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Date: Tue, 30 Apr 91 02:00:21 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: SPACE Digest V13 #482
SPACE Digest Volume 13 : Issue 482
Today's Topics:
Three-Letter Acronym (TLA) Update Program (UP)
Administrivia:
Submissions to the SPACE Digest/sci.space should be mailed to
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From: agate!bionet!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!thunder.mcrcim.mcgill.edu!bonnie.concordia.ca!IRO.UMontreal.CA!matrox!uvm-gen!kira!news@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (Garrett A. Wollman)
Subject: Three-Letter Acronym (TLA) Update Program (UP)
******
This edition's special message...
I would like to hear from people who know about the Japanese,
European, and Soviet programs about more acronyms unique to those
organizations... Also, do you think I should post to
sci.space.shuttle in addition to sci.space?
******
This message is periodically posted to the newsgroup sci.space in an
effort to make NASAspeak understandable to the general reader. The
primary purpose is a repository for space-related acronyms; however, I
reserve the right to make non-acronymic entries at any time. Just the
same, this document does not attempt to cover any issues in-depth; for
more information, you will probably want to read the FAQ, posted by
leech@vangogh.cs.unc.edu, which also comes out about once a month.
The title of this posting comes from an April-fools' spoof of Peter
Yee's "NASA Headline News" postings; I believe that this is in the
archive at Ames. As it turns out, the title given there is not
exactly as I had remembered it, but I will keep this title as is.
Many of the descriptions here are from the NASA Mixed Fleet Manifest
dated February 1991. Others are blatantly stolen from Mark Bradford's
acronym posting, which is somewhat shorter; these entries are marked
with a splat (`*'). His posting has a somewhat different scope than
mine; he also includes material intended more towards sci.astro,
whereas I have chosen to exclude this material. If there is enough
demand, I might add some.
Don't forget that there are 17,576 TLAs possible; get yours in soon!
Thanks to the following other individuals who made a contribution to
this posting: Jonathan McDowell, Ron Graham, and Mary Shafer.
A Three-Letter Acronym (TLA) is defined as follows (from The Jargon
File 2.7.1, edited by Eric S. Raymond):
TLA: /tee el ay/ [Three-Letter Acronym] n. 1. Self-describing
acronym for a species with which computing terminology is infested.
2. Any confusing acronym at all. Examples include MCA, FTP, SNA,
CPU, MMU, SCCS, DMU, FPU, TLA, NNTP. People who like this looser
usage argue that not all TLAs have three letters, just as not all
four-letter words have four letters. One also hears of `ETLA'
(Extended Three Letter Acronym, pronounced /ee tee el ay/) being
used to describe four-letter acronyms. The term `SFLA' (Stupid
Four-Letter Acronym) has also been reported. See also {YABA}.
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===== A =====
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AC: Atlas Centaur.
ADFRF: Ames-Dryden Flight Research Facility, formerly without the
"Ames" as DFRF; this is still reflected in their Internet domain name
(dfrf.nasa.gov). Located at EAFB. Home of Mary Shafer and lots of
older research aircraft. The first SCA also lives here, as well as