Conference thebay::joyoflex

"Host over"            -  Use the SET HOST command to access a another
                          computer on the network.

"send me mail"         -  Implies electronic mail, not paper.

I've heard a lot of "I'm a tag."  People look at the person kind of funny and
say "Interesting, you don't look like a tag"...probably getting images of
dog tags, or clothes tags, or something similar.

					*** Kristy ***

There is also that popular pastime, "NOTEing", and the related
term "SINCing".

-b

Concatenate: 	To append two entities.

Jack

Re .4: "Concatenate" has meant "chain together" for a long time. Seems
O.K. to me.
The one I wonder about is "instantiate". This seems like a pretty good word
to me, inasmuch as I can't think of another word with the same meaning; but
somebody recently pointed out to me that it's not in the dictionary, so
we've somehow gotten along without it for a long time. Anybody have any idea
when and where it got coined?

-John

"Instantiate" hasn't made it to New York yet.  William Safire guards our
linguistic gates ferociously.  Please define it, it sounds like a winner!

...diane

"Instantiate" is from LISP and PROLOG. A variable is said to be instantiated
when it is given a particular value. Sort of makes sense to me; "1" and "3"
are instances of "integer", for example, so I can understand what it means
when someone says " the variable INTEGER is first instantiated to the value
1...".

-John

.7 sounds perilously close to the wonderful world of Semiotics.

"Proactive!" -- I hate proactive. It seems redundant.

"Day 0." -- Only computer people start counting at 0.  It sounds like the day 
the bomb will go off.

"Woods Meeting", and it derivative, "Jungle Meeting."  I haven't heard either in 
a long time, but I always thought they were kind of cute.

Len.

O.K., who's going to swallow his/her pride and ask Mr. Covert what
"semiotics" means?
I know it means "the science of signs", but what does a semioticist do
at work? 
I knew that sooner or later I would regret not having one of those
modern dictionaries...

-John

John,

What does "semiotics" mean?

- dave  (pride swallowed)

Answering my own question again...

semiotics

(Plural in form, used with a singular verb.)

1. Semantics (in Logic)
2. Symptomatology (in Medicine)

The science dealing with signs is semiology.

What John meant by it is still enigmatic (at least it is to me).

- dave

Semiotics is a general philosophical theory of signs and symbols
that deals especially with their function in both artificially
constructed and natural languages and comprises the three branches
of syntactics, semantics, and pragmatics.

I consider it a bunch of rubbish, but that opinion may have been
formed by my opinion of the buffoon of a doctoral candidate who
was at the Georgia Tech School of Information (and Computer) Science
while I was employed there.  As an Electrical Engineering student,
his work seemed pure nonsense to me.  ("If I erase the word "the" in
this sentence, I haven't erased the word "the;" I've only erased one
instantiation of the word "the.")

Probably nobody cares but me, but:
My (oldish) New Century Dictionary actually lists "semiology" as part
of the definition of "semiotics". What it says of the suffix "-ics"
is this -
 A suffix of nouns, originally plural, as denoting things pertaining
to a particular subject, but now mostly used as singular, as denoting
the body of matters, facts, knowledge, principles, etc., pertaining to
a subject, and hence a SCIENCE (my emphasis added) or art,...

 I may have my faults, but being wrong is not one of them.

 Sounds like a promising discipline to pick up a doctorate in, anyway.

-John

"Automagicly" (It's tough to get correct spelling on non-words.)


I actually like "automagicly" (or is that "automagically"?)

[I don't recall seeing it written...]

- dave

Strep meetings instead of staff meetings.   Staph can be cured.

Dave C.

re: "Day 0"

	Mathematicians count from 0 (for professional reasons that I won't
go into). Computer Scientists, thinking it cute, picked it up from them.

Someone told me yesterday that he'd seen an editor use the word ``headerize'',
meaning ``to put a header on''.  The editor wanted to be ``consistent'' with
the rest of the text.

Jim Stratton

Excuuuuuuuuse me... I'm gonna pushback on my manager before I revisit
this issue.  By the way, do you know the time window against which we're pushing?  I'd welcome any feedback from you folks out there, providing it's not
amplified above 98 decibels.

re; 3.5

What does "instantiate" mean?  How is it used? (Example?)

- chuck

OK. So much for "instantiate".

But I think I will use "equate", thank you.

- chuck

Someone coined "snail mail" for the ordinary interoffice paper kind.  Only for 
things that aren't already on the network these days, clearly.

"Instantiate" (IN-STAN-CHEE-ATE) is a verb derived from the noun "instance"
(all nouns can be verbed).  It means "to create an instance of".  It is often 
used when a normal creating/copying/duplicating/cooking etc. method of 
creating things isn't being used, but some novel method outside the realm of 
existing English usage.  In particular, it is often used to mean "create an 
acutal existing example from a non-material pattern".  A really good example 
escapes me right now.
			-Kevin

The first time I heard of DAY 0 was last year or so.  It really wasn't jargon 
until then, and should disappear soon, since it referred to a specific event.
Namely the change in software and service pricing so that customers didn't 
have any service charges bundled in to their software license prices.
								-Kevin

I wish "Day 0" would go away, but alas it refers to a program rather than a 
specific event.  We are currently in Day 0 Phase II, Day 0 Phase III is on the 
way soon.

Len.

re .-n
I thought "snail mail" referred to electronic mail over long
slow data links.

I always thought Day O was what Harry Belafonte sang at the end of 
his songs!

beck

To get back to DIGITALese:

can no-one any longer remember that outside DEC the word "engineering" 
is never used to mean "software development"?  And it's no use talking 
about Software Engineering, because that is one of many skills used to 
develop software, not the developing itself.  

Gabriel Barta.

DEC's original name for Software Engineering was "Programming Department".

Pat Sweeney

In olden times we used to "TECO" files.

Now people "PORT" software from one computer or operating system to another

"Docset" = "documentation"

Oddly, the former is a shorter word with the connotation of "a large amount
of documentation."

"Doc set" is an abbreviation for "documentation set," rather than a synonym
for "documentation."   I'm sure they're often used interchangeably, but,
as a writer, I make a distinction between the two terms.

							-- Nina

.29 set me off on a frenzy of nostalgia.
Back in the old days, we used to PIP files or FLX (pronounced "flix") them.
(And some of us real oldsters used to FOTP them.)

In fact, even today we use the names of programs as transitive verbs.
This practice is not confined to DEC, either.  UNIX (tm) users are particularly
prone to this sort of (ab)use of names.

And then there's the phrase "Let's handle that off-line".

Better yet, the following was dropped during a dinner conversation about
Dungeons and Dragons.

	"And then the elf went off-line."

					<clb>

'field test' is strictly DEC terminology.  The rest of the industry calls it
	'beta test.'

'industry-standard' as a euphemism for 'IBM's implementation' is another
	DEC-ism.  When I worked for an IBM shop, we used to laugh at the
	stilted wording some DEC brochures and manuals would use to avoid
	mentioning IBM by name.

Some jargon non-words used across the computer industry:

prepend

	(v.t.) synonym for 'prefix'.  Back-formation from 'append'.

quiesce

	(v.t.) to render inactive.  Back-formation from 'quiescent'.

recurse

	(v.i.) to call recursively.  Back-formation from 'recursive'.  Synonym
	for 'recur'.

--PSW

    
    	'Productize' - meaning to turn something into a marketable product.
    
    	'Abortage' - from an actual DEC error message ("Editor abortage
    has occurred" - I've forgotten the editor name).
    							- Karl

Re: .31

Sounds like somebody who fixes broken bones.

BU

    In a DEC course:
    
    "A command is issued to the hibernating process.  After the process
    has woken up, it looks for a .COM file for further instructions..."

    re .37 hmm... I think "has woken" is correct British usage -- I'm
    not British, so can anyone confirm this? 
    
    Anyway, is this in a VAX/VMS course? If so, I might be able to get it
    Americanized the next time we update it.
    
    					Val

    Re: .37 I think the quote is anthropomorphistic.

    RE:.12-.14 :
    Semiotics is what is much talked in/about in "Art-Language", that
    collection of gibberish much beloved of Douglas Hofstadter in his
    "G�del, Escher, Bach" and elsewhere. It appears to be the exact
    science of combining meaningful words into meaningless
    concatenations, loosely termed sentences...
    
    - Giles

Re .40:

In other words, meetings and reports.

