Echo

In Greek Mythology, mountain nymph. She incurred Hera's wrath with her chatter and, as punishment, could only repeat the last words said by others. In unrequited love for Narcissus, she pined away until her voice alone remained.

Also, of course, the drum machine for the bunnymen.

echo is a command used on *nix systems using the following syntax:

echo (-n) (string)

It prints whatever the string is to standard output making is a useful command to add lines to files or to give a user a message in the middle of a script.
It is usually found in /bin/echo and also exists as a command built into the C shell and Bourne shell. /bin/echo is the same as the Bourne shell version with one exception: the -n option to /bin/echo works only when the user's PATH variable lists /usr/ucb before /usr/bin. The C-shell version does not support escape characters.

Examples:

echo "does my printer work?" | lp
echo "TITLE\nTITLE" > file ; cat txtA txtB >> file
echo "Warning: ringing bell \07"

I recalled having read something different from dem bones' account as a teenager. So I checked a mythology text and was startled to discover that Ovid's account is essentially the same as our fearless coder's (except for one detail, which you will read below)¹. I suppose the story of Echo I remember must have been taken from one of the adaptations by Bullfinch or someone like that, and now it is distorted by the passage of several years.

Not only that, I have had to make bits up to fill in the holes which have crept into my memory of the story. But never let the facts get in the way of a good story, especially when The Muse of Noding has you in her grasp.

---

Echo, daughter of the river Eridanus, had the "gift of gab". She could converse at length on any subject, and was able to cajole favors out of her father with great ease.

One day Zeus came down off Olympus to cavort with the wood nymphs nearby. Hera, ever mindful of Zeus' wandering eye, realized she could catch him in his infidelity² and followed.

Zeus somehow found out that his wife was on the way. He said to Echo³, "Go, and delay my wife while I visit with the wood nymphs."
Remioving a ring from his finger, he told Echo, "Take this ring as a token of the favor I will owe you if you succeed."

Echo sought out Hera and located her before she could locate Zeus.

"O Hera, I am making a cape for my betrothed for our wedding-feast. What symbols should I embroider into it to ensure my his fidelity?" Hera, being the goddess of marriage, could not refuse this request, and explained what symbols would ensure fidelity, and which would ensure success in the hunt, and which would ensure many sons.

Echo, with her quick wit and clever tongue, soon turned the conversation to the subject of the proper arrangement of a wedding-bed, and other subjects, and their conversation continued until the sun was low on the horizon.
At this point, Hera happened to notice a ring on Echo's finger, the same ring that Zeus had given her in payment for her delay. She realized her change to catch Zeus in his infidelity had gone.

"So, you have done his bidding, and used you talent to thwart my just anger²? From now on, then you shall only be able to repeat the last words that have been spoken to you. Do you understand?"

"...understand", said Echo, as the spell immediately took hold.

---

¹One should never show up the gods, as this story ably demonstrates.
²None of these myths about Zeus and Hera ever said what Hera would do to Zeus if she caught him. As it always worked out, her punishment was always visited on Zeus' partners after the fact.
³So you see the difference. Echo had incurred Hera's wrath not for her incessant chatter, but for thwarting Hera in her revenge. Also see notes 1 and 2.

A Server Side Include tag that allows you to print a variable.

The variables you can print are:

