Abbreviations Dictionary [antikvár]

foreword Abbreviations, contractions, signs, and symbols are all around us and are increasing rapidly with the development of our technological civilization, which demands short cuts and invents short forms. This reference book is necessary if only for the reason that some short forms stand for as many as sixty-four different things. Daily speech, newspapers, magazines, books, and signs along the airways, highways, railways, and waterways reveal the universality of short forms and the growing tendency to use and devise more and more of them. arrangement Everything in this book is arranged in alphabetical and numerical order. Particles, prepositions, and the ampersand are ignored in the arrangement. For example, U of P is alphabetized as UP; A & M and IT & T are arranged as if they were AM and ITT. capitalization Short forms usually follow the capitalization of the words they stand for, although this is not a fast rule. In the fields of armament, computing machinery, electronics, and engineering, we find that, as people get used to new devices and concepts, capital letters drop to initial capitals and finally to lower case. ICBM has become icbm; UNIVAC became Univac and now is often written univac. Loran has become plain loran. In many military establishments and offices, full capitalization is used because message machines are provided only with capital letters. That is the reason why many engineering drawings supplied the armed forces contain all abbreviated material in full capital letters. In good technical wridng and printing, however, all units of measure, velocity, and weight are rendered in lower case: 45 yds, 1500 mph, 1100 lbs. To set such items in running text or on drawings as 45 YDS, 1500 MPH, or 1100 LBS makes them look clumsy and in some instances may lead readers to believe that they stand for things other than the measures and weights indicated.