    Glad to see this note is still alive.  I, too, am bugged at bieng
    told to work things off-line, or to go off and work the issue relative
    to this time frame and give input to share clartiy about where I'm
    coming from.
    
    blecchhhhh!!!
    
    I have most recently been apalled at the perversion of adverbs and
    adjectives into nouns or verbals:
    	-to do something immediately is to "immediatize" it
    	-a written transcript of a speech is an "entranscriptization"
    
    I can't go on.  Anyone else have some of these jewells?
    
    Wess
    	p.s.	re: "headerize"
    		How about "enhead"...?  I actually heard it!

    
    What the hell is/are 'metrics'.
    
    My dic says its something to do with decimal systems, but Digital
    managers are using it in the context of 'something to measure your
    performance against'

    Any clues?
    
    David
    

    'Metric' means 'pertaining to measurement'.  The unit of length
    'metre' (or 'meter' if you must, though that's a measuring instrument)
    just means 'measure'.  The fact that it's part of a decimal system
    of units is irrelevant.
    
    Jeff

    One definition of "metric" is "a standard of measurement."  I believe
    this is the origin of the DEC catchword.
    
    ESW

    Re .43:
    
    Merriam-Webster's _Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary_ says:
    
    	metric	. . . 2 : a standard of measurement <no ~ exists that
    	can be applied directly to happiness -- _Scientific Monthly_>
        
    
    				-- edp

    Metrics as our writing group uses the term refers to standard 
    measurements for getting a job done. It's used primarily to 
    estimate the amount of time needed to do a project.
    
    For example, writers are expected to turn out x number of pages
    a day for hardware manuals; y number of pages for a software manual;
    the editor can edit z pages day for updated material, but only t
    pages for new manuals; the typesetter sets so many pages a day;
    the artist draws so many figures, and so forth.
    
    Before jumping on me that this is too mechanical, please realize
    that these are general guidelines only: allowances must be made for
    many factors (technical difficulty of material, experience of the
    writer, large or small numbers of illustrations, etc.).
                                                     
    -bs 

From the BULOVA::VWS (VAX workstation software) conference:

        MicroVMS Workstation Software V3.0 transitioned into Phase 4 
        on May  23,  1986.  


Sigh...
							-- Nina

At the IDECUS meeting in Marlborough in April, several of the speakers 
mentioned "focussing" on this or that "space"...

Blrrgh...

Stephen

    
    From Marc Rozycki, San Francisco office ...
    
    Dig :	(rhymes with 'smidge')  where we all work
    O.H.:	anyone or anything connected with Digital management,
    		as in, "They're getting pretty testy down in O.H. Central".
    
    John Hayes
    

    "Mailstop"

From a recent Product Requirements Specification:

"...feature foo is not required. In addition, 
feature mumble is a *non-requirement* [emphasis mine]."

    What's wrong with that?
    
    	Jon

What's wrong is that not only is "non-requirement"
not a word, it is unclear what is meant. By saying
"function foo is not required", it is clear that
we (the developers) need not implement foo, but if
we do, that's OK. But, does "function mumble is a
non-requirement" mean the same thing, or does it
mean that we are explicitly barred from implementing
mumble?

Bruce

    
    re: .53
    
    What's wrong with the statement is that it implies that you are
    going to expend energy in order to avoid something.  Just sounds
    silly.  The other FINE DEC "non-" that I hear a lot is "non-goal".
    Those are stated right along with the goals.  I wonder what the
    payback would be on a non-product??  :^)

    I'm surprised at all of you for not pointing out the obvious.
    
    To me, "...feature foo is not required." means exactly what it
    says. "...feature mumble is a non-requirement" means that feature
    mumble is not required. What's wrong with the statement as it's
    written is that it's too clumsy. I'd have written it "Neither
    feature foo nor feature mumble is required."
    
    --- jerry

Let us not forget that the lowly word, "foo" is a Digitalese --
other companies have their own, unique, metasyntactic variables.

As you no doubt already know, foo is a variant of foobar, which
is derived from fubar.  The definitive history and definition
follows the form feed.

Martin.

The term FUBAR actually first appeared during the reign of Queen
Anne of England (1702-1714), the last ruling sovereign of the
Stuart Dynasty (1603-1714). The Duke of Marlborough (1650-1722),
John Churchill, Sir Winston's great great... grandfather, after
his great victory at the battle of Blenhiem (August 13, 1704)
against the French, in Austria, had some captured French
dispatches translated. The translator, unfortunately unknown,
but believed to be a Lance Corporal in the Royal Guards, having
some difficulty translating a slang French expression used by
Marshall Tallard, the defeated French general, gave up in despair
and wrote in FUBAR, although not literally translating the
dispatch, expressed the French general's analysis of the situation.

	Smith-Huxley,J.P., "The Augustan Age of Good Queen Anne",
	pp 386-387, R. Clay Ltd, London, (1903) SBN 384-82210-2.


 FOO 1. [from Yiddish "feh" or the Anglo-Saxon "fooey!"] interj. Term
   of disgust.  2. [from FUBAR (Fucked Up Beyond All Recognition),
   from WWII, often seen as FOOBAR] Name used for temporary programs,
   or samples of three-letter names.  Other similar words are BAR, BAZ
   (Stanford corruption of BAR), and rarely RAG.  These have been used
   in Pogo as well.  3. Used very generally as a sample name for
   absolutely anything.  The old `Smokey Stover' comic strips often
   included the word FOO, in particular on license plates of cars.
   MOBY FOO: See MOBY. 4. The legendary South Sea island FOO bird,
   named for its characteristic squawk, "whose digestive system
   [as described by Spider Robinson] is so incredibly rank that,
   if its excrement should contact your skin, re-exposure of the
   contaminated skin to air is invariably fatal."  Thus, "if the
   foo defecates, wear it."
				-- From the AI Hackers' Dictionary

    If "non-requirement" is not a word, then what is it, a picture?
    
    "Non-goal" and "non-requirement" are important words that have a
    well-defined meaning. "Non-requirement" does not meant that something
    is not a requirement. It is much, much stronger. It means that
    something is really an anti-requirement; it is specifically not going
    to be considered. They are extremely useful terms. They pre-empt
    spurious requests. 
    
    	Jon

Sorry, Jon, but I feel that "words" like
non-goal, non-requirement, non-strategy, etc.
only serve to confuse and/or hide the real issues.
I am new to DEC (but not new to Software Engineering),
and have always thought that requirements specifications
were the most important piece of the development 
cycle. Thus, the clearest language possible should be
used, and assumptions should be stated. Terms like
non-requirement appear because someone somewhere once
mentioned a certain function in the context of the 
product under consideration, and apparently all ideas
and requests must be addressed in the specifications.
So, I guess there is possibly a deeper problem here?
After all, fuzzy words are usually used to express
fuzzy ideas or understanding.

Bruce

    re:  Non-Goal --  
    
    In Educational Services, our use of this term has a very specific
    meaning which, in the context of our courses, is:
    
    "Those things described as Non-Goals will absolutely NOT be covered
    in this course."
    
    We do this for a reason -- mostly to cover our butts... by explicitly
    stating what the course will NOT cover, we avoid problems with 
    dissatisfied recipients (whomever they may be).
    
    For instance, if a dissatisfied recipient comes back to us and says,
    "I thought your XYZ course was going to cover XYZ Internals," we
    can point to the Non-goals and say "You'll notice it says here in
    the Non-goals 'This course will not cover XYZ Internals.' Have a
    nice life."
    
    Why do we do this?  Because recipients HAVE come back and complained
    that they were unhappy when their pet subjects weren't covered in 
    courses.

    Often, knowing what is NOT in a course is just as important as what
    IS in the course.
    
    
					Andrew

Re: .-1

Exactly the point!  The purpose is to clearly state what
is and is not to be included in the scope of something, 
whether that something be a product, a class, etc.  
What bothers me is the creation of "Digital words" to
cover these cases.  I would rather see a statement such
as "FOO and BAR are not included (required, etc.) in this
class (product, etc.)...", as opposed to making FOO a 
"non-" something.

Bruce

    re: -.2
    
    Absolutely!!  You said it yourself in the last sentence, without
    resorting to non-words :^), and gave a great illustration of the
    issue.  There's nothing wrong with saying what is NOT in the course
    being offered.  The offense being discussed here is the presenatation
    of those topics as any sort of goal.
    
    From Webster - GOAL - An end; objective.

                   OBJECTIVE - defn 1 - something worked for, or striven
                                        for;  a goal.

