A Call for the End of Abbrevs

Its getting impossible to know what people are talking about on these forums

A couple of years ago my new job made me watch videos on Uncle Bob's Clean Code paradigm. In it he is a big advocate for sensible names and the elimination of "encoding" symbols including spelling out the names of functions. Its becomes a huge source of confusing just to save a little typing.

For example

C&C
DOS
PoE
DOS
NMS

People are typing these with the assumption that we all know what these mean

/rant

I wholeheartedly agree with you but, unfortunately, you've merely expressed yourself with another equally incorrect set of instructions.

The use of abbreviations is a required part of a good text because, without them, text can quickly become a burden to both read and write. Take the following paragraph:

I really enjoyed my time in Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky. What Legends of Heroes: Trails in the Sky did that other games didn't might be a matter of hot debate, but, for me personally, Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky was something else altogether. Legends of Heroes: Trails in the Sky is something I'll be replaying again, that's for sure.

The title is way too dominant and becomes just a blur of Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky and was a pain to write and no doubt laughably awful to read.

The correct use of language is to write that paragraph as:

I really enjoyed my time in Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky. What TitS did that other games didn't might be a matter of hot debate, but, for me personally, TitS was something else altogether. TitS is something I'll be replaying again, that's for sure.

In the improved version the title is established by writing it out in full, but thereafter shrunk down to its abbreviation so that the brain can subconsciously scan any further reference without it interrupting the flow of the meaningful words and narrative structure.

What bad writers do is, as you say, go straight in with the abbreviation without the initial reference point and this is appalling communication. But bad writers can also do the opposite and drown their words in mind numbing repetition of very long and very destabilising nouns.

Solution would be a "sticky" thread explaining everything, preferrably in the "General Chat" area, I think.

Example : http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=822400

What I hate is when somebody posts a link to something that is not related at all to the topic. What does SWTOR have to do with the abbreviations we use at RPGWatch? Nobody with living brain cells will follow a link to Drakensang or SWTOR threads.

https://professionalmoron.com/2013/04/25/how-to-be-an-irritating-social-media-presence/

Personally I find it more natural to write:

"I really enjoyed my time in Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky. What that game did that other games didn't might be a matter of hot debate, but, for me personally, it was something else altogether. It is something I'll be replaying again, that's for sure."

I think it's easier to read this way, without the need for abbreviations. But of course English is not my native language, so I may be wrong.

P for pibbur

Yes, generally the shortest pronoun is the way to go, once you've established the noun, and if there's no ambiguity.

I think we're probably stuck with abbreviations, though. Every club or society on a specialist subject tends to be rife with them, which can be less than ideal sometimes. I don't think it's that a big a problem.

Ripper said:

Yes, generally the shortest pronoun is the way to go, once you've established the noun, and if there's no ambiguity.

I think we're probably stuck with abbreviations, though. Every club or society on a specialist subject tends to be rife with them, which can be less than ideal sometimes. I don't think it's that a big a problem.

Click to expand...

Sometimes, if we leave the domain of games, it can be. In medicine we have a lot of abbreviations, many of them specific to subspecialities. When I worked as a resident in radiology, I occasionally received requests with unfamiliar acronyms. No big deal when they were unknown, I could always ask. But we could have a serious problem if the requester (order placer) and the radiologist (order filler) understood the same acronym differently. Didn't happen on my watch, fortunately.

It's important, when using acronyms to consider if it's likely that the receiver will understand them as you/I do.

pibbur who repeatedly claims that the main benefit of having both a medical and an IT education is knowing twice as many acronyms.

Yes, in a medical context, it could be disastrous. They have various strict communication regulations over here to avoid exactly that.

In a place like this, though, which is in some ways similar to a real world model aeroplane enthusiasts' club, I don't think we will avoid acronym proliferation, and the consequences seem unlikely to be dire.

I plead guilty for that yesterday. Sorry. you are right.

wtf?
tl:dr
lol

I was in DC last night during a FO session and realized there was no BW so I ran through the CW to GN and luckily KLEO had some for sale. WTF the GN? How can I fight the BOS and INST for the RR and MM without my BW?

