Monday, June 04, 2007

Windows Cairo


Ever been curious as to what the "XP" in Windows XP meant? Some say it stands for eXPerience, but according to Wikipedia, Microsoft had a project code named "Cairo" from 1991 to 1996. It was to build technologies for a next generation operating system.

"Cairo was announced at the 1991 Microsoft Professional Developers Conference by Jim Allchin.[1] It was demonstrated publicly (including a demo system for all attendees to use) at the 1993 Cairo/Win95 PDC.[2] Microsoft changed stance on Cairo several times, sometimes calling it a product, other times referring to it as a collection of technologies.[3]

At its peak, Cairo was one of the largest groups at Microsoft and employed a majority of the company's senior engineering and design talent." LINK

Cairo (Arabic: القاهرة transliteration: Al-Qāhirah), which means "The Vanquisher" or "The Triumphant", is the capital city of Egypt.
Chi Rho
"The Chi-Rho [pronounced kahy-roh] emblem can be viewed as the first Christian Cross.

As a pre-Christian symbol, the Chi-ro signified good fortune. The Chi ro became an important Christian symbol when adopted by the Roman Emperor Constantine, representing the first two letters in the name of Christ- the Chi, or 'ch,' and Rho, or 'r.' According to Church Father Eusebius, on the eve of the Battle of the Milvan Bridge, the Emperor saw the emblem in a dream, with the inscription, "By this sign, you shall conquer." According to the story, the battle was won. In return for the victory, Constantine erected Christian churches. Unfortunately, this story is very unlikely, as Constantine's conversion occured on his deathbed, if at all. In any case, the symbol was the standard of the Emperor's army, prominently displayed on the Emperor's labarum, or battle standard.

Before it became the monogram of Christ, the chi rho was the monogram of Chronos, the god of time, and an emblem of several solar deities.

The Chi-ro is also the origin of the tradition of abbreviating "Christ" in "christian" or "Christmas" to "X."

In Hebrew, Chi-Rho equates to Tav-Resh. The chi rho was used in hermetic alchemical texts to denote time." LINK

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5 Comments:

At 7:38 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Right on! Glad to see others have picked up on this as well.

 
At 10:29 AM, Blogger Crackpot! said...

Hey there, Greg! Stay tuned for another Bill "Gates"/"Windows"/Computer bit in the near present.

Anyhoo, I'm anxiously awaiting for your next podcast. Care to spill the beans?

 
At 10:04 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

drunvalo says that symbol represents the kundalini column with the p loop being a recirculation of the breathe/prana energy. the x represents the four directions.

 
At 6:45 AM, Blogger Crackpot! said...

This comment has been removed by the author.

 
At 1:50 PM, Blogger Crackpot! said...

Aye, I forgot about Drunvalo's explanation of the chi ro. Thanks for bringing it up! If anyone is unfamiliar with Drunvalo Melchizedek's work check his 'The Ancient Secret of the Flower of Life' books

 

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