    Surely you don't work at something, like putting a course together,
    with the objective of NOT including certain topics!!  You work at
    INcluding certain (other) topics.
    
    Make sense???
    
    :^"

    
    Seems to me that a list of non-goals would be very-long indeed.
    
    sm

    Samuel Johnson beat everyone to the punch.  He objected strenuously
    to the "barbaric rending" of the language by the introduction of
    "monstrous sounds, cavorting as words".  He once called for a commission
    on the Kings' English, to ensure the purity of the language (although
    he did so many things with tongue-in-cheek, I don't know if he was
    serious on this one).  Some of the "non-words" he objected to:
    
    		lovely
    		delicious
    		overstate
    		pell-mell
    
    So, the argument he started still goes on...

< Note 3.60 by SUPER::KENAH "O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!!" >
                 -< Non-Goal has a specific meaning in ESD&P >-

    re:  Non-Goal --  
    
    In Educational Services, our use of this term has a very specific
    meaning which, in the context of our courses, is:
    
    "Those things described as Non-Goals will absolutely NOT be covered
    in this course."
    
As a former Ed Services employee I feel compeled to say that this is a 
pathetic cop-out to justify creating a phrase where there's plenty of
legit language that would do just fine.

As a participant, my humble brain could understand a phrase like:

This course will not cover...

or

Not included:

or...

Much of this sort of sloppy language comes from trying to be cute or current.
We do better to create words that fill a void.  "Non-Goals" doesn't do that.

Mark

    As another ex Ed. services employee (an instructor, not a course
    developer) I'd like to express my opinion. Non-goal is merely
    consistent with the unnecessary term goal where "here's what we
    teach" would have done. (No offense, Andrew).
    						-Brian

    One of the beauties of English is that there are many ways to say the
    same thing. The advantage that "non-goals" has over "things we will not
    teach in this course" is that "non-goals" has is that it is two
    syllables long instead of eight. I would argue that the shorter
    construction is the clearer one.
    
    	Jon 

re: .67

    "Shorter is better" is Occam's Razor.  It's applied a lot in science,
    where the simpler theory is considered the better one, if both theories
    are consistent with the observations.  Occam's Razor was first applied
    to the theory that the earth revolves around the sun.  It IS possible
    to show that all the planets, stars, etc., revolve around the earth;
    however, the mathematical model for this theory is INCREDIBLY complex.
    
    I've also heard a teaching dictum that "it's sometimes better to be
    inaccurate for the sake of clarity".  Both Occam's Razor and the inaccuracy
    theory are applied a lot.  I also prefer "non-goals", because it's shorter,
    and clearer.
    
    (Before someone flames about inaccuracy: do you really think that
    instructions are dropped into neat little boxes in the machine, the
    way it's presented in the documents?)

'non-goal'  plusgood; 'list of things not covered' doubleplus ungood

	Nigel 

    re: -.1
    
    Watch it, Nigel.  You know what happened to the original compiler
    of the Newspeak Dictionary.

    Re: .71
    
    Does    non-plussed = minus  (as in "no longer there"?)

The discourse of the last 20 or so replies points out why non-goal
should be either
    1) not used anymore, or
    2) defined better.

I had trouble with the word when I started reading DEC specs 10 years ago.
What I learned then was that a "non-goal" was something that was not
to be part of the effort, but if it happened for free, that would be okay.

This is quite rational.  There are a lot of things we try to do, and if
side benefits accrue as well, that's a plus.  The goal of a team player
is to help his team win (that's what makes him a team player).  If, as
part of the conduct of his job, he gets extra outside attention  (say
he hits 50 home runs and leads the league in stolen bases)  then
that's a plus.  It might not have been a goal, but it wasn't a goal
to NOT get 50 home runs either.  

I favor the use of the term non-goal to indicate such things, but this flies
straight in the face of other interpretations, notably that in .58,
which indicates that a non-goal is something that is not only not to be
achieved, but is to but actively avoided.  I believe that that interpretation
means that it is a GOAL to not do something.

Hence it is lack of agreement as to what "non-goal" means, and this lack 
of agreement arises from lack of communication.  Thus, be warned:
I will use non-goal as I have stated my favored use of it here, and 
any of you who read my specs will now understand what I mean.  
(There, I'm cleared.)

- tom (who also defended "functionality" but who doesn't use it often)]

    I have generally seen the term "anti-goal" used to serve the secondary
    purpose of non-goal mentioned in .-1.
    
    I think some previous comments have missed the point of the non-goal
    term. Of course in the broad sense one would have to state a whole
    lot of non-goals if they were just things you didn't plan to do.
    
    However, most DEC projects grow out of many disjoint discussions
    and suggestions regarding a particular problem, and that leads to
    n-1 differing sets of expectations (I'm giving the definer of the
    project the benefit of the doubt and claiming he'll at least agree
    with the last person he talked to.)
    
    In an effort to set expectations correctly, it is necessary to state
    what it is you are doing and precisely what characteristics of a
    project will make it a product. These I think we all agree are goals.
    
    I generally use the term non-goal to clarify any suggestion which
    has NOT been included in a goal but that a potential consumer of
    my product may think I said I'd include. My definition fits with
    .-1: If these happen, fine, but we won't do much work for them.
    
    I use the term Anti-goal to denote an expectation which we will
    actively work to defeat, such as running a software system on a
    processor which is no longer produced. Here's a case where my
    goals in building a product (pushing new hardware at minimal support
    cost) may not mesh with a potential consumer (an account rep with
    a customer who has 1000 of the old widget) and I want to make sure
    that he understands that I will work to make sure the software doesn't
    run on that machine.
    
    One final note: I usually put all three terms into a spec (except
    that anti-goal often isn't needed) but I start each section with
    my definition of the term for those who aren't into DECese.
    
    							-Brian

    .74 has settled the argument for me.  If one is to use the terms
    `Non-goal' and `Anti-goal' with any clarity it is necessary to include
    a definition each time because the terms are not part of the standard
    language.  That seems to defeat the object of keeping things as
    brief as possible.  I can't see any reason why I should want to
    use either of these clumsy terms when there are alternatives which
    I can use and which I can assume that my readers will understand.
    
    
    Julian

    .73, .74:
    
    "non-goal"? "anti-goal"? What's wrong with statements such as
    
    "xxx is not a goal..."; "xxx is not included in our goals..."
    
    "xxx will no longer work..."; "xxx will not work under these conditions:";
    "xxx will not be 'supported'...";
    
    You get the idea, I think.
    
    Dick
    

	If I may revert to DIGITALese just briefly, this
	whole conversation seems to have 'gone down a rat hole'...




	Does the expression 'working an issue' give anyone else the shivers?

	

    How about "working an issue down a rat hole"?
    
    -bs

    re .77:
    
    "Working an issue" sounds like a difficult birth.
    
    Steve Kallis, Jr.
    

    re .57 "foo" & "fu-, foo-, (phu- !) bar"
    
    Is this really DIGITALese?  I was intimately familiar with this
    term and its associates, "bar", "baz", "snod", "froz", etc. in college
    and never heard it to be associated only with DEC.  I had never
    heard "mumble" used in the context it is used here, though.  Is
    it indigenous to DEC?
                      
    
    re "non-goals"
    
    I started working at DEC last July, and sometime last fall we had
    a meeting to discuss our group's LRP (long range plan - which means
    about 2-3 years...).  The manager has these nice "TeX'ed up" :-)
    overhead slides, with things like our schedule, our goals and,
    suddenly, our "non-goals".  Boy, was I confused.  Of course, I had
    to ask the stupid question, `What the heck is a non-goal?', excusing
    myself for my ignorance, but I was new, etc.  Their reaction was
    `You don't know?  One always has to have non-goals!'  Obviously
    one of those commandments I missed somewhere.  As someone mentioned
    earlier, a list of non-goals seems to be a rather ambitious project:
    "The VAX Lisp Development group's non-goals include:  implementation
    of VMS, VT3xx production, redecoration of the Mill, ...".  The implied
    meaning is `those things they might think we should do, but which
    we don't have the resources for, so we better tell them ahead of
    time that we ain't gonna do it!'  And I guess it is quite reasonable
    to have such a list, covering one's butts, as someone put it earlier.
    But the term "non-goal" is not immediately clear.  I was confused.
    Anyone out there understand it the first time you encountered it?
    I doubt it.  There must be a better way.
    
    Richard

    "Non-goal" and "Working the issue" suffer similar impediments: both
    allow the speaker to say one thing and the listener to understand
    the other.
    