• DOCUMENT_NAME - the full local directory path of the current document.
• DOCUMENT_URI - the local directory path of the current document, relative to the base directory of the webspace.
• QUERY_STRING_UNESCAPED - the query sent by the users browser. Shell-special characters are escaped with \.
• DATE_LOCAL - the current local time and date.
• DATE_GMT - the current Greenwich Mean time and date.
• LAST_MODIFIED - time and date the current document was last modified
• REMOTE_ADDR - the IP address of the requesting browser.
• QUERY_STRING - the raw query string sent by the browser.
• SERVER_SOFTWARE - the name of the server software being run.
• SERVER_NAME - the name of the box running the server.
• GATEWAY_INTERFACE - the name/version of the Common Gateway Interface run on the server.
• SERVER_PROTOCOL - the name/version of HTTP served.
• SERVER_PORT - the port the server is serving on (standard being 80).
• REQUEST_METHOD - the method the current document was requested by.
• PATH_INFO - the path info, relative to the base directory of the HTTP server.
• PATH_TRANSLATED - the PATH_INFO translated into its local equivilant.
• SCRIPT_NAME - the virtual path of the script being executed.
• REMOTE_HOST - the hostname of the remote host.
• AUTH_TYPE - the authentication type used to validate the remote client.
• REMOTE_USER - the username used to validate the remote client.
• REMOTE_IDENT - the remote username, if using RFC931 identification
• CONTENT_TYPE - the content type of the attached information in the case of a POST or PUT.
• CONTENT_LENGTH - the length of the attached information in the case of a POST or PUT.
• HTTP_ACCEPT - a comma seperated list of mime types accepted by the server.
• HTTP_USER_AGENT - the name of the remote client browser.
• REFERER - the ULR which referred the remote client to the current document.
• FROM - the email address of the remote user.
• FORWARDED - the name of the proxy server through which the document is being processed.
• HTTP_COOKIE - the cookie sent by the remote client.

"Echo"
by Christina Rosetti (1830-1894)

Come to me in the silence of the night;
Come in the speaking silence of a dream;
Come with soft rounded cheeks and eyes as bright
As sunlight on a stream;
Come back in tears,
O memory, hope, love of finished years.

Oh dream how sweet, too sweet, too bitter sweet,
Whose wakening should have been in Paradise,
Where souls brimfull of love abide and meet;
Where thirsting longing eyes
Watch the slow door
That opening, letting in, lets out no more.

Yet come to me in dreams, that I may live
My very life again though cold in death:
Come back to me in dreams, that I may give
Pulse for pulse, breath for breath:
Speak low, lean low,
As long ago, my love, how long ago!

Also an audio player by Unsanity for MacOS.

While the visuals and audio quality are fairly standard, the real claim to fame Echo has is its skin support, including some of the first actual innovations seen since Audion's limited animations and alpha-blending (though Echo doesn't actually have alpha-blending at this point).

Among these are attaching scripts to the skins which allow for multiple windows, inlined video, curved sliders, and other niceties.

Ηχω

A Nymph of the trees and springs; some of the legends surrounding her provide explanations of the phenomenon of echoes. In one account Echo was vainly loved by Pan and loved a satyr instead, who shunned her; in revenge, Pan sent some shepherds mad, who tore her to pieces. In another account Echo loved Narcissus unrequitedly and pined away; when she died her voice alone remained - this repeated the last syllables of spoken words.

{E2 DICTIONARY OF CLASSICAL MYTHOLOGY}

EBCDIC = E = ECP

echo [FidoNet] n.

A topic group on FidoNet's echomail system. Compare newsgroup.

--The Jargon File version 4.3.1, ed. ESR, this entry manually entered by rootbeer277.

Echo is a young adult book by Francesca Lia Block, author of the popular Dangerous Angels series. It was published in hardcover in 2001 by Harpercollins's imprint Joanna Cotler Books.

Echo is one of Ms. Block's longer stories. Its shifting storyline bounces back and forth across time and jumps between perspectives, always returning to first person when Echo is telling her own story.

Mainly, Echo is a girl on a quest to find someone to love her as much as her parents loved each other. She has felt inadequate since young childhood when she saw how amazing and angelic her mother was and how entranced her father was with her; she has felt invisible for most of her young life. She searches for identity in the book and seeks to perfect herself by latching onto friends and lovers and going through bouts of dissatisfaction with her physical appearance.

Echo tries to perfect herself by starving her body until she is sickly and thin, and later trying to achieve health and beauty by excessive workouts. She also is envious of all the beautiful people in her life and emulates them while wishing to be them. But eventually, Echo uses all of her experiences with her friends, lovers, and experiences to find that they were all her "angels," and that she is worthwhile in own right.

The real-life hardships conveyed in Ms. Block's book stick to their usual poetic style, and it is simply a joy to read.

.

