Jack-o-lantern etymology from OED

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Today's word is jack-o'-lantern:

1. A man with a lantern; a night watchman.

1663 STAPLETON Slighted Maid III. 48, I am an Evening dark as Night, Jack-with-the-Lantern, bring a Light. 1698-1700 E. WARD Lond. Spy II. (1709) 32 Each Parochial Jack-a-Lanthorn was Croaking about Streets the Hour of Eleven. a1704 T. BROWN Lett. fr. Dead Wks. 1760 II. 195 Who should come by before I could get up again, but the constable going his rounds, who quickly made me centre of a circle of jack of lanthorns.

2. An ignis fatuus or will-o'-the-wisp; = friar's lantern (FRIAR n. 9b); fig. something misleading or elusive.

1673 RAY Journ. Low C. 410 Those reputed Meteors..known in England by the conceited names of Jack with a Lanthorn, and Will with a Wisp. 1749 FIELDING Tom Jones XII. xii, Partridge..firmly believed..that this light was a Jack with a lantern, or somewhat more mischievous. 1750 S. HALES Earthquakes 10 Plenty of inflammable sulphureous Matter in the Air, such as Ignes fatui, or Jack-a-Lanterns. 1775 SHERIDAN Rivals III. iv, I have followed Cupid's Jack-a-lantern, and find myself in a quagmire. 1862 H. MARRYAT Year in Sweden II. 67 As a mist rises, Jack-o'-lantern flits his pale light over the swamp. 1870 LOWELL Study Wind. 5 Supplying so many more jack-o'-lanterns to the future historian.

attrib. 1750-1 Student II. 352 It..is..of a mere Jack~lanthorn nature, neither here nor there. 1817 COLERIDGE Biog. Lit. 293 The characters in this act frisk about, here, there, and everywhere, as teasingly as the Jack o'Lantern lights which mischievous boys..throw with a looking-glass on the faces of their opposite neighbours.

3. A lantern made of the rind of a large turnip or a pumpkin, in which holes are cut to represent eyes, nose, and mouth; a turnip- or (in U.S.) pumpkin-lantern. North Eng., Sc., and U.S.

1837 HAWTHORNE Twice-Told Tales 222 Hide it [sc. the great carbuncle] under thy cloak, say'st thou? Why, it will gleam through the holes, and make thee look like a jack-o'lantern! 1959 I. & P. OPIE Lore & Lang. Schoolch. xii. 269 As soon as it is dark on Hallowe'en they take the lighted ‘Jack-o-lanterns’ and put them on their gateposts.

Hence jack-o'-lantern v. intr. (nonce-wd.), to play or move erratically like a will-o'-the-wisp.

1891 G. MEREDITH One of our Conq. I. iv. 52 His Puckish fancy jack-o'-lanterning over it.

Amazon e-book reader

Amazon.com Unveils New e-Book Reader

By Calvin Reid -- Publishers Weekly, 11/19/2007 9:09:00 AM

Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos unveiled Kindle, its much anticipated e-book reading device at a packed press conference in Manhattan this morning. Intended to compete with the now discounted ($299) Sony Reader, Kindle is priced at $399 and offers wireless access to more than 90,000 downloadable titles at a uniform price of $9.99.

The Kindle weighs in at 10.3 ounces with a black & white electronic ink screen that can be read in bright sunlight. It’s thin as a pencil and will hold about 200 books, which are also stored in online user accounts and can be redownloaded at any time. But most impressive is the title selection and pricing as well as its wireless functionality. Unlike most digital reading devices, Kindle does not require a personal computer. Through an agreement with mobile carrier Sprint, Amazon has built its own network on the back of Sprint’s EVDO wireless cellphone network. There is no separate fee or monthly billing for use of Kindle’s wireless access and all titles and services for Kindle can be purchased through the wireless access provided through the device.