    When someone says that "Double precision is a non-goal for this
    compiler" they are likely to mean it in the strong sense, ie "We
    are not implementing it, and furthermore aren't inclined to do so."
    
    The listeners hearing it as a non-goal finds the flame of hope ignited
    because the speaker _has_ mentioned it.  Was it mentioned in order
    to start discussion, appeal for funding, etc?
    
    Every non-goal is someone else's goal.  That's why statements are
    never direct.  No one will ever say "This is not part of the project."
    when the non-goal evasion exists.
    
    "Working the issue" can be truthfully uttered by anyone living.  It's
    a figleaf over dealing with when there will be action.

    The score was tied, 3-3.  I had the puck behind our goalie's net,
    my eyes flashing across the expanse of blue, which now, with
    only a few seconds left in the game, seemed a mile long.  Players
    hovered and snarled; sticks clacked, skates scratched and sprayed
    the ice.  The crowed roared, impatient shrieks.  Suddenly I charged
    out, my mind blurred and numb with the vision of victory.  The clock
    above me, so far above, glistened with its cold yellow numbers.
    I glanced at the tip of my stick; then I whirled, and with gentle
    leverage, lifted the puck into a thick black arc that carried it
    above our goalie's left shoulder and into our net, a soft plop. 
    The green light flashed on.  Behind his cage mask, the goalie looked
    shocked, dismayed, confused.  But I grinned.  We had won; the score
    was now 3-2.  I had scored a non-goal.
    
    

    
    I'm not sure if this is in here already, but....
    in a recent memo sent out to my group, there 
    was the following sentence:
    
    Some dialouge was held with W and X about the needs for 
         ^^^^^^^^
    prototyping the Y for Z.
              
    
    Now, what I want to know is how did X, Y, and Z hold the
    dialouge?? It seemed pretty heavy to me. 8^)
    
    						/^PiT^\ 
    

    Dialouge?  Is this a two person sled they use in the Olympics?

    re:.84
    
    	I don't know, but I saw them after the dialougeing (sp?),
    	and they looked pretty tired!! 8^)
    
    				/^PiT^\

    re .85
    
    Don't be so luge!

    RE:86
    
    	Define `luge'.
    	My dictionary does not compute.  8^)
    
    					/^PiT^\ 

    'luge' is French for 'toboggan'.
    

    ... which prompted the subtle reponse in .84.  Mr. Shuster probably
    inferred (like me) that 'dialouge' rhymed with 'rouge' :-)
    
    Which prompts a question: I thought the American way was to drop all
    -ue endings (catalog-ue etc.).  Is it sometimes spelt (spelled if
    you like) with?
    
    Jeff.

    re: .89
    
    As in all rules of English or its derivatives (American, Pidgin,
    etc.), as soon as someone makes a rule for it, someone else makes
    exceptions.  'Dialogue' is the current American spelling of the
    word.  I've seen 'dialog', but only as a company name.

    I don't know if the "og" ending is American, but Digital prefers
    to drop the "ue".
    
    I think the "ue" looks more elegant.  Such as yelling, "Road Hogue!"

    re "dialog(ue)":
    
    Last Sunday in the Worcester Telegram there was an article about
    Noah Webster, the creator or Webster's Dictionary.
    
    Anyway, it was he who tried to standardize an American English by
    dropping the "u" from words such as "colour", and "flavour", replaced
    "-re" with "-er" as in "theatre", and other such things.
    
    Perhaps this "-ue" bit is his doing also.
                                                   
                  /
                 (  ___
                  ) ///
                 /
                    
    

>	Such as yelling, "Road hogue" !


I tried it.  The lady thought I yelled "Road hog".

I suspect it doesn't work write if you yell.

/Eric

I came across this in a Human Resource Plan. I think it is remarkable.

"...Revenue will nearly double each year over the next two years. We
have both upside and downside to these numbers and no visibility to
the timing of peaks and valleys." 

Ouch.

John H.

    Would someone define for a new noter (or point me in a decent direction for
    the definitions of) "flame" and "WAG"?

    Flame (vi):  Angrily go on and on about something that no one 
    else really cares about.  
    
    Flame (vt): Get angry at someone just on principles.
    
    Flame (n): A long, boring diatribe, lacking substance, but not
    exclamation points.
    
    Flamer (n): Someone who likes to flame.  A pyromaniac.
    

    WAG -- Wild guess. The "A" is silent. Similar to the silent "F" in RTFM
    meaning Read The Manual. 
    
    	Jon

    Re: .96
    >    Flame (vt): Get angry at someone just on principles.

    Sorry, but I don't see how that's (vt) - you don't flame someone,
    you flame *at* someone, which is still (vi).
    
    To the questioner:  it's also included parenthetically (as Flame
    on, flame off) in notes as a polite warning to the reader.  It means
    "I am about to call you all sorts of things that are actionable,
    but you can't sue me for libel because it's in a flame."

    (Also known as Diplomatic Immunity, or, in this country, Parliamentary
     Privilege)
    
    Jeff.

    The "Famous Flamers' School' also defines flaming as "moving your
    fingers without having them connected to your brain".

    re WAG
    
    There is also SWAG and EWAG
    
    Scientific Wild A** Guess
    and
    Educated Wild A** Guess

    See also 181.13 for a canonical flame.
    
    	Jon

    
    re: .97
    
    YUK YUK YUK.  That was pretty good.  Like your tag, also, Jon.

    Assume that I've typed in one of those "Gee, I finally found this
    conference" messages that appear so often.
    
    One of my favorite DECspeak words is:
    
    wordsmith (vi, vt) - DECspeak for 'completely rewrite, while implying
                         that very little will be changed'
    
    
    
    another favorite: 'offline' or 'off-line'.  I've often wondered:
    how can something be "worked" while I'm off-line?  I thought 'offline' 
    meant 'unreachable' as in a peripheral.
                                  
    
    Glen
    
    

    For those of you who were getting bored with "space", there is now
    "platform", as in "new strategy for Unix platforms in the 4GL product
    space."
    
Lew Lasher

re: .104 
    
>    another favorite: 'offline' or 'off-line'.  I've often wondered:
>    how can something be "worked" while I'm off-line?  I thought 'offline' 
>    meant 'unreachable' as in a peripheral.
                                  
You picked up on only one of the meanings and uses of the term off-line.
Off-line usually means that the operating system is not available. When
it refers to a peripheral, the device is not available to the operating
system. So when someone is going to work an issue "off-line", for example
at a meeting a topic which is not the main focus, came up and is now taking
too much time, they may want to continue the discusion "off-line". In this
case, it would be outside of the context of the meeting, or not directly
available to the meeting.
    
				- - -  Karl

re: .106

> So when someone is going to work an issue "off-line", for example
> at a meeting a topic which is not the main focus, came up and is now taking
> too much time, they may want to continue the discusion "off-line". 

Any more of this Karl and you can expect a 3 a.m. call from the Grammar Police.

In the above sentence I can identify:
 i)    singular subject with plural verb    ( someone ..... they )
 ii)   tautology                            ( main focus )
 iii)  wrong word !                         ( focus )
 iv)   spelling error                       ( discusion )
 v)    random punctuation                   ( focus, )
 vi)   incorrect punctuation                ( "off-line". )
 vii)  missing preposition                  ( work an )
 ix)   The whole sentence itself is 
       dangerously close to being  
       one large tautology.                 ( So when someone is going to 
                                              work an issue "off-line", .....
                                              ....  they may want to continue 
                                              the discusion "off-line". )

Apart from the specific errors, that sentence is one of the most excrutiating
pieces of prose I have had this misfortune to read for many a month  :-)

Please sir, this standard is, ( regretably ), acceptable in most other note
files, but not - I believe - in this one !

Indigantly yours,

Henry Gillard - TSC Sydney

    Re .107
    
>Please sir, this standard is, ( regretably ), acceptable in most other note
                             ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
    Take the brackets and word away and you are left with silly looking
    punctuation .
    
>files, but not - I believe - in this one !
               ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
    Same use , different format . Standardize .
    
                                               
    John J :^)
    
    

    But, John, surely - the essense of stylishticness (sick) is doing
    lotsa many different things - in whole, heaps of (inventive[we hope]}
    ways.�wHy standardize?

    Your friend in sunny Welwyn (Hubba Hubba)
    
    Phillip - but that's another confrence

    Re .109
    
    Oobsolatly . 
    But if someone makes mistakes , and these mistakes are highlighted
    world-wide , then he'd better not make any himself . I thought this
    was an unwritten rule that we all adopted ?
    
