Comment by aleph_minus_one

7 months ago

> FWIW "blob" isn't an acronym.

As far as I am aware, BLOB is an acronym for "Binary Large Object" [1], but it is part of the pun that, as you wrote, a blob is (also) an amorphous ball of goop.

[1] At least according to the German Wikipedia: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary_Large_Object

4 comments

aleph_minus_one

colonwqbang 7 months ago

The Blob is a movie from 1958 and the blobs in databases were named after the movie. Later, some people felt that blob should be an acronym.

https://web.archive.org/web/20231108173312/https://www.ibpho...

aleph_minus_one 7 months ago
> Later, some people felt that blob should be an acronym.
At least this acronym took on a life of its own: we now also have CLOBs (which correspond to no English word that I am aware of): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Character_large_object
- sajb 7 months ago
  
  Aka a backronym.
- BizarroLand 7 months ago
  
  clobber
  verb: informal hit (someone) hard. treat or deal with harshly. defeat heavily.
  Noun: British slang for Clothes, circa 1879
  The Fantastic Four's The Thing's catchphrase, "It's clobberin' time!" was the only "clob" I was aware of prior to doing these searches.