Feature request; acronym glossary

[Alan Goldhammer]

"The TLAs are coming! Soon you will all be TLA's!"

-ERM

I'm curious as to what the first commonly used acronym was.  Perhaps SOS.  Certainly SNAFU was of WW II origin.  My favorite was the one we used in our lab at NIH was P6 - Prior Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

As a photographic site, I think our acronym glossary should be illustrated:

[Eric Myrvaagnes]

As a photographic site, I think our acronym glossary should be illustrated:

+1!

[Jeremy Roussak]

Yes, in the IT world they often record ID10T errors, although that's not really an acronym.

So what say you, Jeremy, a thread (lightly moderated to keep it to useful info only), of relevant TLAs and explanations?  And perhaps brief note on pluralising TLAs to ensure they don't become possessive?

I suspect some sort of wiki might be better. Threads here take up an awful lot of screen real estate to say very little (that's not a general comment about quality, just an observation about single-line postings).

Jeremy

[Jeremy Roussak]

I'm curious as to what the first commonly used acronym was.  Perhaps SOS.  Certainly SNAFU was of WW II origin.  My favorite was the one we used in our lab at NIH was P6 - Prior Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance

We should probably define our terms, too. I'm old-school: an acronym is a pronounceable abbreviation, so acronyms are a subset of abbreviations. Thus SOS isn't, because it's always "ess oh ess", and nor is TLA; but SNAFU is. Raw, of course, is merely a word.

I'd understood 6Ps to be a military abbreviation.

Jeremy

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

... an acronym is a pronounceable abbreviation, so acronyms are a subset of abbreviations. Thus SOS isn't, because it's always "ess oh ess"...

Funny, it IS an acronym in Serbian, where it is pronounced as "sauce," but I digress.

[Farmer]

We should probably define our terms, too. I'm old-school: an acronym is a pronounceable abbreviation, so acronyms are a subset of abbreviations. Thus SOS isn't, because it's always "ess oh ess", and nor is TLA; but SNAFU is. Raw, of course, is merely a word.

Indeed.  It should be abbreviations, acronyms, and commonm technical words - all as they relate to photography and/or LL specifically.

[saiguy]

+1 to Farmers post. That's all that would be relevant.

[Alan Goldhammer]

We should probably define our terms, too. I'm old-school: an acronym is a pronounceable abbreviation, so acronyms are a subset of abbreviations. Thus SOS isn't, because it's always "ess oh ess", and nor is TLA; but SNAFU is. Raw, of course, is merely a word.

I'd understood 6Ps to be a military abbreviation.

Jeremy

6Ps may indeed be a military abbreviation.  I take a bit of an issue with the acronym being pronounceable.  Certainly with the advent of the early PCs and on line forums where both connect time and space were a premium resulted in a lot of acronyms:  ROTFL, LOL, etc.  A fair number of these carried over when texting on cell phones came into vogue because it was easy to type in LOL, BFF, and so on.

[Farmer]

6Ps may indeed be a military abbreviation.  I take a bit of an issue with the acronym being pronounceable.  Certainly with the advent of the early PCs and on line forums where both connect time and space were a premium resulted in a lot of acronyms:  ROTFL, LOL, etc.  A fair number of these carried over when texting on cell phones came into vogue because it was easy to type in LOL, BFF, and so on.

The actual definition of an acronym is an abbreviation made with the first letters of other words and then itself pronounced as a word.  It's a subset of abbreviations.

Then there are other, almost-acronyms or pseudo-acronyms which are really just shorthand of a sort like the telex favourite of bibicul8r - "bye-bye, see you later".  It represents other words, but it's not just the first letters of each, and it's pronounced as you would saying the entire phrase.

:-)

[D Fuller]

Here's a start:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_abbreviations_in_photography
And no, RAW isn't there 
And this one's HUGE (also not an acronym).
https://www.netlingo.com/acronyms.php

Is raw an acronym?

[digitaldog]

Is raw an acronym?

In terms of photography and raw sensor data, NO.

[Alan Goldhammer]

The actual definition of an acronym is an abbreviation made with the first letters of other words and then itself pronounced as a word.  It's a subset of abbreviations.

Then there are other, almost-acronyms or pseudo-acronyms which are really just shorthand of a sort like the telex favourite of bibicul8r - "bye-bye, see you later".  It represents other words, but it's not just the first letters of each, and it's pronounced as you would saying the entire phrase.

:-)

Acronyms are pronounceable as Phil notes while initialisms (made up of the first letters of the words in the phrase) are not.  OMG and LOL are initialisms.  Here is a great resource for abbreviations and acronyms.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

About RAW vs. raw.

It is hard not to capitalize when camera manufactures do so. And it makes sense, if for no other reason, than to distinguish a raw photographic file from, say, raw meat (as much as I like steak tartare or beef carpaccio). 

[Alan Goldhammer]

if for no other reason, than to distinguish a raw photographic file from, say, raw meat (as much as I like steak tartare or beef carpaccio).

...plus Sushi.

[Eric Myrvaagnes]

If we, as photographers, always spelled it "raW," most others wouldn't be likely to confuse it with Sushi.   

[digitaldog]

About RAW vs. raw.

It is hard not to capitalize when camera manufactures do so. And it makes sense, if for no other reason,

If fifty million people say a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing.
-Bertrand Russell
Hard to capitalize when Adobe doesn’t (one example).
As the Chinese proverb says: "The first step towards genius is calling things by their proper name"
Common sense isn't a flower that grows in everyone's garden. 

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

... Hard to capitalize when Adobe doesn’t (one example)...

Adobe is just another user of those files. How about someone who created them? Let me see, Andrew vs. Canon... Andrew vs. Canon... hmmm... tough choice.

[digitaldog]

Adobe is just another user of those files. How about someone who created them?

Wrong's wrong bud, doesn't matter who created the files. The facts you can't accept is that raw sensor data isn't an acronym.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raw_image_format
Bryce Bayer, the Eastman Kodak scientist used RAW where Slodoban?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayer_filter
Your continuing inability to resolve the facts and history and an inability to provide any meaning to "RAW" as an acronym associated with sensor data is well known now. You can and should continue to use the usage incorrectly, doesn't mean the rest of us should foolishly do so.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

... you can't accept is that raw sensor data isn't an acronym...

I didn't argue it is an acronym... I suggested it should be capitalized, just as Canon does.