    Anyway , I came here to be pedantic , and pedantic I shall be .
    :^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^):^)
    
    John J
    

    �    Same use , different format . Standardize .

    Regrettably, `regretably' (however spelt and/or punctuated) is an
    adverb. I believe `I believe' isn't.
    
    b 
    

    
    So ?
    
    John J
    

    So, although the duplication of () between ,, is pleonastic,
    the two parenthetical comments weren't structurally similar.
    
    It's not my standard practice (I don't have one).  But if
    someone wants to set off a parenthetical adverb in () and
    a parenthetical sentence in dashes, maybe that's _his_
    standard.
    
    Yours for diacritical heterogeneity, and thoughtful use of dashes,

    b

    Does that mean it's acceptable ?
    
    John J
    

    Re .-1
    
>>       Does that mean it's acceptable ?
                             ^^^^^^^^^^
    
    Please see topic 464. :^)
    
    Dan

    Re .114
    
    Dunno - wouldn't like to pontificate (see 466.14). The ,(), is
    superfluous; but I don't agree with the fairly wide-spread view
    that dashes are uncouth.
    
    b

re: 107

> Please sir, this standard is, ( regretably ), acceptable in most other note
> files, but not - I believe - in this one !

re: 113
>    So, although the duplication of () between ,, is pleonastic,
>    the two parenthetical comments weren't structurally similar.
>    
>    It's not my standard practice (I don't have one).  But if
>    someone wants to set off a parenthetical adverb in () and
>    a parenthetical sentence in dashes, maybe that's _his_
>    standard.

Now I _am_ confused.  As a lad I was taught that a pair of brackets _should_
be surrounded by a set of commas, but that a pair of dashes did not require
them. Having had the practice of a quarter of a century brought into question
I retreated to the local library in an attempt to find some scholastic
authority to settle the issue.

Unfortunately the importance of grammar has been so devalued that finding a
reference work is not an easy task.  The only one which I could find tells me
that the commas surrounding the brackets are redundant, but hedges its bets
on the treatment of dashes. In the text it makes no reference to commas; 
similarly its examples show no commas. On the next page however, illustrating 
the Gerundial Infinitive, I found the following two examples :-

   I am,-to tell you the truth,- quite tired of this work.
   They were thunderstuck,-so to speak,- on hearing this news.

Comma,dash,comma,dash ?  Mr Knowles, what does your authority reckon to that?

p.s. apologies to all on the two typographical errors in .113.  Wonder why
     no-one has pulled me up on the second one yet ?

Henry Gillard - TSC Sydney

    re .117
    
>    p.s. apologies to all on the two typographical errors in .113.  Wonder why
>    no-one has pulled me up on the second one yet ?

    OK then, if you really ask for it, we'll pull you up on the second
    one (re excruciating), and the third one (re indigent).
                 -                                    -    

    	roger    

    Re .117
    
    The -, ... ,- punctuation used to be the norm, I think. I don't
    remember seeing a pair of single dashes in anything printed before 
    this century.  And I've noticed that languages in a post-colonial
    context (not a dig at Oz - the same applied in France after the
    Romans) tend to be conservative.  So maybe standard practice in
    present-day Australia is to stick with the -, ... ,-
    
    I will cite an `authority', with the proviso that I understand all
    books as interesting and often worth considering - not final (I've been
    involved too long in the process of publishing books to regard anything
    in black and white as sacrosanct.) A particularly interesting thing
    about any academic `authority' is the date when it was printed. 
    
    Kirkman, J.: _Points_on_Punctuation_ (1983) [no more publication
    details I'm afraid - the copy I have is in typescript]
    
    `6.1
    
    Use a pair of dashes to set off heavy parenthetical asides...
    
    Examples
    	
    	The raw data produced by these routines - and there are
    	17 of them - must be processed within ...
    
    	... client claims that most of the computing is interactive -
	though we would not accept this definition - and he therefore...

    6.2
    
    Use a single dash to add a phrase or clause to a sentence, especially
    to create a pause before a final "punch" at the end:
    
    Example
    
    	... consistently achieved 50 gallons per hour - optimum output.'

    
    As it happens, this is in line with the way I use dashes; but that's
    not the reason the Kirkman book happens to be on my desk - just
    old course-material that I haven't thrown away.
    
    bob

    Re: .119
    
    > The -, ... ,- punctuation used to be the norm, I think.  I
    > don't remember seeing a pair of single dashes in anything printed
    > before this century.
    
    In her novel _The Mill on the Floss_, first published in 1860, George
    Eliot uses the single dashes extensively.  For example, in Book
    Second, Chapter IV:
    
    	So he carried off the sword in triumph mixed with dread - dread
    	that he might encounter Mr Stelling - to his bedroom, where,
    	after some consideration, he hid it in the closet behind some
    	hanging clothes.
    
    On very rare occasions, she places a comma _before_ the first dash,
    but never after it; she never places a comma either before or after
    the second dash.  Sometimes she introduces the first dash with a
    colon; for example, from Book Sixth, Chapter X:
    
    	Her eyes and cheeks were still brightened with her child-like
    	enthusiasm in the dance; her whole frame was set to joy and
    	tenderness: - even the coming pain could not seem bitter - she
    	was ready to welcome it as a part of life, for life at this
    	moment seemed a keen vibrating consciousness poised above the
    	pleasure or pain.
    
    Bernie
                                 

    It's a fair cop. That `before this century' felt pretty shaky
    as I was writing it.
    
    Watch out, though: `first published in... ' doesn't tell you
    much about punctuation. From edition to edition publishers
    often used to change punctuation according to the fashion
    of the time (but they don't do it nowadays, if they can get away
    with using the old typesetting). Whenever a new edition has
    the type reset (without the author reading proofs) things
    can change.
    
    b

.119 >	I don't remember seeing a pair of single dashes in anything printed
	before this century. 
    
Just to add to the confusion, many typographies distinguish between a dash and
a hyphen, as our VTs cannot.  Thus many of us `spell' a "single dash" with a
pair of hyphens -- so.		-- I mean "so: `--'".		I guess.
    
I use "--" just the way Kirkman recommends using what he calls `dashes'.

By the way, Gower in 1965 let stand Fowler's classification of dashes as just 
one of four indicators of parentheses: square brackets, round brackets, dashes 
and commas, in order of decreasing interruption to the run of the sentence.
And Fowler goes on to say

	After the second bracket or dash any stop that would have been
	used if the brackets or dashes and their contents had not been
	there should still be used.  After the second bracket this is 
	sometimes forgotten; after the second dash it is seldom remembered,
	or rather, perhaps, is deliberately neglected as fussy.  But, if
	it is fussy to put a stop after a dash, it is messy to pile two
	jobs at once upon the dash, [...]

My gut agrees with one of his examples:

	If he abandons a pursuit it is not because he is conscious of 
	having shot his last bold -- that is never shot --; it is because...

and not so much with the other:

	So far as it is true -- and how far it is true does not count
	for much --, it is an unexpected bit of truth...

I guess it feels as though the dash is strong enough to wash out the comma, 
but not the fuller stop.  Anyone feel the same way?
							-JwT
(How did this topic get into this topic anyway?)

.122 >	having shot his last bold -- that is never shot --; [...]

Obviously "bolt" is intended there.

I feel I have to point that out because there's some controversy centering 
around the dash being felt to be bold compared to other stops.
I'd like, myself, to put a stop to that bolder dash.
							-JwT

    Re: .122
    
    Why is it necessary to use two hyphens to indicate a dash?  The
    spacing makes it obvious which is intended; no spaces for hyphens,
    single space before and after dashes:
    
    	Grandfather's favorite ear trumpet - the one made of
        ivory - has been purchased by a wealthy medical-antique
    	collector.
    
    Bernie

    For a typographer, the thing is even _less_ straightforward.
    The `dash' can be an en-dash or an em-dash.  But I agree
    with .124 - context makes everything clear.  I find a text
    full of en-dashes typed as `--' and em-dashes typed as
    `---' almost unreadable.
    
    b

    When I took a secrtarial typing course several years ago, I
    was taught to represent a hyphen with a hyphen and a dash with
    two hyphens, since most typewriters, like most video terminals,
    do not have a character for a dash of either length.
    
