Conference thebay::joyoflex

    
    
    Naturally...
    
    DEC Corporation ??????
    
    

       The dreaded:	VAT tax

    Before `PIN numbers' were dreamt of (I think) I was haunted by `ISBN
    number'.  This was serious, because I worked in a bookshop at the time.
    
    To answer .0's last question, I don't think there is anything anyone
    can do.  But languages stay around for quite a while, and I guess that
    sometime in the next millennium (dv) everyone (except readers of
    historical dictionaries and students of etymology) will be unaware
    that `PIN' implies a noun.
    
    In the meantime, a lot of people find it annoying.  I find it
    irritating, but don't lose any sleep over it. When I'm feeling
    pedantic (esp. with security people, who are very fond
    of saying `PIN number') I just say `PIN'. This often hinders
    communication (an important consideration, esp. when dealing with
    a jobsworth); so - when necessary - I tack some other noun on
    (but not `number'): `PIN whatsit' or `PIN doofer' or `number thingy'.
    Plain `number' sometimes works.
    
    Wise coiners of acronyms leave the noun out - e.g. Geep (in which the
    P stands for a noun all right, but not for the vehicle itself - which
    is a General Purpose vehicle/car/w.h.y.)
    
    b

    
    In Canada we have a Social Insurance Number which the government
    uses to track. 
    
    In this case its not too bad. Ask someone for their SIN number;
    it could be fun.
    
    Roger

	SCUBA gear

	LASER light

	Dan

SALT Treaty.
COBOL Language.

Larry

Maybe the fault lies not in the people who use the acronyms, but in the 
people who make them up.  If anyone seriously thought people would be saying
"I'll take my SCUBA topside," or "Oh good, they've signed the SALT!" they
are badly out of touch with people's speaking habits.  This is especially
true in cases like SALT or PIN where the acronym is a commonly used word
that can only cause confusion when heard in context.

So don't get angry at the persons who try to make themselves understood by
adding these little redundancies, get mad at the idiot who put them in that
awful position.
					>>>==>PStJTT

    It is also true of abbreviations that are neither common words nor
    pronounceable as words.  Our project is performing extensive testing
    now and it is quite common to hear people speak of "DVT tests" and
    "SVT tests."
    
    I agree with .0 - the practice is maddening and it does take an
    effort to keep from correcting people when they use such locutions.
    There seems, moreover, to be little pattern to the practice.  We
    never hear, for instance, people speaking of the "AMA association"
    or the "GNP product," but "PIN number" and "DDA account" are quite
    common.
    
    Bernie
    

Some of the examples in previous replies aren't fair.

For example, "SALT" could refer to the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks,
the negotiations that produce a SALT treaty.

Also, is there an official corporate interpretation of "DVT"?  If it stands
for Design Verification Testing, then "DVT tests" would be correct if used
as follows:

	"In the course of Design Verification Testing, the xxx group ran
	a total of 200 DVT tests during the last month."

    It works the other way too:

    In the UK the Ministry of Transport (MOT) instigated a roadworthiness
    test for cars which gave rise to the following usages (both meaningless
    if you think about them too hard) -

    "Let's see its MOT"     -   ie MOT certificate

    "It failed its MOT"     -   ie MOT test

    Looking at the latter, perhaps people were afraid that T stood for test
    and therefore didn't want to fall into the trap described in previous
    replies :-)

    Dick

    Language lives. I'm still a pedant on such things as correct usage of
    fewer/less but "PIN number" rolls off the tongue sufficiently well for
    me to use it (except that I've forgotten mine :-). After all, the
    history of language is one of anomalies becoming the "norm". 

A problem of a different sort occurs almost universally with the acronym 
"MIT".

The first (and just about only time) I heard someone refer to "MIT" as 
"the MIT", it sounded funny, but preceding "MIT" with "the" is correct.

Clay

    Re: .9
    
    It is not unfair to criticize "DVT tests."  If the T stands for
    "testing," it is at best awkward to say "Design Verification Testing
    tests," and much more satisfactory to refer to them simply as "Design
    Verification Tests."  Why add the extra word and the redundancy
    "testing tests"?  Also, even if the T stood originally for "testing,"
    it is not incorrect to change the form to "test" or "tests" as required
    in sentences.
    
    Bernie

	But "MIT" could very well include the "the", just as it
	includes the "of", despite there not being a letter in
	the acronym for it.

	Dan

    It certainly sounds awkward to say "the MIT," but then it doesn't
    sound awkward at all to say "the FBI."  I suppose this is yet another
    part of the language in which one should not expect to find an excess
    of logic.
    
    Bernie

re .12

I certainly agree with you that "Design Verification Testing tests" sounds
awkward, and I have no problems with "Design Verification tests".  The point
that I was trying to make was that "DVT tests" is not incorrect in the way
that that "PIN number" (meaning Personal Identification Number number) is.
"Design Verification Testing tests" is a clumsy, but appropriate, term for
tests that are run in the course of the procedure called Design Verification
Testing.  "DVT tests" is less clumsy, and means exactly the same thing.

Perhaps we can reach a compromise on this issue, by agreeing to an alternative
term.  Instead of either "DVT tests" or "Design Verification tests", how
about "that goddam waste of time that didn't detect the problems that it
should have"?

-- Eric, who remembers DVT for a product whose name I won't bother mentioning

    Re: .15
    
    > "Design Verification Testing tests" is a clumsy, but appropriate,
    > term for tests that are run in the course of the procedure called
    > Design Verification Testing.  "DVT tests" is less clumsy, and
    > means exactly the same thing.
    
