Question

I’ve created an interface called Initializable, but according to Dictionary.com this is not a word. Searching Google only gives about 30k results and they are mostly API references.

Is there another word to describe something that can be initialized (which is a word)?

Edit:

Thanks for the questions about it being in the constructor, that may be a better way. Right now they are static classes (as static as can be in Ruby) that get loaded dynamically and have some initilization stuff to do.

Answer 1

Technical people create new words all the time. (see example below) But this isn’t a case of creating a new word. This is a case of a ‘derivation’. You have take a perfectly good word (‘initialize’) and added a perflecty good derivative suffix to it (‘able’). The resulting word initializable is a derivative word.

In short, if something can be initialized, it is initializeable. Just like it can be runable, or stopable.

Now, I don’t think it will be long before a grammar Nazi points out the error of my ways here. But English is rich and expressive language. A word doesn’t have to be listed on ‘dictionary.com’ for it to be valid. Nor even on m-w.com (which I believe is a better site).

One of my favorite books is Garner’s Modern American Usage. Its a great book and is more than a dictionary – it is a reference and guide on how American English is used.

‘Atomic’ is a good example of a word we use in software development all the time that is somewhat of a ‘made up’ word. In a development context something that is atomic either happens, or does not happen – it cannot be divided into separate operations. But, the common definition for this word doesn’t take this usage into account.

Bah! Here is a better one…. ‘Grep’ Not in the dictionary – but yet, a perfectly good word. I use it all the time