    I can remember when I first started seeing the three-hypen dashes
    in mail messages, notes, and memos -- about when DOCUMENT started
    to be widely used in the company.  If you enter "---" you get the
    en-dash and if you enter "--" you get the em-dash (and yelled at
    by your editor!); after a while you get used to typing the dashes
    the way DOCUMENT expects them and you forget that the rest of the
    world isn't DOCUMENT. 

    --bonnie

    
    What, yelled at by your editor? Impossible!
    
    Anyway it's "--" for an en- and "---" for an em-dash. Ens are shorter
    than ems.
    
    SO GET IT RIGHT NEXT TIME!
                                 
    ;^)
    
    Perry (a quiet-spoken editor)

    En you tell em for me, too!!

    Alternatives for instantiate:
    
    invoke
    populate
    activate
    start
    begin
    go
    
    Lee

    But none of those means instantiate.  
    
    "Instantiate" means "to make an instance of something that is
    based on a definition of a type."
    
    For example, if I define a type in Pascal, I haven't really
    defined anything yet, just a template for defining things. When I
    actually declare a variable based on that type, I instantiate that
    type. 
    
    The same principle holds true in many database systems, data
    dictionaries, and almost any software that has the idea of types.
    
    --bonnie 
     

    Re "instantiate": this is a term used in Ada. It has the precise meaning
    explained in .-1

    Re: previous few (instantiation)
    
    A related annoyance is the use of "instantiation" to mean "instance."
    
    An unrelated annoyance that you see and hear all the time at Digital
    is the use of "own" as in "he owns that problem."  I wonder whether
    people who use this sort of coinage believe it's an interesting
    metaphor, or whether they deliberately blur the delineation of
    responsibility by using an imprecise word.  More probably, people
    adopt it from their neighbors, figuring it's a fashionable clich�.
    
Lew Lasher

    re .132:
    
    How does "own" blur responsibility? "I own X" is the same thing to me
    as "I am responsible for X." On the one hand, if "own" is fuzzy, then
    one might defend it on the grounds that many things at Digital have
    imprecisely defined responsibilities. Now on the other hand, I view
    "own" as describing a *very* precise delineation of responsibility: if
    I own a problem, it's mine -- I am responisble for it. Don't bother
    going to anyone else, 'cause it's mine, mine, mine, all mine. I own it. 
    
    	Jon

    Re: .133 [Re: .132]
    
    It may well be that within the circles in which you work, "own"
    has a more or less agreed-upon meaning.  But it is no more precise
    than the standard English that normal people use.  Superfluous jargon
    risks confusing the uninitiated.
    
Lew Lasher

    Lemmeesee if I got this right:  the phrase "I own x" is superfluous
    jargon because it concisely expresses the thought "I am responsible
    for x".  We should, therefore, expunge all redundant forms of
    expression from English?
    
    len.
    

     re .134
     
>>   Superfluous jargon risks confusing the uninitiated.
     
     ... as well as the uninstantiated.
     
     Dan

    
    re .133:
    
    I was simply confused about your reasoning. In .131, you argued against
    it because it was imprecise. I think it's very precise. Now you're
    saying that it's potentially confusing. Personally, I can't see how
    anyone could misunderstand the statement "I own that problem." 
    
    If you think it's disgusting, that's fine. If it offends your
    sensibilities, fine. We all have sensibilities that get offended from
    time to time. That's a good reason. The others confuse me, though. 
    
    	Jon

    I agree with Lew in both .132 and .134.  If 'to own' a problem is
    to have responsibility for the problem, then why not just say the
    latter?  Why add a different term to mean the same thing as a perfectly
    clear and familiar term?  Why run the risk of being misunderstood when
    it's so easy to avoid the risk.  When I first heard 'own' used in
    this way (probably at DEC two or three years ago), I was not sure
    what was being said.
    
    Bernie

    re:.132
    
    I've heard and seen that use of "own" for quite some time, both
    in and out of Digital. I think it just started as a "cute" bit
    of phraseology that ended up spreading far and wide, much like,
    oh, "Let's do lunch".
    
    re:.138
    
    Why use "I own that problem" when there already exists the perfectly
    useful "I am responsible for that problem"?  Well, one reason I
    can think of right off the bat is that the former is more concise,
    using only four words, whereas the latter uses six.
    
    --- jerry

    To my ears, "owning a problem" is precise.  "Owning a product",
    on the other hand, is ambiguous: if I own [software] product X, do
    I have responsibility for it, or did I buy it?
    
    Jeff.

    
    Excuse me , but
    
    "I do not own everything I am responsible for" and
    
    "I am not responsible for everything I own" .
    
    ie I own a cat (I purchased it anyway) but I am not responsible
    for it (responsible *TO* it maybe) , and I am responsible for a
    hired TV , but do not own it .
    
    
    "Owning a problem" must come from the 'monkey on my back' syndrome.
    
    
    John J
    

I've been at DEC forever and I used to understand what "to own" meant.  It was
somewhat stronger than "to be responsible for".  If you owned something, your 
pay raise was dependent upon its success or failure.  Simple as that.

At least, that's how it used to be.

Larry

    I must admit I cannot express exactly what the ambiguous
    interpretations of "own" are, but I know they're there.  Reading
    some of the last few replies has reinforced this impression.
    
    If conciseness is the goal, I'd prefer the simpler "has" (as a
    shorthand for "has responsibility for" to the somewhat pretentious
    "own."  "Own" seems as though it ought to mean something more, but
    no one is sure just quite what.  To some extent, it seems a euphemism,
    connoting "pride of ownership" where all that one has been "given"
    is the buck.  It also has a false sense of exclusive control ("he
    drives like he owns the road") that further confuses things.

    I am not against superfluous redundancies that add some nuance to
    expression, but in the case of cutesy bureaucratic jargon, I think
    the burden is on the proponents of the neologism to justify an ill
    thought out metaphor that is no more precise than normal English
    words.
    
Lew Lasher

    I think the problem with "owns" in this sense isn't its meaning,
    which is, as Jon points out, perfectly clear and straightforward.
    It's not a neologism; one can "own" almost anything.  Nor is it in
    itself redundant.  As somebody else has pointed out, "being
    responsible for something" is not the same as "owning something." 

    The problem is, too often it is used to mean the opposite of what
    it appears to mean.  "Owning" a problem seems to preclude doing
    anything toward solving it. When you hear a management-type say he
    "owns" a problem, you can assume that he's going to sit on it for
    a while to see if people will forget about it, and if they don't
    he'll either find a new owner or set up a committee, and either
    way you can forget about results. 

    --bonnie

    p.s. I don't think "has" will work.  I can see saying "I have that
    problem," but I don't think "He has that problem" is going to go
    over too well.... 

    "Has" can work, so long as the object isn't the word "problem" itself.
    In fact, usually at this level of management, they're called "issues"
    anyway.  And in the common context of divying up the unwanted tasks,
    "has" flows fairly nicely, as in "he has this one, and she has those
    two ...."
    
Lew Lasher

      Managers have the habit of sitting on problems instead of solving
      them. However, this is a problem that managers have, regardless of
      the problems they own. 
    
      In my experience, individual contributors have fewer problems in
      owning problems. Some of this, no doubt comes from managers being
      stuck with having to own a problem that has no good solution, while
      easier problems are given to people who would have fewer problems
      owning them. 
    
    
    Okay. I've just done one of my standard tricks for examining a
    questionable usage -- I write a couple paragraphs with it and its
    proposed replacement. 
    
    Sorry, I see no ambiguity. I do not see that it is bureaucratese --
    it's *real* hard for a monosyllable to become bureaucratese;
    bureaucratese is puffing up one's authority by using big words, not
    replacing whole phrases with three-letter words. Nor is it a euphemism.
    A euphemism is a supposedly benign term used to avoid offending
    sensibilities: "I have to visit the little programmer's room." is a
    sentence with a euphemism, "I own that problem." is not. 
    
    Again, as I said before, there's nothing wrong with objecting to
    something on stylistic grounds. "I say it's spinach, and I say to hell
    with it" is a perfectly good objection. So is "it sucks." I'm not
    overly fond of that particular use of "own," myself. But it is not a
    "superfluous redundancy," nor "cutesy bureaucratic jargon," nor a
    as Bonnie said, is it a neologism. 
    
    Perhaps I am still confused with some of your definitions. I just don't
    see how "own" is less concise than "be responsible for." Nor do I see
    how a single-syllable word can be more pretentious than a phrase. Nor
    do I see how "own" is anything other than a normal English word. Sorry,
    maybe it's just me -- maybe it's a problem I have.
    