The piano music
from the bar across the street,
was slow jazz
sultry

The only light
through an open window
was courtesy of a full moon
blue

The small triangle
between her neck and cleavage,
still wet from the shower,
glistened

After Echo was cursed by Hera and her golden tongue forever gone, she found herself in love with Narcissus son of Cephissus and Liriope and known for his beauty (and his obsession with it).  With her curse, she was unable to express her love for him, and could only follow him in the forest as he hunted.  She longed to approach him but could only repeat his words.  When he got lost in the woods, he cried out to his friends "where are you?" and she repeated, when he heard her he asked "who is there?", and she repeated "who is there?".  This continued for some time until she finally revealed herself.  Echo leapt into the arms of Narcissus who scorned her and threw her off on to the ground.  With such rejection she slowly withered away until there was nothing left of her but her voice.  In her despair, she disintegrates and her personality is engulfed into and swallowed up by Narcissus.  Echo had lost her individuality when Hera took away her voice, and as she perished from her despair, she lost what was left of her identity and what remained was a voice that could only echo the expressions of others.

Then there was Pan, who fell in love with Echo and tried to seduce her, the way he tried to seduce so many others.  When Echo did not reciprocate Pan's love and rejected his advances, he became angry and ordered his shepherds to tear Echo into pieces.  Once again Echo is left with nothing but her voice. Gaia, mother earth bore witness to all that had happened to Echo and developed a great compassion for her.  To commemorate Echo and her golden voice, Gaia left a small piece of her in every corner of the Earth, the wind, the trees and the air so the world can be reminded of Echo's unrequited love and mother earth's compassion for her.  

Summary

Echo is a playable character in Blizzard's 2016 video game, Overwatch. She was added in mid 2020, and was the 32nd character added to the roster. I actually bought the game with a friend the same week that she was released, so I didn't really experience the release hype that other fans experienced. That month, though, every game had two Echoes (one on each team), if I queued for DPS I had to select the character as fast as I could or the other DPS would get her.

 

Lore

I really like Echo conceptually; she is an adaptive robot (sapient robots are known as "Omnics" in the Overwatch universe), and was developed by Overwatch researcher Dr. Mina Liao. Liao spent all her time in the lab with Echo, and Echo's personality is based on Liao's, because she imprinted onto the developing Echo. Her development was kept strictly secret, with only a handful of people knowing of her existence, Blackwatch agent Jesse Mcree being one of them. I believe Mcree canonically spent a lot of time with Echo, though I don't remember the circumstances. Liao created the Omnics in general; she created the Omnic race before Null Sector became a thing. Echo was her crowning achievement, the most powerful of all the omnics. Overwatch deemed Echo to be too dangerous, and eventually ordered that she be put in stasis. When Reyes (Reaper as known in-game) betrayed Morrison (Soldier 76 in-game), the Overwatch headquarters were destroyed and Mina Liao was killed in the process. This led to the destruction of Overwatch in general; it fell apart.

Many years after Overwatch had disbanded, Winston decides to illegally recall Overwatch. (Which really seems like a bad idea without commander Morrison because he was like the head hancho and I have doubt in Winston's administrative capacity, him being a gorilla and all) Jesse Mcree was working as a mercenary. He knew that Echo would be hauled as cargo on a specific train, and anonymously tipped off the Deadlock Gang (which he used to be a part of), who blew up and derailed the train so that they could loot weapons from the cargo. He said that all he wanted was Echo's stasis chamber (I think he just referred to it as "that box"), and Ashe (the leader of the Deadlock Gang) could have the rest. Ashe, unwilling to give up something valuable, refused, and they had to have a "confrontation". Mcree John-Wicked his way through the confrontation because he's a bona-fide badass I guess and everyone misses their shots but him, and then he awakens Echo and basically prompts her to heed the Overwatch recall.

The casual intimate familiarity and friendship that Echo and Mcree share in the cinematic just, ughhhh I love it so much. Their target demographic is like teenagers but I still really like it okay? The characters personalities are really well done and their quirks are super lovable.

I still don't get why Echo has her own cinematic but Tracer doesn't, when Tracer's the poster-boy (or covergirl?) of the video game, but it's whatever. At least she's in a cinematic.

