The many sounds of kludge
Ok, so this has troubled my mind for a long time now. Sometime ago “kludge” came into common parlance in the technical world. m-w.com gives this definition:
a system and especially a computer system made up of poorly matched components
Which seems to be about right, if slightly narrow. But the pronunciation of this has always bugged me. To me, when I see kludge, I want to say “kluj” with a “u” sound like ugly and a “j” sound like junk (just like judge, but with a “kl” kicking it off). m-w.com wants me to pronounce it “klooj” with an “oo” sound like “doofus” and a “j” sound like junk. I’ve also heard this pronounced “kloozh” with an “oo” like “doofus” and a soft “j” sound like you were french saying “jacques”.
What’s up with that? If it were up to me the laws of onomatopoeia would kick in and “kluj” would be the order of the day. I mean that just an ugly sounding word for an ugly looking solution. Know what I mean? Adding in the “oo” and the soft j just try to class up the joint, like pronouncing Target, “tar-zhey”. But why try and class it up?
I’m not saying… you know, I’m just saying.
June 3rd, 2007 at 9:53 pm
At my old house, I build an entire kludge network. It was cobbled together from the most unimaginable pieces of junk. It was sweet. ;-)