Subject: Re: Acronyms

From: Bob Braden <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 9 Sep 2001 15:20:58 -0700 (PDT)

Jiwoong,

In my view, any acronynm that would not be instantly understood by 98%
of the IETF should be defined the first time it appears in the
document.  This seems like just plain common sense and courtesy to the
reader.

The RFC Editor has started to enforce this usage in the Abstract
section of an RFC.  It might not be a bad idea to enforce it
everywhere.

Bob Braden

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From: Daniel Senie <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 09 Sep 2001 18:52:10 -0400

>section of an RFC.  It might not be a bad idea to enforce it

Guess I'm not the only one who finds it annoying to read a draft title 
which is chock full of acronyms, and then an abstract which says the same 
thing, with the same acronyms... If I can't determine what the author is 
talking about from the announcement that gets sent to ietf-announce, 
there's a good chance I won't read the draft and make comments.

I think this should go beyond RFCs, and perhaps be added to the Guidelines 
for Authors of Drafts.

Dan
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Daniel Senie                                        [email-masked]
Amaranth Networks Inc.                    http://www.amaranth.com

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From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 09 Sep 2001 15:43:15 -0700

>section of an RFC.  It might not be a bad idea to enforce it

excellent suggestion.

d/

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Dave Crocker  <mailto:[email-masked]>
Brandenburg InternetWorking  <http://www.brandenburg.com>
tel +1.408.246.8253;  fax +1.408.273.6464

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From: Einar Stefferud <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 9 Sep 2001 16:29:37 -0700

The basic problem with Acronyms is that they do not
tend to include enough vowels;-)...

This leads to what I call "acronymics"
or "painful acronyms".

But, this problem has a possible solution:

If your first try with initial letters fails to satisfy,
try using the first 2 letters, likely including more vowels.

And, if that does not work, use the first 3 letters...

Etc, until you reach the degenerate case
of just using whatever language you prefer;-)...

This is a language independent solution.
All acronyms can be shown to degenerate
into some kind of natural language.