New adapters have arrived at the Hirsh Health Sciences Library circulation desk…or should we say dongles? If you’re using wired headphones but your phone or laptop doesn’t have a 35mm headphone jack, these are the dongles for you!
Apple dropped the headphone jack on their iPhones in 2016, and in recent years many cell phone manufacturers including Google have followed suit. Luckily, we have both the USB-C and Lightning variety of headphone dongle available for 4-hour loans at the circulation desk. We also have wired headphones available to check out, so if you lost your AirPods on the Orange Line, we’ve got the complete package for you here at Hirsh.
Speaking of dongles – why do we call them that? I hadn’t really thought about the origin of the word “dongle” until I sat down to write this post. I learned that the etymology of the word is disputed, but it first appeared in the 1980s as a catch-all for a small external piece of hardware that provides another device with enhanced functionality when plugged into an access port. That’s some word salad, isn’t it? And so the word “dongle” was invented – possibly by a Mr. Don Gall, and probably because the dongle dangled – and we still use it today.
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