Online connection to the Kindle online store was very quick and downloads of even the largest books take less than a minute. The device also downloads newspapers and magazines and provides full-text access (not RSS Feeds) to more than 300 blogs that can be updated continuously. Each device comes with a pre-assigned email account that allows the user to email themselves personal documents (Word, plus gifs and jpegs) that can be read on the device.

Using a giant overhead screen, Bezos demonstrated the device (which worked flawlessly) to the assembled press corps. He said that they were trying to create a device so easy to use that it “disappears when you use it.” He said Amazon’s designers believed, “you can’t outbook, the traditional book. You have to have a device that can do things that the print book can’t do.”

From the looks of Kindle, Amazon may have made good on that claim. New media professionals at the event seemed impressed by the device, although not necessarily by its price. To seal the deal, Bezos unveiled a video presentation with such authors as Michael Lewis, Toni Morrison, Neil Gaiman and James Patterson, all lavishing praise on the new device. And then Bezos ended the press conference by handing out free devices to the assembled press corps. Now that’s the way to get the buzz started.

You've Received an Email Greeting: NOT!

In case you haven't heard yet, there is a virus being spread around the Internet in phony e-card spam. I have received several e-card notifications in both my work and personal email, one of them supposedly from bluemountain.com (a reputable e-card website). So don't open any e-cards!
Here are some of the subject lines:

• You've received a greeting card from a school-mate!
• You've received a greeting ecard from a class mate!
• You've received a greeting ecard from a neighbour!
• You've received a greeting postcard from a partner!
• You've received a greeting postcard from a worshipper!
• You've received a postcard from a family member!
• You've received a postcard from a neighbour!
• You've received a postcard from a worshipper!
• You've received an ecard from a colleague!
  

For more info, see the Information Week article at http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=200001991

Tina Lau
North County Librarian

Resizing an Image without PhotoShop

At the Information Desk, we often get a question from one of you who have found that perfect image for your project--but want to resize it. And often, many computers on campus do not have a photo editor like Photoshop. Well, where have you been? It's a Web 2.0 universe now and you should expect to find a site you just go in and visit, register if you want to save your work, to do what you want-- right?

Well, there is a new site--currently in beta mode but in this site you are able to do simple photo and image editing functions. It's called Picnik. Go to http://www.picnik.com/app, upload the image you have found--and you can rotate, crop, resize, modify colors, sharpen, reduce red eye-- in other words, be able to do what you most often want to do with your photos and images. You can set up an account to save your photos and images and variations as well. And there's a tab where you can easily get your photos that you have saved on Flickr.

The Library would like to remind you to keep in mind copyright restrictions when planning to use images. They're fine for projects you present for class--but for websites, if they're not clipart, check for permissions and ask the site owner from where you got it.

Again, enjoy your picnik: http://www.picnik.com/app . And at home, if you think you'll use it often, check out Picnik tools at: http://www.picnik.com/info/tools

Thanks go to the Chabot College Library blog, where I found this tip--Tina Lau, North County Librarian

Cascading Style Sheets

I learned webpage publishing (using HTML) several years ago, before Cascading Style Sheets were invented. I never had the time/inclination to update my HTML knowledge, and finally I have been confronted with the fact that my own personal webpage won't display correctly in the Mozilla Firefox browser. I have tried to find a quick-and-dirty introduction to Cascading Style Sheets in the past, but have been unsuccessful. I finally found a really good basic tutorial at the W3 Consortium, http://www.w3.org/Style/Examples/011/firstcss. If you're like me and are basically clueless on the creation of CSS and don't have the time to wade through a manual, try out this tutorial.

Tina Lau
North County Librarian
(in WWW resources, Technology)

Creating categories in Blogger

I finally found out how to create categories for this blog--there is a hack at http://netcf2.blogspot.com/2005/11/blogging-categories-categories.html that I used. Hope you like the categories! [If you understand this posting, you have passed the Geek Test.]

Tina Lau, North County Librarian
(in Technology)