×
INTELLIGENT WORK FORUMS
FOR ENGINEERING PROFESSIONALS

Log In

Come Join Us!

Are you an
Engineering professional?
Join Eng-Tips Forums!
  • Talk With Other Members
  • Be Notified Of Responses
    To Your Posts
  • Keyword Search
  • One-Click Access To Your
    Favorite Forums
  • Automated Signatures
    On Your Posts
  • Best Of All, It's Free!
  • Students Click Here

*Eng-Tips's functionality depends on members receiving e-mail. By joining you are opting in to receive e-mail.

Posting Guidelines

Promoting, selling, recruiting, coursework and thesis posting is forbidden.

Students Click Here

Jobs

Longer abbreviations
4

Longer abbreviations

Longer abbreviations

(OP)
It was pointed out to me that saying the letters www, is three times longer than saying "world wide web".
I know it's easier to type, but had anyone ever come across anything similar, where the abbreviation is longer to say than the original, full length name?

(Then we can move on to why they chose the symbol "@" which is two key presses and thus as slow to type as the word "at"...only joking.)

"I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go past." Douglas Adams

RE: Longer abbreviations

and why is Abbreviation such a long word?

Keep the wheels on the ground
Bob

RE: Longer abbreviations

So it can be abbr.

RE: Longer abbreviations

Hmm... is "WWW" an abbreviation or an acronym?

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943.
Have you read FAQ731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?

RE: Longer abbreviations

dub, dub, dub is how I say it.

RE: Longer abbreviations

I don't think it's either an abbreviation or an acronym.  It's an initialism.

Good Luck
--------------
As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein

RE: Longer abbreviations

(OP)
We actually say "Wickey Wickey Woo".
Not much shorter, but you do get some raised eyebrows.

CajunCenturion: I think you are correct. Whoops!

"I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go past." Douglas Adams

RE: Longer abbreviations

2
I prefer "world -wide wait"

Bung
Life is non-linear...

RE: Longer abbreviations


As I understand, there are several types of abbreviations, including shortened words or phrases, logograms (symbols), acronyms and initialism.

Whenever acronyms are pronounced by reading each letter separately, and not as a single word, we have initialism. Examples: CIA, BBC, HP, Btu, TEL, DDT, EDTA, NTP, STP, DNA, RNA, BOD, emf, FM, fpm, ppm, UHF, etc.

It appears the difference lies in the pronunciation, especially when there are vowels that enable reading the abbreviation as a word.

So, what would the abbreviation psia be, an acronym, an initialism, both, or what ?

RE: Longer abbreviations

So if I start saying "Wha-wha-wha" then I can call it an acronym?

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943.
Have you read FAQ731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?

RE: Longer abbreviations

One that always bugged me was "Dubya Dubya Two" for World War Two.  Seven v. three syllables.  Silly.

RE: Longer abbreviations

GensetGuy,

That's to avoid confusion with "Dubya Dubya Eye Eye."  (Another one from my father.) See that alpha-numeric thread for more details.  (Two (2) or two).


RE: Longer abbreviations

WYSIWYG - What you see is what you get, seems to be in line with OP's idea.

RE: Longer abbreviations

GUI- Graphical User Interface, usually pronounced "gooey"

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943.
Have you read FAQ731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?

RE: Longer abbreviations

"Double U" (W) three times is 6 'U's, but I doubt if it will catch on!

RE: Longer abbreviations

How about "sextuple U" - only 4 syllables.

Good Luck
--------------
As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein

RE: Longer abbreviations

[Rant]

Since this discussion has moved to particulars about the World Wide Web, I dearly despise it when I hear commercials that omit the "dot" between the WWW and the rest of the URL.

"For more information go to WWW this-is-dumb dot com". Where the hell is the first dot.

I'm sure some of you are thinking I have way too much free time if that is on my annoyance list, but there you have it.

As a side note, I also used to hate hearing "H T T P colon backslash backslash" when it's obviously not a backslash. This one has fallen out of use since most people are enlightened enough not to need anything but the actual content of the URL.

[/Rant]

RE: Longer abbreviations

"As a side note, I also used to hate hearing "H T T P colon backslash backslash" when it's obviously not a backslash. This one has fallen out of use since most people are enlightened enough not to need anything but the actual content of the URL."

Except when it's https.

colonslashslash
Hg

RE: Longer abbreviations

Years ago in the early days of CAD when 3D was still at the cutting edge of "technolgy" (note that Hi-tech now intuitively means  computer science -- rocket science is out-of-vogue and computers are in) we had an IT guy that would say baclslash when he meant slash and it would drive me nutty and this was before double-U, double-U, double-U even existed or for that matter http//.  But I inadvertantly got back at him because I would always spell out (is this in the same catagory as ...up... for jimbo?) I.G.E.S. and he would always come back with ijiss  as one word.  2 syll's vs 4 so I guess I am getting payed back in spades with www initialed up.

RE: Longer abbreviations

I use "TripleU" which, to me, is just a longer version of "DoubleU".

RE: Longer abbreviations

I always have trouble when telling people what URL to type, because they always seem to assume that everything should start with www.  I'll say "go to maps.yahoo.com"  and they'll type "www.maps.yahoo.com" and then tell me that the page doesn't load...  makes me want to shove 'em out of the way and type it myself.

RE: Longer abbreviations

I worked for a firm that contracted with the Atlantic Division of the Naval Facilities Engineering Command, or LANTNAVFACENGCOM for "short".  LANTDIV was used as an abbreviation for the acronym.

Would a word formed from the first syllable of the component words be considered an acronym?  It is the same principle.

Regards,
William

RE: Longer abbreviations

That's a blend.

Hg

Eng-Tips guidelines:  FAQ731-376

RE: Longer abbreviations

I just leave out the "triple -U" (www) because if they need that much spoon feeding I don't want them slowing down the World Wide Wait when I have serious surfing to do.....

Racing and bullfighting are the only real sports...everything else is just a game.
Bob

Red Flag This Post

Please let us know here why this post is inappropriate. Reasons such as off-topic, duplicates, flames, illegal, vulgar, or students posting their homework.

Red Flag Submitted

Thank you for helping keep Eng-Tips Forums free from inappropriate posts.
The Eng-Tips staff will check this out and take appropriate action.

Reply To This Thread

Posting in the Eng-Tips forums is a member-only feature.

Click Here to join Eng-Tips and talk with other members!


Resources