abbreviations in uppercase

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Author Message Sheldon Wolfe Senior Member Username: sheldon_wolfe Post Number: 726 Registered: 01-2003 Posted on Friday, February 28, 2014 - 12:22 pm:    I recall a rule for abbreviations that says they should be uppercase and not use periods. I thought it was a CSI thing, but I didn't find it in the PRM, practice guide, or National CAD Standard. Do you know where such a rule exists? Lynn Javoroski FCSI CCS LEED® AP SCIP Affiliate Senior Member Username: lynn_javoroski Post Number: 1768 Registered: 07-2002 Posted on Friday, February 28, 2014 - 12:36 pm:    Do you mean i.e.: "NIC"? (grin) Sheldon Wolfe Senior Member Username: sheldon_wolfe Post Number: 727 Registered: 01-2003 Posted on Friday, February 28, 2014 - 12:46 pm:    And GPM and VAC and PSI... Lynn Javoroski FCSI CCS LEED® AP SCIP Affiliate Senior Member Username: lynn_javoroski Post Number: 1769 Registered: 07-2002 Posted on Friday, February 28, 2014 - 12:58 pm:    Read about abbreviations: http://www.economist.com/style-guide/abbreviations http://www.dailywritingtips.com/7-advisories-about-abbreviations/ http://www.writingservices.eu/Abbreviations-HowToWriteThem.htm and from the last one: Lower-case abbreviations We read by moving our eyes from right to left across a line of letters which are broken up into groups called words. Lower-case letters are preferable because they are quicker and easier to read and do not interrupt the word-flow by making the eyes move up and down. Therefore, as a general rule, capitals should not be used unless there is a good reason to do so, eg, to show the beginning of a sentence. Thus, measures such as kg, km and kph are nearly always in lower-case. When they are preceded by a figure, the modern practice is not to put a space between the figure and the abbreviation, eg, 10pm, 20kg, 45lb, 80kph, 50mph, and so on. Common phrases By common consensus, abbreviations of common phrases, such as ‘ie’ for ‘that is’, are also in lower case. In modern written English there are no points (periods or full stops) between the letters (as used to be the case) because these are considered redundant as they do not add to the recognisability of the abbreviations. All readers instinctively understand what ‘ie’, ‘eg’, ‘viz’, and ‘etc’ stand for. However these abbreviations are nearly always followed by a comma (which represents the natural pause when saying these phrases out loud), though the comma too could easily be considered redundant. Capitalising abbreviations In most other cases abbreviations are nearly always capitalised – even where they refer to phrases or groups of related words that do not take initial capitals because they consist of common nouns, such as CAP for ‘common agricultural policy’, GDP for ‘gross domestic product’, and so on. The purpose of this capitalisation is to make the abbreviation more recognisable as such which, in these cases, outweighs the need to keep the flow of words as smooth as possible. The plural of these abbreviations is always indicated by a lower-case ‘s’, eg, IOUs. Abbreviations that are combinations of several words, each of which is abbreviated to more than one letter, are a mixture of capital and lower case letters. These mainly occur in academic titles. Each element of the combined abbreviation begins with a capital letter and lower-case is used for the other letters as in, for example, PhD, BComm, and BEng. William C. Pegues, FCSI, CCS Senior Member Username: wpegues Post Number: 903 Registered: 10-2002 Posted on Friday, February 28, 2014 - 01:11 pm:    I think that applies acronyms and materials abbreviations. Technically, it can be incorrect to use all uppercase for things like gpm and psi. Those are well defined officially as case sensitive. Otherwise, when you get into performance specifications and you start talking about ultimate strengths and yield strengths, look at the official abbreviation for ultimate strength... MPa its not MPA and to make it so would be not just bad form, but rather mistake. Also, the official abbreviation for most metric measurements are lower case - unless they specifically have a mixed case abbreviation. William C. Pegues, FCSI, CCS, SCIP Affiliate WDG Architecture, Washington, DC | Dallas, TX William C. Pegues, FCSI, CCS Senior Member Username: wpegues Post Number: 904 Registered: 10-2002 Posted on Friday, February 28, 2014 - 01:13 pm:    Nice find, Lynn! William C. Pegues, FCSI, CCS, SCIP Affiliate WDG Architecture, Washington, DC | Dallas, TX David E Lorenzini Senior Member Username: deloren Post Number: 149 Registered: 04-2000 Posted on Friday, February 28, 2014 - 08:29 pm:    Sheldon, I recall seeing the same rule about not using periods for abbreviations in TD-4 - Abbreviations, one of a series of Technical Documents published by CSI, probably in the late 80s or early 90s. You are correct in that Module 5 of the UDS on Terms and Abbreviations, although the most comprehensive publication on abbreviations for drafting, did not include this advice. It did, however, present all 5000 entries without periods. It also organized them both ways, alphabetically by abbreviation and by meaning. David Lorenzini, FCSI, CCS Architectural Resources Co. Sheldon Wolfe Senior Member Username: sheldon_wolfe Post Number: 728 Registered: 01-2003 Posted on Friday, February 28, 2014 - 11:02 pm:    I should have prefaced my question; as usual, I tried to find an answer before posting. Lynn, I found several guides, though not the ones you suggested. Unfortunately, none of them address our world of construction documents, which occasionally has rules that are not the same as for "normal" publications. As William notes, there are conventions for abbreviations, but sometimes, what we do in construction documents is not the same. Thanks, David! I may not be entirely crazy! I'm fairly certain I have seen a rule of some sort that said "all uppercase and no periods" or something to that effect. The National CAD Standard lists all abbreviations in uppercase, but it also states that is the preferred case for all text. As is often the case, there is no universal agreement. It's sometimes difficult to decide which standard to follow. A common example is snail mail addressing. The USPS says the last line should be City (space, space) State abbreviation (space, space) Zip code, yet it's common to see addresses with single spaces and a comma after the state abbreviation. Does it matter? Apparently not, because mail seems to arrive no matter what is on the address label. Another example is phone numbers. By the book, they should be (123) 456-7890, but it's unusual to see the parentheses anymore, and many companies have decided that 123.456.7890 looks cool. John Regener, AIA, CCS, CCCA, CSI, SCIP Senior Member Username: john_regener Post Number: 687 Registered: 04-2002 Posted on Saturday, March 01, 2014 - 12:50 pm:    I believe USPS has a standard for handwritten addresses that says all-caps (no cursive) and put the ZIP code on the same line as City and State. Also, for businesses (at least), use ZIP + 4 numbers. For telephone numbers, putting the Area Code in parenthesis was because it was not always needed. Now, Area Code is sometimes necessary for calls across the street. And including "1+" is only for the benefit of those who don't know how to "dial" a call to a number with an Area Code. Christopher Borcsok (Unregistered Guest) Unregistered guest Posted on Saturday, March 01, 2014 - 01:42 pm:    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abbreviation gives a summary of conventions one way or the other. CSI Manual of Practice appears not to mention it. CSC Manual of Practice (of which I don't actually have a copy) may, as referenced by the NMS user's manual (reference to CSC MoP Chapter 13): https://secure.spex.ca/siteadmin/usermanuals/images/4.pdf "Abbreviations do not use periods." Louis Medcalf, FCSI, CCS Senior Member Username: louis_medcalf Post Number: 27 Registered: 11-2010 Posted on Tuesday, March 18, 2014 - 03:55 pm:    USPS does not like the abbreviation St for 'Saint' as in my address on St Charles Ct, because 'ST' means 'stree' to their computers. Not using periods for abbreviations is advocated by Elements of Style by Strunk & White [a favorite book I re-read from time to time].