[Pipet Devel] Re: [Pipet Devel] summary for web page and announcements

[Brad Chapman]

Jeff wrote:
> And after we get that put up, I would like to make some 
announcements about
> the collaboration.  I know that we don't have a working system yet, 
but I can
> mention that Overflow, GMS and Loci have merged.  And I can mention 
what our
> plans are.  This is very important so that people know we are here, 
and so
> that no-one tries to make a VSh of their own ;-)

    Well, before we start announcing we should probably actually 
decide on a final name for the program...
    I was thinking about this a bit in my genetics class and came up 
with an idea for a name:

Hedgehog

Why? What the heck are you talking about, Brad? 
    Well, the hedgehog family of proteins are a really important set 
of molecules for controlling development in flies and mammalian 
systems. They are signal transduction proteins that pass 
developmental information from cell to cell and are responsible for 
proper formation of patterning in developing embryos (so they help 
detemine what if your back and front and right and left sides).
    So I thought this was analagous to vsh/loci/gms/overflow in the 
following way:

Biology                           Our program                  
--------                          ----------
cell-cell communication   => program-to-program communication
proper embryo development => proper workflow development

So Hedgehog is a protein that coordinates cells to develop in a good 
way, and vsh is a program that coordinates programs and libraries to 
flow together in a good way.

    Whadda you all think? The added advantages are that it has a easy 
acronym (hh) and that we can put pictures of hedgehogs on our site 
without people taking us away to the mental hospital :-)

Brad