anything about it at all. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.214.160.1 (talk) 23:35, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Try looking at X (manga). When there are several meanings for a term, look on a disambiguation page, such as X (disambiguation) for a list of links to the other meanings. LinaMishima (talk) 01:09, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

乂 in Chinese

Don't "undid" my correct edit. I looked up this character in the most authoritative dictionary of Chinese language 现代汉语词典. As a Chinese speaker, my Chinese is excellent. This character is not pronounced Ai and rarely used for a name. Don't confuse this character yì 乂 with the character ài 艾. The proper pronunciation of this character is yì. There are 2 meanings of this character. Its original meaning is "mow" but its common meaning is "govern;settle;stable". This character existed in Classical Chinese and rarely used in Modern Chinese. Dreamer in Utopia (talk) 15:11, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Dr. Seuss

"X is very useful if your name is Knixxie Knox. It also comes in handy spelling axe and extra fox." This should be included, it can easily be sourced and Dr. Seuss is a recognized expert on the subject. Perhaps there can be a link to the Dr. Seuss article? I am new to this and am not sure how to do it —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.215.203.11 (talk) 15:58, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

"ecks"?

User:A new name 2008 is insisting that somewhere on http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/x is a statement that the name of the letter is sometimes spelled "ecks". I cannot find this anywhere; I see several pronunciation keys that state that the letter's name is pronounced as "eks" (not ecks), but nothing on the spelling of the name. I invite A new name 2008 or anyone else to point out where exactly on that page is this statement. Anomie⚔ 18:34, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Went back and looked again, not sure what I saw before, I am wrong. A new name 2008 (talk) 18:47, 17 November 2008 (UTC)