    Well stated.  Why may it not be the case as well that "Design
    Verification Test test" is also a clumsy but appropriate term for
    a test that is run in the course of the procedure or process called
    Design Verification Test?  And in that case "DVT test" would also
    be a less awkward way of saying exactly the same thing.  I just
    do not see the difference between the two.  I think neither is
    incorrect.  Both are merely redundant and awkward.
    
    Incidentally, we may never know what the "T" was intended to stand
    for.  In the publication _Corporate Phase Review Process Guide_,
    there occurs a glossary entry "Design Verification Testing (DVT)"
    and the following statement in the text: "Design Verification Test
    (DVT)...units must be the same as the production units."
    
    I like your proposed compromise very much and shall adopt it.  If
    we change the name to GWT (Goddamn Waste of Time), then GWT test
    would not be redundant.
    
    Bernie 

    After four years of going there, I assure you that "the MIT" sounds
    very strange. (I hestitate to say it's wrong.)  The text, carved into
    stone above the entrance says,
    
    	MASSACHVSETTS INSTITVTE of TECHNOLOGY
    
    "The" simply isn't there.

	A favourite (in the French computer press at least) is to talk
	about proceesing power in MIPS.  Unfortunately, only those
	processors with 2 or more MIPS are quoted correctly.

	Often reference is made to 1 MIP processors  -  1 "Million
	Instructions Per" processors 

    
    On the same line, is VUP plural? 5 VUP or 5 VUPs?

    G'day,
    
    
      MIPS = Meaningless Information for P....... Saletalk
    
    
    
    
    djw
    (or so 'twas defined to me , once )
    

    
    Just as an example of redundancy that I've always liked, an artist
    friend of mine did a work in college called:
    
    Bare Naked Nude Without Any Clothes   
    
    (And ALL acronyms are annoying, redundant or not! List all the
    alternatives for any one of them -- PC is a good one:
    Personal computer
    Pocket caluclator
    Personnel Committee
    Pop corn
    Portable computer
    
    
    you can go on from there into meaninglessness forever...)
    
    Sherry

    Re 21 (Sherry):
    
    >(And ALL acronyms are annoying, redundant or not! List all the
    >alternatives for any one of them -- PC is a good one:
     
    ... not to mention the granddaddy of them all:
    
    Printed Circuit.
    
    Steve Kallis, Jr.

    Re .23 (Dave ,K):
    
    Hmph!  I was keeping it in the realm of electronics.
    
    Steve Kallis, Jr.

>    Hmph!  I was keeping it in the realm of electronics.
    
>   Steve Kallis, Jr.

	Then we must certainly include Programmable Controller.

			Dave	

	Don't forget Program Counter...

	/ken

    Personnel Consultant

    re somewhere back there - VUPs are not like MIPSs.  A VUP is a VAX
    Unit of Processing.  A VUP is roughly a VAX MIPS.  VUPs got invented
    because a VAX I (as in MIPS) can be a whole lot bigger than a RISC
    I, making VAX MIPS and RISC MIPS unfairly comparable.
    
    By the way, the use of MIP as a pseudosingular form is also ubiquitous
    in the US.
    
    Of course, the classic acronymnyms are AC current and DC current.
    
    len.
    

In baseball, there is a statistic called "run batted in", normally referred to 
by its acronym (or more correctly, I suppose, its initialism) "RBI".  The 
plural is "runs batted in".  Question: what is the plural of the initialism --
"RBI" (with the "R" standing for "runs") or RBIs?

Lately, baseball announcers have taken to saying, e.g. "He now has 100 RBI".
That sounds funny to me, but I don't know whether it sounds funny because it 
is incorrect or because I'm used to hearing it the other way.  

According to the "Handbook of Technical Writing", the correct way to form the 
plural is to add an "s", but their examples (MIRVs, CRTs, and GIs) are all 
initialisms for phrases ended by a noun.  I guess VUP is and example in which 
the last word of the acronymned :^) word is not a noun, so if "VUPs" is 
correct, then "RBIs must be also.

My guess is that "RBIs" is correct, and sports broadcasters (the least 
literate of media folks) just want to sound linguistically correct, but end up 
sounding silly. 

Clay

    re .29 - it's obviously RsBI, pronounced ArzBeeEye.
    
    Of course, that would mean we'd have to adopt VUsP and MIsPS etc..
    
    Uhm, "initialism"?  Whatever happened to acronym?
    
    len.
    

    re .29
    
    Everyone knows RBI is pronounced 'ribbie' and the plural is 'ribbies'
    
    Well just about every baseball anouncer does.
    
    Roger

re: .30

According to the "Handbook of Technical Writing" and acronym is pronounced as 
a word, while and initialism is pronounced as separate letters.  So, COBOL, 
scuba, laser, DEC, RSTS (at least to me), VAX and RBI (pronounced `ribbie' are 
acronyms, but IBM, RSX, PDP, and RBI (pronounced `are bee eye' are initialisms.
I have no idea what the significance is.  I usually use "acronym" for either.

Clay

    re .32 - Aha - now I believe I finally understand the true meaning
    of such technologisms as "initialize" and "initialization".
    
    I wonder - do acronyms and initialisms (how do all the anti-neologists
    (paleologists?) tolerate that neologism?) hinge solely on the
    pronounceability of an arbitrary assemblage of letters?
    
    len.
    

    Did we discuss the issue here or elsewhere of whether such plurals
    require or prohibit an apostrophe?  E.g., in the title to .33, should
    I have written "I's" rather than "Is"?  Do the pluralization rules
    for acronyms and initialisms differ?
    
    len.
    

Re .34

Note 480 in this conference.

Dave C.