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Comment by lallysingh | Hacker News Reader

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lallysingh·

The plug is part of the cable, the socket is part of the device. The geometry of the connector itself is irrelevant.

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How would one differentiate between the type of cable end that goes into this outlet?

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Leviton-15-Amp-125-Volt-Locking-...

Use a second word to identify it. A "Foo plug" or if it's just the reverse of what you normally have, an "inverted plug."

Adding an avenue for confusion when you can tell anyone in any language that you need a wire with a female end for a male outlet seems like a less than ideal use of resources.

Sounds like you're conflating connector types with which side goes on the cable. Your ontology only works for simple connectors where the gender metaphor is trivial. But it's still a metaphor, and a poor and crude one at that. You could say "pinned socket" and "holed plug" and be simpler and more direct.

But sure, keep with the 6th grade penis joke instead.

What is an example where the ontology does not work? It seems like a pretty accurate metaphor for all the everyday electrical/plumbing use cases I have come across. What makes it “poor and crude”?

And viewing it as a 6th grade penis joke is more of a 6th grade penis joke mentality than just using male and female. We use allusion all the time to use words to mean different things in different contexts all the time.

And this will cause issues when you have cable-into-cable. Then you'll have a plug into a plug, with no apparent difference.

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