Someone had to!

lackblogger said:

I wholeheartedly agree with you but, unfortunately, you've merely expressed yourself with another equally incorrect set of instructions.

The use of abbreviations is a required part of a good text because, without them, text can quickly become a burden to both read and write. Take the following paragraph:

I really enjoyed my time in Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky. What Legends of Heroes: Trails in the Sky did..etc.

The correct use of language is to write that paragraph as:

I really enjoyed my time in Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky. What **** did..etc.

In the improved version the title is established by writing it out in full, but thereafter shrunk down to its abbreviation so that the brain can subconsciously scan any further reference without it interrupting the flow of the meaningful words and narrative structure.

What bad writers do is, as you say, go straight in with the abbreviation without the initial reference point and this is appalling communication. But bad writers can also do the opposite and drown their words in mind numbing repetition of very long and very destabilising nouns.

Click to expand...

Its not "correct" at all as you say because its obviously inappropriate. You want to choose a more appropriate abbreviation for the term.

The second point, is there is nothing wrong with using abbreviations in this way, which may be your point, because its clear what you are talking about from the context.

In an essay where more colloquial terms or jargon is used its often made clear with the use of parenthesis, like "In the game Neverwinter Nights (NWN)".

Legal language will clarify parties and involved by spelling out their full legal name (Sir-Tek Canada Limited) , then explaining in parenthesis the more jingoistic name (Sit-tek Canada) or the pronoun (the defendant).

Either way, this is explained early and we understand it by context.

My point is too many people are lazy and use phrases as the above and presuming people know what they mean. Like today I read someone talking about AoD.

Of course we all know what AoD is.

pibbur who said:

Personally I find it more natural to write:

"I really enjoyed my time in Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky. What that game did that other games didn't might be a matter of hot debate, but, for me personally, it was something else altogether. It is something I'll be replaying again, that's for sure."

I think it's easier to read this way, without the need for abbreviations. But of course English is not my native language, so I may be wrong.

P for pibbur

Click to expand...

Oh, without a doubt. If your narrative only involves the mentioning of one game unambiguously then you probably wouldn't need to keep mentioning it again and again in either format.

When writing out an informative example on a forum though it's unlikely someone will quickly imagine the perfect scenario and will likely just use something that provides what is needed to express the point.

wolfgrimdark said:

I was in DC last night during a FO session and realized there was no BW so I ran through the CW to GN and luckily KLEO had some for sale. WTF the GN? How can I fight the BOS and INST for the RR and MM without my BW?

Click to expand...

Exactly!

Lucky Day said:

Its getting impossible to know what people are talking about on these forums (…)

For example

C&C
DOS
PoE
DOS
NMS

Click to expand...

These ones are easy:
C&C = Command and Conquer
DOS = Disk Operating System
PoE = Edgar Allan's last name
DOS = again?????
NMS = No More Shit

Of course, I was kidding.

I also try and avoid using abbreviations, maybe because like Pibbur Who, English isn't my native language. I remember I once asked here what C&C would mean. The answer I received was "Choices and Consequences", but it could well be Westwood's Command & Conquer. But, regarding this subject, I fear we're preaching in the desert…

To me this is a FWP

Just try to keep up with the acronyms

crpgnut said:

Nobody with living brain cells will follow a link to Drakensang or SWTOR threads.

Click to expand...

SWTOR no, Drakensang however I would.

On the topic, soon we'll be confusion will spread around because of repeated letters. Recently when PoE was mentioned in a thread it wasn't clear if it's Path of Exile or Pillars of Eternity. For that reason I'm always writing Eternity instead of PoE when I talk about that game.

Banning abbreviations can't be good however. We need a new system. And I don't mean users, but vBulletin. An option to hover over abbreviations and see tooltips of full titles would be nice for example, but it's forum engine developer who should set a thing like that possible.

What is FWP ?