    	Jon

    Re: .146

        "I do not see that it is bureaucratese -- it's *real* hard for a
    	monosyllable to become bureaucratese; ... bureaucratese is puffing
        up one's authority by using big words, not replacing whole phrases
        with three-letter words."

    This is a good analysis of bureaucratese, and it points out the
    distinction between DIGITALese and bureaucratese elsewhere.  Where
    normal bureaucratese uses big words to make the trivial appear
    important, DIGITALese uses small words to trivialize the significant.
    Similarly, "working an issue" comes across as more relaxing and
    fun than having to "resolve" a problem.  The main common ground
    is the inventing of language for the sake of inventing language
    peculiar to the clique.
    
Lew Lasher

    Okay, now I understand what you're saying. In the future, would you do
    us literal-minded folks a favor by saying what you mean -- if you say
    bureaucratese, please mean bureaucratese instead of its exact opposite.
    It makes communication a tad easier. 
    
    	Jon

    " I own a problem "
    
    " I have a problem "
    
    Difference ? The former originated with somebody else , who still
    'has' the problem , but you have taken (or been given) the
    responsibility for solving it . The latter identifies the individual(s)
    who will ultimately benefit from the solution .
    
    John J
    

    Here's another one.
    
    I told my husband I was having a one-on-one with my manager and
    he thought I was having a hockey game!?!
    

From an update notice:
    
    		"Advisory committee is meeting
                aggressively to revise this standard."
                

    re: .151
    
    Yeah, they're having box-off -- every meeting, a different pair slugs
    it out and the winner gets to advance to the next round.
    
    --bonnie

[ mail header deleted ]

News on DEC

Analysts revealed today that a shortage of acronyms may be behind Digital
Equipment Corporation's poor stock performance of recent weeks.  By middle
of 1989 it is projected DIGITAL will have exhausted all usable 3- and 4-letter
permutations available in the western alphabet.  This is expected to
seriously hamper the introduction of new products.

Although possibilities exist for introducing non-alphabetic characters to
increase the number of permutations available, using unpronounceable
symbols, such as ~,[,*,^, and !, has serious drawbacks.  The Acronymic
Task Force (ATF) has been created by Digital to study the problem.

"We have not actually exhausted all the different combinations of letters,
but the ones that are left often have negative connotations." said William
Hought, ATF chair.  "We can't go around calling products 'FOO' or 'BLAH'."

Hought said the shortage affects the computer industry as a whole, "Right
now there is a rush to trademark various random combinations of letters --
to grab as many acronyms as possible for future products."

"But," Hought said, "the real solution is to expand the alphabet."  When
asked if it might make more sense to use longer, descriptive names Hought
responded, "This is a performance issue." 

Funny, I would have expected that when we run out of TLAs we'll start
using 4-letter acronyms.  Of course existing 3-lettered ones will have
to be converted to 4-letter form by appending the letter 'O' (cf. site
code conversion in 1982).  Thus, a reference to a 3-letter acronym which
existed prior to the new conversion would be called a TLAO.  The TLAO
often used to denote the name of the company itself will look weird of
course, but we'll all soon get used to DECOspell, DECOwindows, etc.

Questionable will be whether separate corporations which are associated
with DECO will conform to the new policy.  Will the credit union be
known as DCUO?  Will the insurance company's program for DECO employees
be called METOpay?

Dave C.

        Come on Dave. 8^) Choose another letter.

        It didn't work with site locations and it would be just as bad
        making FLAs out of TLAs.

        In hardware we were able to keep certain letters out of things
        because they looked too much like something else. O was one of
        them.

        How many people get mail to ML0 and HL0 etcetera when it should
        be MLO and HLO. I don't think ELF likes it either.

        It has nothing to do with it but the SemiConductor Operations
        organization, SCO just recently changed its name and is now
        known as SITG!

        Where will it all end?!

        	Mike

re .154

And the stuff that we hang on the walls of our cubicles will be known as
Art DECO.

    Does that mean that what I buy for lunch in the cafeteria will be a
    DECOration?
    
    Or is a DECOration one of Ken's speeches?
    
    
    (Boo, hiss!!!)

    re .155 - obviously, it will all end at ZZZZ.
    
    At which point we will move on to Five Letter Acronyms, or FLAOOs.
    
    len.
    

>   At which point we will move on to Five Letter Acronyms, or FLAOOs.
When we've all had it up to our wazoo.

    But FLA is a TLA (and ambiguous as well)!

    matrix

I don't recall seeing the following example of Digitalese at its best (or 
worst, depending on your point of view) mentioned in this notesfile.  This
example is from page 394 of the May 1989 (U.S.) telephone directory.

	In ELF a wild-card can ONLY represent trailing letters.
	Non-examples are *OBERT BLOGGS and BOB BL*GS.
	^^^^^^^^^^^^

I guess if you can nounize or verbize anything, you can nonize it also.

Clay

Project Newsletter (management summary):
   
    Hello Everybody!

    Short-to-medium timeframe setting up committee coordinate membership
    structure Task Force wide-ranging power remit (scope-wise) examine any
    and every possibile contingency feedback received Pilot Study
    trainings.

    Mission critical Knock-on Effect current fiscal.

    Q3 business plan feed-forward built into the loop finalise Mission,
    Vision and Critical Success Factors organisational model semi-funded
    development ramping up drive it cross-functional Developmental
    Services Coordination Group (formerly Coordinated Services
    Development Group) flexible working.

    I know the team can count on your support. 

    Thankyou for your time.

    We're having renovations done in the building.  Several memos and
    postings warn us that if we are attempting to use the entrance nearest
    the renovations, then "directional signage" will point the way to an
    alternate route.
    
    gaaah!
    
    -Jody
    

    ... and when the carpets were being revamped at REO2, we were regaled
    with the notice
    			CAUTION TO BE TAKEN
    
    Such fun.
    
    b

    
    
    	My current favorite is ISL... Invisible Support Layer!  
    
    	Noone knows what it does, the virtual images are hidden, 
    	documentation is unknown, but it's absolutly neccesary.  
    
    	It's like an invisible car that comes out of nowhere, hits 
    	you, and vanishes.  Us systems type dweebs call it a 
    	non-existance virtually unknown event!  Don't blink you'll 
    	miss it.  
    
    	Another is Everware!  Absolutly bullet proof software chock 
    	full of bugs...will I Ever stop patching this softWare?  
    	It lasts forEver...believe ME!!  
    
    
    							Kelly
    
    

    The principal DEC hardware product isn't processors, or disk drives, or
    terminals, or workstations. It's bus adapters.  Every bus has an
    adapter to every other bus and there is a different version of adapter
    for every system type. For some interconnections, there is a different
    adapter depending on which bus is slave and which is master.
    
    Every few weeks, another bus is proposed which finally solves the
    performance or cost or length or compatibility or industry-standard
    problem. In order to understand this complexity, and participate in the
    decision process involving it, you must join the
    
    			Bus-of-the-month Club

    RE: a few (months) back...
    
    "I have a problem".  Much more common is "I have a problem with...",
    meaning "I disagree!".
    
    Why do we mince our words?  Of course a much more topical example
    is "rightsizing".
    
    				Cheers...Keith
    

    Everyone's heard of software and hardware, now firmware is getting
    popular.  A scary one I recently heard is for 
    
    	liveware --  the people/personnel of Digital.
    
    (So what's deadware?)
    
    --  Tracy
    (Whose favorite TLA is ADA - Another Damn Acronym)

    
    
    >>>>>	 	liveware --  the people/personnel of Digital.
    
    >>>>>        (So what's deadware?)
   
    
    
    	Can you spell "package"?

     Not any more.

	Suit (n) [from their habitual dress] -- a Digital employee in 
	the field of business, finance, marketing, etc.  A non-propeller 
	head.  <What's the group in the conference room?  I don't know,
	just a bunch of suits.>

    RE .-1
    
    I've heard `suit' with that meaning outside the context of Digital. I
    don't know the right term for the sort of slang it comes from, but I
    associate it with Rastafarianism (Black <mumble> English?  - someone
    here knows the right term).
    
    b

    I used "suit" over ten years ago -- there was a variation, too:
    
    		"Who's the empty suit?"
    
    					andrew

    Granularity
    
    I heard it used in discussions of budgets, systems, personnel, food,
    architectures, designs etc.
    What's an appropriate antonym - boulderization?
    
