"GNU" meaning in English

See GNU in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Proper name

IPA: /ɡəˈn(j)uː/, /ˈd͡ʒiːˌɛnˈjuː/ [uncommon] Audio: En-gnu.ogg
Rhymes: -uː Etymology: Coined by Richard Stallman in 1983 as a recursive acronym for “GNU's Not Unix”, following convention of naming programs similar to or inspired by existing programs as “(New Name) Is Not (Old Name)”; compare Xinu. Specifically influenced by lack of English words of form ?nu (“?NU is Not Unix”), that gnu is the alphabetically first (and in fact only) English word of the form ?nu (“?’s Not Unix”), that gnu was perceived as a humorous word, and the existence of the song “The Gnu”. Etymology templates: {{coin|en|Richard Stallman|in=1983}} Coined by Richard Stallman in 1983 Head templates: {{en-prop}} GNU
  1. The Free Software Foundation's project to develop a free UNIX-like operating system, including the legal framework, such as the source code and documentation licenses. Categories (topical): Unix Derived forms: GNU FDL, GNU GPL, GNU/Linux
    Sense id: en-GNU-en-name-5G6VGxyJ Disambiguation of Unix: 92 8 Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, Pages with 2 entries, Pages with entries Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 89 11 Disambiguation of Pages with 2 entries: 90 10 Disambiguation of Pages with entries: 92 8
The following are not (yet) sense-disambiguated
Etymology number: 2

Noun

IPA: /ˈd͡ʒiːˌɛnˈjuː/ Forms: GNUs [plural]
Rhymes: -uː Head templates: {{en-noun}} GNU (plural GNUs)
  1. (politics) Abbreviation of government of national unity. Tags: abbreviation, alt-of Alternative form of: government of national unity Categories (topical): Politics
    Sense id: en-GNU-en-noun-b~ekf0Ez Topics: government, politics
The following are not (yet) sense-disambiguated
Etymology number: 1
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  "senses": [
    {
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        {
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        }
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        {
          "kind": "topical",
          "langcode": "en",
          "name": "Politics",
          "orig": "en:Politics",
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            "Society",
            "All topics",
            "Fundamental"
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          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
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          "politics"
        ],
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        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(politics) Abbreviation of government of national unity."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "abbreviation",
        "alt-of"
      ],
      "topics": [
        "government",
        "politics"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "ipa": "/ˈd͡ʒiːˌɛnˈjuː/"
    },
    {
      "rhymes": "-uː"
    }
  ],
  "word": "GNU"
}

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    }
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          "_dis": "89 11",
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
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          "source code",
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          "documentation",
          "documentation"
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  ],
  "sounds": [
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      "ipa": "/ɡəˈn(j)uː/"
    },
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      "ipa": "/ˈd͡ʒiːˌɛnˈjuː/",
      "tags": [
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      "rhymes": "-uː"
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    }
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    "Pages with 2 entries",
    "Pages with entries",
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    "Rhymes:English/uː/1 syllable",
    "Rhymes:English/uː/3 syllables",
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    "English entries with incorrect language header",
    "English lemmas",
    "English proper nouns",
    "English terms coined by Richard Stallman",
    "English terms with homophones",
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    "Pages with 2 entries",
    "Pages with entries",
    "Rhymes:English/uː",
    "Rhymes:English/uː/1 syllable",
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      "word": "GNU FDL"
    },
    {
      "word": "GNU GPL"
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    {
      "word": "GNU/Linux"
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  "etymology_text": "Coined by Richard Stallman in 1983 as a recursive acronym for “GNU's Not Unix”, following convention of naming programs similar to or inspired by existing programs as “(New Name) Is Not (Old Name)”; compare Xinu.\nSpecifically influenced by lack of English words of form ?nu (“?NU is Not Unix”), that gnu is the alphabetically first (and in fact only) English word of the form ?nu (“?’s Not Unix”), that gnu was perceived as a humorous word, and the existence of the song “The Gnu”.",
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          "UNIX",
          "UNIX"
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        ],
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          "source code",
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}

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This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2025-04-13 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2025-04-03 using wiktextract (aeaf2a1 and fb63907). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.