This is Info file vera.info, produced by Makeinfo-1.63 from the input file vera.texi. START-INFO-DIR-ENTRY * V.E.R.A.: (vera). Virtual Entity of Relevant Aconyms END-INFO-DIR-ENTRY This is a special GNU edition of V.E.R.A., a list dealing with computational acronyms. Copyright (C) 1993/1998 Oliver Heidelbach Please send corrections to Oliver Heidelbach . Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this manual provided the copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved on all copies. Permission is granted to copy and distribute modified versions of this manual under the conditions for verbatim copying, provided that the entire resulting derived work is distributed under the terms of a permission notice identical to this one. Permission is granted to copy and distribute translations of this manual into another language, under the above conditions for modified versions, except that this permission notice may be stated in a translation approved by the Free Software Foundation. Within the above restrictions the distribution of this document is explicitly encouraged and I hope you'll find it of some value. This dictionary has nothing to do with Systems Science Inc. or its products. File: vera.info, Node: Versions, Next: File extensions, Prev: Concatenation, Up: Format Acronyms pointing to versions ============================= When there is a series of related acronyms differing by a number at the end, V.E.R.A. usually has just one entry, which omits the number. For example, there are many versions of MNP (Microcom Networking Protocol), distinguished by numbers; but we do not list MNP4, MNP5 or MNP10, only So if you look for an acronym that ends in a number, and you don't find it, try leaving out the number(s). File: vera.info, Node: File extensions, Next: Gaps, Prev: Versions, Up: Format File extensions =============== Please note that file extensions are not covered by V.E.R.A. at the moment, although some exceptions were made. You will not find things like EPS (Encapsulated PostScript) or GIF (Graphics Interchange Format). There are many such lists on the Internet if you should be looking for file extensions. File: vera.info, Node: Gaps, Prev: File extensions, Up: Format You will probably notice that some acronym expansions or references are tagged with three question marks (`???'). This indicates that an expansion or reference is still missing or uncertain. File: vera.info, Node: Acronym, Next: Release notes, Prev: Format, Up: Top Acronym ******* An acronym is a word derived from the initial letters or groups of letters of several other words. Popular examples are: *Laser*, from "(l)ight (a)mplification by (s)timulated (e)mission of (r)adition", *Radar*, from "(ra)dio (d)etecting (a)nd (r)anging" or *snafu*, which should politely be rendered as "(s)ituation (n)ormal, (a)ll (f)ouled (u)p". The word acronym itself derives from the greek words *akros* "the highest, the most outer" and *onyma* "name". Please note that acronyms are always pronounced as the spelling indicates. File: vera.info, Node: Release notes, Next: Credits, Prev: Acronym, Up: Top Release notes and other useful information ****************************************** *V.E.R.A. -- Virtual Entity of Relevant Acronyms* *Version 4.4* Version 4.4 (Texinfo release 1.3) contains about 250 acronyms more than the initial release. Now V.E.R.A. knows about more than 7400 acronyms. Version 4.2 had accidently been released containing ISO 8859-1 characters. I received no complaints, but I believe not everyone can display these characters as meant to be, so I switched back to 7 bit with this version. Recently V.E.R.A. ran into copyright/trademark problems. It's unbelievable how small the name space in the computer field went over the years. To give you an example there are acronyms in this list which have five or more different meanings. However Systems Science Inc. agreed to solve the problem by including the following sentence into the distribution: "This dictionary has nothing to do with Systems Science Inc. or its products." Please don't wonder if you surprisingly run into this sentence. *Version 4.3* I found no time to release V.E.R.A. 4.3 as Texinfo version in March 1998 as I was busy with other things. As compiling the Texinfo version is always additional work to do, I thought of to spare the March version and release the next Texinfo version on the next release date (June, 1st). *Version 4.2* Version 4.2 contains about 180 acronyms more than the last release. I also