 

In-game abilities

There are three character classes: Tank, Damage, and support. Echo looks like a support character, but she's a damage character. Her primary fire is a triple-shot, in which she release three projectiles in a tight triangle formation. Her secondary is sticky bombs, in which she release three sticky bombs, not in a triangle formation. The special attack is a "focusing beam", which does minimal damage normally but mows down characters if their HP is under half. And, last but not least, her special ability lets her fly way up into the air and then slowly glide back down if you hold space. This makes her highly maneuverable, able to fly up above the battlefield and scope people out. Her shots travel in a straight line and do not sink with gravity, so you have to be very precise with your tracking. Also, because you glide slowly to the ground, you're an easy target for snipers like Ashe or Widowmaker. Her ultimate ability is perhaps the most unique in the game; you get to "become" another character for 15 seconds, and you acquire that character's ultimate. That character's ultimate will charge obscenely fast, so if you get some good hits in you can use it a couple of times before your ult wears off.

I can't play Echo. I'm terrible on Echo. I can never seem to land shots on an enemy Echo, but when I play echo I just get mowed down by snipers every time I try to fly up in the air. Also, landing shots is so difficult because her shots are so precise.

 

Links

The Reunion cinematic, where Mcree frees Echo.

The character introduction cinematic, in which the addition of Echo was announced. Not really a cinematic though.

A cinematic-gameplay crossover of sorts in which it showcases Echo's gameplay style

Ech"o (ek"O), n.; pl. Echoes (ek"Oz). [L. echo, Gr. 'hchw` echo, sound, akin to 'hchh`, 'h^chos, sound, noise; cf. Skr. vAç to sound, bellow; perh. akin to E. voice: cf. F. écho.]

1.

A sound reflected from an opposing surface and repeated to the ear of a listener; repercussion of sound; repetition of a sound.

The babbling echo mocks the hounds.
Shak.

The woods shall answer, and the echo ring.
Pope.

2.

Fig.: Sympathetic recognition; response; answer.

Fame is the echo of actions, resounding them.
Fuller.

Many kind, and sincere speeches found an echo in his heart.
R. L. Stevenson.

3.

(a) (Myth. & Poetic)

A wood or mountain nymph, regarded as repeating, and causing the reverberation of them.

Sweet Echo, sweetest nymph, that liv'st unseen
Within thy airy shell.
Milton.

(b) (Gr. Myth.)

A nymph, the daughter of Air and Earth, who, for love of Narcissus, pined away until nothing was left of her but her voice.

Compelled me to awake the courteous Echo
To give me answer from her mossy couch.
Milton.

Echo organ (Mus.), a set organ pipes inclosed in a box so as to produce a soft, distant effect; -- generally superseded by the swell. --
Echo stop (Mus.), a stop upon a harpsichord contrived for producing the soft effect of distant sound. --
To applaud to the echo, to give loud and continuous applause. M. Arnold.

I would applaud thee to the very echo,
That should applaud again.
Shak.

 

© Webster 1913

---

Ech"o, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Echoed (?); p. pr. & vb. n. Echoing. -- 3d pers. sing. pres. Echoes (&?;).]

1.

To send back (a sound); to repeat in sound; to reverberate.

Those peals are echoed by the Trojan throng.
Dryden.

The wondrous sound
Is echoed on forever.
Keble.

2.

To repeat with assent; to respond; to adopt.

They would have echoed the praises of the men whom they &?;nvied, and then have sent to the newspaper anonymous libels upon them.
Macaulay.

 

© Webster 1913

---

Ech"o, v. i.

To give an echo; to resound; to be sounded back; as, the hall echoed with acclamations. "Echoing noise." Blackmore.

 

© Webster 1913

---

Ech"o (?), n.; pl. Echoes (#). [L. echo, Gr. &?; echo.] (Whist)

(a)

A signal, played in the same manner as a trump signal, made by a player who holds four or more trumps (or as played by some exactly three trumps) and whose partner has led trumps or signaled for trumps.

(b)

A signal showing the number held of a plain suit when a high card in that suit is led by one's partner.

 

© Webster 1913