WHAT and WHO were both proposed as candidates for the Wi-Fi foundation protocol. There were no candidates named WHY or HOW.

In 1993, multiple competing proposals were put forward as candidates for the IEEE 802.11 “foundation protocol” to the IEEE 802.11 standards committee for Wireless LANs. Xircom’s was called “WHAT” (Wireless Hybrid Asynchronous Time-Bounded). National Semiconductor put forward a protocol named WHO (Wireless Hybrid Operation). Xircom’s WHAT was subsequently merged into the joint specification from Symbol and NCR to form the three-company “DFWMAC” proposal, which eventually was voted in as the foundation protocol for the IEEE standard. The concepts within DFWMAC still form the foundation for Wi-Fi.

Read further about the birth of Wi-Fi in Beyond Everywhere.