received a mail from the folks who maintain the GNU catalogue. This may mean that V.E.R.A. will be included on the GNU CD-ROM distribution, but I'm not sure. *Version 4.1* Version 4.1 contains about 500 acronyms more than the initial release. Now V.E.R.A. knows about more than 7000 acronyms. Besides I wrote a script which automagically translates the german references sometimes to be found behind the acronym expansions in the original version of V.E.R.A. into the appropriate english terms. It also adds `Germany' to german locations. However I still may have missed some german terms or locations. It is kind of awful to proof-read 7000 acronym expansions. If you still spot german terms in the references, please let me know about. *Installation as Info file* If you like to install V.E.R.A. in your Info environment, there are three steps to do so: 1. Make an Info file from the Texinfo source, type: `makeinfo vera.texi' (The file extension may differ in your environment.) 2. Copy the files generated by the previous step to the directory where the Info files reside on your site. 3. Go to your Info directory and edit the `dir' file. Insert a line like the following where appropriate. `* V.E.R.A.: (vera). Virtual Entity of Relevant Aconyms' *Bugs* This edition of V.E.R.A. has been translated from German and has not been intensively proofread. Please report bugs concerning the use of broken or unsound English used in this document to the current maintainer of this document. If you spot any faults in the acronym chapters, these will be considered a bug too. Please report those bugs to the current maintainer of this document. *Call for submissions* This acronym list is not and will never be complete. However if you feel that something particular is missing, please submit it to the current maintainer. Your submission will be included in the next edition of V.E.R.A. *Current maintainer* The current maintainer of this document is Oliver Heidelbach File: vera.info, Node: Credits, Next: Disclaimer, Prev: Release notes, Up: Top Credits ******* *V.E.R.A. -- Virtual Entity of Relevant Acronyms* The following people contributed to this document: (In order to block spam-robots all @ have been replaced with #.) Wolfgang Houben Hans Fischer Harald Welte Rainer Frohnhoff Marcus Cai Degler Sven van der Meer Patrick Hess Hans-Georg Forster Stefan Rinne Wolfgang Kopp Alexander Senne Frank Schlueter Frank-Th. Bonnemeyer Olaf Naumann Keith Edgerley Kristian Koehntopp Andreas Kempf Thomas Rexroth <100414.42#compuserve.com> Christoph Lechner Timothy Slater J.P. Lodge Andre Torrez Jeff Jewell Peter H. Wendt Rene Caspersen Carsten Schymik Noah Friedman Robert Bihlmeyer Matt Hillman Claude Gingras David Frewen Thorsten 'thh' Hempel Bruno Haible Andreas Waibel Martin Zierke Leonard Otto Stolz Wolfgang Borgert Stefan Hackebeil Wolf Ivo Lademann Werner Henze Kai Reese John L. Sokol Guy Dumais Gerhard Moeller Mike Moxcey Marco Koering Olaf Columbus Craig Menefee Kevin L. Burns About 200 acronyms dealing with the ATM subject were taken from the online collection of the ATM forum. By courtesy of ATM forum. Another batch of acronyms was taken from the freely available acronym collection "Internet Perls 22" (*iperls22.zip*). By courtesy of William Hogg . A lot of military related acronyms as well as several others were taken from the online collection of the DISA Center for Standards. By courtesy of DISA Center for Standards. Thanks to all of them and everybody who should be missing. Also thanks to the following people: Richard M. Stallman For his encouraging words to get this edition done and some comments on how a Texinfo file should be formatted. Also for the efforts taken to deal with the Systems Science Inc. copyright/trademark incident in April 1998. Horst von Brand For pointing to the inconsistency between the file name in `@setfilename' (upper case) and the suggested info entry (lower case). File: vera.info, Node: Disclaimer, Next: Index, Prev: Credits, Up: Top Disclaimer ********** *V.E.R.A. -- Virtual Entity of Relevant Acronyms* This is a special GNU edition of V.E.R.A., a list dealing with computational acronyms. It is currently maintained by Oliver Heidelbach . Although V.E.R.A. has been corrected and worked over for quite a long time, no guarantee can be given for the correctness of any part of its contents. Please don't get it wrong and help to correct any faults you may find. Please send corrections to the current maintainer. The author suggests not to redistribute corrected versions of this document, but instead to inform the actual maintainer about corrections you might have. This would help not to confuse users because of different versions. Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this manual provided the copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved on all copies. Permission is granted to process this file through TeX and print the results, provided the printed document carries a copying permission notice identical to this one. Permission is granted to copy and distribute modified versions of this manual under the conditions for verbatim copying, provided that the entire resulting derived work is distributed under the terms of a permission notice identical to this one. Permission is granted to copy and distribute translations of this manual into another language, under the above conditions for modified versions, except that this permission notice may be stated in a translation approved by the Free Software Foundation. Within the above restrictions the distribution of this document is explicitly encouraged and I hope you'll find it of some value. Please note that another version of V.E.R.A. exists, which is not related to the GNU project. This dictionary has nothing to do with Systems Science Inc. or its products. Oliver Heidelbach (original author) , Copyright (C) 1993/1998 File: vera.info, Node: Index, Prev: Disclaimer, Up: Top Index ***** * Menu: * 0, Acronyms beginning with: 0. * A, Acronyms beginning with: A. * About V.E.R.A.: About. * Acronym, Definition of the term: Acronym. * Acronyms , Searching for (online): Format. * Acronyms pointing to versions: Versions. * Acronyms, Common style of: Format. * Acronyms, How to submit new: Release notes. * Acronyms, Pronounciation of: Acronym. * Acronyms, References for: References. * Additional explanations: Explanations. * Alternative expansions: Alternatives. * Approach, Systematic: Format. * B, Acronyms beginning with: B. * Bugs, How to report: Release notes. * C, Acronyms beginning with: C. * Call for submissions: Release notes. * Changes: Release notes. * Common style of acronyms: Format. * Contributors: Credits. * Copying policy: Disclaimer. * Credits: Credits. * Current maintainer: Release notes. * D, Acronyms beginning with: D. * Definition of the term acronym: Acronym. * Disclaimer: Disclaimer. * Distribution policy: Disclaimer. * E, Acronyms beginning with: E. * Expansions, Alternative: Alternatives. * Expansions, Missing: Gaps. * Expansions, Style of: Style. * Explanations, Additional: Explanations. * Extensions (files): File extensions. * F, Acronyms beginning with: F. * File extensions: File extensions. * Format used: Format. * G, Acronyms beginning with: G. * Gaps: Gaps. * German umlauts: Format. * H, Acronyms beginning with: H. * How to install in the Info environment: Release notes. * How to report bugs: Release notes. * How to submit new acronyms: Release notes. * I, Acronyms beginning with: I. * Info environment, Installation in the: Release notes. * Installation in the Info environment: Release notes. * J, Acronyms beginning with: J. * K, Acronyms beginning with: K. * L, Acronyms beginning with: L. * Legal stuff: Disclaimer. * List format: Format. * M, Acronyms beginning with: M. * Maintainer, Current: Release notes. * Missing expansions or references: Gaps. * Modifications policy: Disclaimer. * N, Acronyms beginning with: N. * News: Release notes. * Numbers, Acronyms beginning with: 0. * O, Acronyms beginning with: O. * Online overview: Top. * Overview, Online: Top. * P, Acronyms beginning with: P. * People who contributed: Credits. * Printing policy: Disclaimer. * Pronounciation of acronyms: Acronym. * Q, Acronyms beginning with: Q. * R, Acronyms beginning with: R. * References for acronyms: References. * References, Missing: Gaps. * Release notes: Release notes. * Reporting bugs: Release notes. * Requests: Release notes. * S, Acronyms beginning with: S. * Searching for acronyms (online): Format. * Style of expansions: Style. * Submissions, Call for: Release notes. * Systematic appraoch: Format. * T, Acronyms beginning with: T. * Translations policy: Disclaimer. * U, Acronyms beginning with: U. * Umlauts, German: Format. * Used format: Format. * V, Acronyms beginning with: V. * V.E.R.A., What is it?: About. * Versions, Acronyms pointing to: Versions. * W, Acronyms beginning with: W. * What is V.E.R.A.?: About. * X, Acronyms beginning with: X. * Y, Acronyms beginning with: Y. * Z, Acronyms beginning with: Z.