    Let's get granular! [Apologies to S. Martin]

    
    There are degrees of granularity -- fine-grain, coarse-grain, etc.
    
    But if you really need an antonym, how about monolithicity?
    
    JP

     But I thought that was where BatmanSupermanTheFlash hangs out.

     You want crushed rock? Come to HLO but come the back way. We have our
     own version of a "big dig" 8^) .

    "Atomicity" might be a reasonable opposite to "granularity". It has the
    right sense, it is used that way in some technical contexts, and it
    doesn't require the creation of a new word.

    I feel a bit cross over the Digital synonymizationizing of "orthogonal"
    with "unrelated" (or just "different").
    
    Ray

>     <<< Note 3.178 by SSDEVO::EGGERS "Anybody can fly with an engine." >>>
>
>    "Atomicity" might be a reasonable opposite to "granularity". It has the
>    right sense, it is used that way in some technical contexts, and it
>    doesn't require the creation of a new word.

I disagree.  I think "atomicity" is quite close in meaning to "granularity."
Both mean that there is some fundamental unit of measure, some discrete
quantization.

The opposite of "granular" would be "smooth" or "continuous,"
but I can't think of a good noun that encapsulates the meaning.
Continuousness?

- tom]

>     <<< Note 3.179 by ESGWST::RDAVIS "Chaws more than he can bite off" >>>
>                    -< "Pay is orthogonal to productivity" >-
>
>    I feel a bit cross over the Digital synonymizationizing of "orthogonal"
>    with "unrelated" (or just "different").

Why?  "Orthogonal" means "at right angles to."  Its common use is to
describe two or more qualities that don't have a common correlation.
"Unrelated" is not the only synonym for orthogonal, nor may it be the best,
but it is accurate in certain contexts.

- tom]

    "At right angles" is a fine (some would say the only) definition of
    "orthogonal".  If someone uses the term figuratively (which is only
    appropriate), I'd take it to mean something like "at cross purposes"
    rather than "unrelated".  Lines at right angles _are_ related; they're
    at right angles to each other and, if they're the very best sort of
    lines, intersect.  3rd Avenue is orthogonal to 53rd Street but they're
    related by a stoplight.
    
    Ray

    I am annoyed by the use of "orthogonal" as an unnecessary metaphor.
    Metaphors are wonderful when they enrich meaning by alluding concisely
    and accurately to an already familiar concept.  In the case of
    "orthogonal," however, there are a number of possible interpretations,
    and it is easy enough just to say "independent of," which is probably
    the intended meaning.
    
Lew Lasher

> The opposite of "granular" would be "smooth" or "continuous,"
> but I can't think of a good noun that encapsulates the meaning.
> Continuousness?

	This is a good start, but I think you need to drop the
	"ness" -- it's not Latinate enough.  Also, most people
	know what "continuous" means.  How about something a 
	little more obscure, like "glabrous"?  Let's see, that
	would give us "glabrocity."  But why not throw in a 
	couple of more syllables, say something like "glabroti-
	city."  And then we can shorten to G10Y.  Yeah, I like
	it.

    Nah, that definition sounds too hairy for me.  :-)
    

    Re: .180

    >> I think "atomicity" is quite close in meaning to "granularity." Both
    >> mean that there is some fundamental unit of measure, some discrete
    >> quantization.

    If you feel that way, then using atomic as an antonym to granular would
    be a bad choice.

    To me however, they are fairly close to opposites: if something is
    atomic, then it cannot be divided into granules; if something is
    granular, then the individual pieces can be separated.  It works for me
    in both the physics and computer senses.

>     <<< Note 3.186 by SSDEVO::EGGERS "Anybody can fly with an engine." >>>
>...
>    To me however, they are fairly close to opposites: if something is
>    atomic, then it cannot be divided into granules; if something is
>    granular, then the individual pieces can be separated.  It works for me
>    in both the physics and computer senses.

My interpretation comes from the equating of atoms with grains, metaphorically
at least.
Neither is divisible in the context being considered.
The "granularity" of a budget entry (as an example of the context in which
the word came into this discussion) is the quantum by which it can be
increased or decreased.  Thus I liken granularity to atomicity based
on their relative indivisibility.

- tom]

    
    "Human Resources Architecture"
     

[headers after FF]

ENGINEERING EXCELLENCE COMMUNICATION MANAGER NEEDED

The Engineering Excellence Program Office is seeking a Communication Manager
to develop and implement the worlwide EE communication plan.  The individual
must have a proven track record of success in the communication arena with
ability and desire to work in a high volume, fast pace setting mode.


DO YOU KNOW OF SOMEONE?

I have attached a descprition of the position.  Do you know of somone that
would be a good fit for this role?  If so, please have them contact me by
January 8, 1994.  I will be on holiday beginning today through January 3rd and
will be contacting people when I return.

HUMAN::Raibley, DTN:  226-2907

Regards,

Rebecca



                           COMMUNICATION MANAGER
                       ENGINEERING EXCELLENCE PROGRAM
                               
The individual in this position will work with the Engineering Excellence
Program Office and Steering Committees in developing the communication 
plan, systems, tools and capabilities to support the drive for excellence 
throughout Engineering. The goal of the Engineering Excellence Program is
to dramatically reduce Engineering cycle time.  The Communication
Manager will lead the development and implementation of an Engineering-wide
cross-organizational communication architecture in support of the overall
EE goals.

I.  RESPONSIBILITIES

    A.  Manage the development and implementation of the communication
        framework for the Engineering Excellence Program which include
        programs, processes, events, media, focus groups, teleconferences,
        forums, conferences etc. This communication framework will drive
        employee/manager two-way dialogue, resulting in substantial employee
        contributions to the achievement of Engineering Excellence goals.

    B.  Create/acquire/manage the systems/processes/vehicles necessary to 
        implement an organization wide communication effort.
    
    C.  Interface with Engineering staff members and their teams on their
        communication requirements in the Engineering Excellence area, 
        supporting the design of communication approaches in their areas.

    D.  Work collaboratively with Engineering organizations to identify the
        opportunities to promote Engineering Excellence employee action.

    E.  Focus on communication as a leverage point in achieving 
        Engineering Excellence.

    F.  Integrate Engineering Excellence communication efforts into the 
        on-going communication work of the company.
     
    G.  Participate as a team member of the Engineering Excellence Program
        Office and help to continually refine and drive the organization
        wide development of the EE program.

II. QUALIFICATIONS

    A.  Strong background and experience in communication strategy,
        methodology and tools including demonstrated ability 
        to create and manage organization wide effort.

    B.  In-depth experience at working cross-organizationally with
        excellent credibility.

    C.  Demonstrated experience in leading the development and implementation
        of varied communication strategies for diverse employee groups.

    D.  Ability to work effectively with and consult to senior managers.

    E.  Demonstrated experience in budgeting, business planning, program
        management, evaluation and team leadership.

    F.  In-depth experience in the development and implementation of varied
        communication plans, processes, vehicles and events.

    G.  Excellent communication and collaboration/partnership/learning skills

    H.  Strong writing skills preferred.


From:	MUNCH::FRANCINI "Oh, no! We've got mail sign!  22-Dec-1993 1043" 22-DEC-1993 10:48:51.21
To:	@inside
CC:	
Subj:	FWD: Engineering Excellence Communication Manager Needed

From:	RANGER::LUNER::MUNROE "Becca 223-2143 Operations Eng. & Analysis  
22-Dec-1993 0920"   22-DEC-1993 09:20:11.48
To:	@GEN
CC:	MUNROE
Subj:	Communication Manager Needed

From:	LUNER::GERSTENBERG "Operations Eng & Analysis, 223-1944  22-Dec-1993 
0918" 22-DEC-1993 09:19:01.65
To:	@OEA
CC:	
Subj:	FYI-Communication Manager Needed

From:	LTLDPR::STUIE::SHARPE       "Stu Sharpe - BXC-2/Pole H4 - DTN: 229-7806" 
22-DEC-1993 08:29:37.71
To:	@WJO-GROUP,FRIEND,@LOGCOE
CC:	
Subj:	FWD: ENGINEERING EXCELLENCE COMMUNICATION MANAGER NEEDED

[forwards removed]

From:	MSBCS::HUMAN::RAIBLEY "21-Dec-1993 1050" 21-DEC-1993 10:52:20.00
To:	@[RAIBLEY]STAFF.DIS
CC:	
Subj:	ENGINEERING EXCELLENCE COMMUNICATION MANAGER NEEDED