Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Cryptography/Cipher vs Cypher

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Matt, In order to leave room for alternate views, I have moved you advocacy line a little lower. Others can reply in their own blocks of advocacy. I trust this doesn't unduly offend, none was meant.

I also added a comment at books using cypher as was apparently intended, though it's within your advocacy block. Hope that's all right with you.

ww 14:34, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Spelling question: Cypher vs cipher

I'd like to invite discussion on how to treat the "cypher" spelling, a variant of "cipher", in cryptography articles: See Wikipedia:WikiProject Cryptography/Cipher vs Cypher for arguments. — Matt 15:44, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

According to American and British English differences#Miscellaneous, "cypher" is a UK spelling, and "cipher" a US spelling. As such, I think it falls under the guidelines in Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Usage and spelling. - jredmond 16:02, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

Actually, it's more complex than that. "cipher" is the most popular form in the UK as well as the US (e.g. UK security researcher Ross Anderson uses it). I favour "cipher" (I'm from the UK), and another editor who advocates "cypher" is (I believe) from the US. — Matt 16:17, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

Maybe I've been corrupted by too many things american, but I spelt it cipher. If there is a need to standardize, then the "i" version is the best bet. Pete/Pcb21 (talk) 16:10, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

You haven't been too corrupted. I can tell, since you spelled spelled as spelt. ;-) -Rholton 18:43, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

GCHQ's predecessor was "the Government Code and Cipher School" [1]. I'd always thought cypher was another aspect of American English's long term scheme to inflate scrabble scores. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 17:06, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

I've generally seen it as GC&Cypher School, however. That fits with common British use of the period as in, for instance, the Royal Navy Cypher series (eg, nr 3). Even though at least nr 3 was a superencyphered code. ww 20:58, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

I guess the point is, ww, even GCHQ, the British government's cryptography agency, now spells it "cipher" (the link is to their website). The "cypher" spelling seems to be deprecated in usage by those in the field of cryptography itself; Wikipedia should follow this trend. — Matt 15:25, 26 May 2004 (UTC)

The OED, at least, lists "cipher" first and "cypher" as the varient. It has cites back to 1528 for cipher. -- DrBob 17:31, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

The New Oxford American Dictionary likewise lists cipher first and cypher as the variant. It also has an entry for cypher punk, which it defines as "a person who uses encryption when accessing a computer network in order to ensure privacy, esp. from government authorities." It places the origin of the phrase as "1990s: on the pattern of cyberpunk." -Rholton 18:43, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

Seems like I've seen "cipher" most used regarding cryptography, and "cypher" often used to mean "zero". ;Bear 18:06, 2004 May 25 (UTC)

Cypher is an anti-etymological variant of cipher used across the English-speaking world because it's prettier than the correct form. Chameleon 16:11, 26 May 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Current Wiki links

I know it's been about half of a year, but I hope someone's watching this. My concern is not the spelling per se, but I would like to note that perhaps cipher may be the term to use. As I noted on ww's page, here, currently the link for cypher is a disambiguation page, but cipher redirects to Encryption. Seeing as how it seems cypher can mean a number of things, I think cipher by default becomes the preferred spelling. Otherwise, I guess we're going to have a number of pages with [[cipher|cypher]] code in them. Either way, correct (or just make a note not to change things) on the cypher page. In reality, I couldn't care less, and I'll leave it to you all to debate. --Ricky81682 (talk) 09:15, Jan 18, 2005 (UTC)