Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by reallydontask 1641 days ago
What do you call a rota?

Seems a word in common use in the UK

3 comments

I guess they use something like "duty" or "shift plan".

Rota is indeed very British. It clearly comes from the Latin word for "wheel", but in Italy it is not used (nor in France, afaik) - we have the Sacra Rota (which is the Catholic ecclesiastical tribunal, typically invoked for marriage dissolutions) and the word rotazione which is "rotation" and can indeed be used to indicate shift planning. Now I wonder if "rota" in that context comes as a shortening of rotation...

"Rotation", in the US. I've never heard "rota" as shorthand before. That's interesting!
Here in New Zealand we usually use 'roster'.