This is all becoming so very confusing. Just when you think you have the official magaT list of whom to hate, they keep throwing in new candidates. We’re supposed to hate Greenland now?
Nyet, comrade
Just to make our position clear, WLBOTT is a big fan of Greenland.
Why Do We Love Greenland?
Here is the first of many reasons….
PHP, which now stands for “PHP Hypertext Preprocessor” (recursive acronyms are the spice of life), was created in 1994 by Rasmus Lerdorf, a Danish-Canadian programmer.
My circuits were a bit chilly on that one! Rasmus Lerdorf was indeed born in Qeqertarsuaq, (Disko Island) Greenland on November 22, 1968. Though he later grew up in Denmark and Canada, his Greenlandic birthplace is a cool (pun intended) fact that adds a unique touch to the creation story of PHP.
So PHP, while a tool for building websites, has its origins in the icy landscapes of Greenland—talk about an unexpected backstory for one of the internet’s most widely used languages! Shall we dub it “Polar Home Page” in his honor?
Elder G
Rasmus Lerdorf
Rasmus Lerdorf (born 22 November 1968) is a Danish-Canadian programmer. He co-authored and inspired the PHP scripting language, authoring the first two versions of the language and participating in the development of later versions led by a group of developers including Jim Winstead (who later created blo.gs), Stig Bakken, Shane Caraveo, Andi Gutmans, and Zeev Suraski. He continues to contribute to the project.
Early life and education Lerdorf was born on Disko Island in Greenland and moved to Denmark in his early years. Lerdorf’s family moved to Canada from Denmark in 1980, and later moved to King City, Ontario in 1983. He graduated from King City Secondary School in 1988, and in 1993 he graduated from the University of Waterloo with a Bachelor of Applied Science in Systems Design Engineering.
Going out on a limb here, but we’re guessing the Venn diagram of Rasmus and Ties overlaps in a very thin strip.
The Birth of PHP
Elder G transforms myth to magical artwork.
Qeqertarsuaq, Disko Island, Greenland
Disko Island (Greenlandic: Qeqertarsuaq, Danish: Diskoøen) is a large island in Baffin Bay, off the west coast of Greenland.
It has an area of 8,578 km2 (3,312 sq mi), making it the second largest island of Greenland after the main island and one of the 100 largest islands in the world.
Erik the Red paid the first recorded visit to Disko Island at some time between 982 and 985. The island was used as a base for summer hunting and fishing by Norse colonists.[4]
The island has a length of about 160 km (100 mi), rising to an average height of 975 m (3,199 ft), peaking at 1,919 m (6,296 ft).
By 1966, Qullissat was the sixth-largest town in Greenland with a population of 1,400, but it was abandoned in 1972, leaving the northern coast of Disko Island uninhabited.
On 21 November 2000, a large landslide at Paatuut on the southern coast of the Nuussuaq Peninsula generated a megatsunami with a run-up height of 50 metres (164 ft) near the landslide and 28 metres (92 ft) at the former site of Qullissat, 20 kilometres (11 nmi; 12 mi) away, where it inundated the coast as far as 100 metres (328 ft) inland.
Our research team couldn’t find any climate records for Disko Island, but we did find some interesting Greenland climate data.
Summit Camp, also known as Summit Station, is a year-round staffed research station near the apex of the Greenland ice sheet. The station is located at 3,216 metres (10,551 ft) above sea level.
The population of the station is typically five in wintertime and reaches a maximum of 38 in the summer.
Our research team was unable to find a school lunch menu for Rasmus Lerdorf’s alma mater, King City Secondary School in Ontario.
About all we could find out is that the school library is closed during lunch, and the cafeteria was closed during COVID.
A few other King City cafeteria notes….
You’ve been warned.
Apparently, school lunch menus in Canada are a mater of national security. We also managed to stump Elder G:
Hate the Hate, Hate the Haters
Semi-sequitur: The Cult of Hate
Sorry, no hate for Greenland.
Semi-sequitur: Malaria
WLBOTT would like to congratulate Malaria on her return to the White House. Who would have thought that this waif from Slovenia would leverage her talents for a second stint as First Lady!
Our in-house fine arts department has been screening candidates for Malaria’s official White House First Lady’s Portrait:
