ACS American Chemical Society.
AIChE American Institute of Chemical Engineers.
AIEE American Institute of Electrical Engineers.
AIP American Institute of Physics.
ANSI American National Standards Institute: A non-governmental organisation which develops and publishes standards for voluntary use in the United States.
ARPANET Advanced Research Project Agency Network.
ASCII American Standard Code for Information Exchange. A standard method for encoding characters - "text" files are usually ASCII files.
ASEM American Society for Engineering Management
ASTM American Society for Testing Materials.
art. Article.
BBS Bulletin Board System - electronic bulletin board.
BIDS Bath Information and Data Services. Based at the University of Bath, providing the UK academic community with access to databases over JANET. Also used in Scandinavia.
BITNET Because It's Time NETwork - a co-operative education and research network, primarily used for e-mail services. Uses BITNET protocols.
BL British Library.
BLDSC British Library Document Supply Centre.
Bps Bits per second, a measurement of the speed of transmission of data across computer links.
CA Chemical Abstracts.
c, cop. Copyright, protecting the work of one author from piracy by another.
CCITT Comité Consultatif Internationale de Télégraphique et Telephonique (International Telegraph and Telephone Consultative Committee). The CCITT provides world-wide coordination for telephone and data communication systems.
CD Compact Disc.
CD-ROM Compact Disc - Read Only Memory. An optical memory disc with a capacity to store approximately 550 Mb of information.
CDST Centre de Documentation Scientifique et Technique, Paris. (See CNRS-INIST).
CEC Commission of the European Communities.
CERN Organisation Européenne pour la Recherche Nucléaire (European Organisation for Nuclear Research) Geneva.
cf = confer Compare.
CNRS-INIST Centre Nationale de la Recherche Scientifique - Institut de l'Information Scientifique et Technique, Vandoeuvre-lès-Nancy, France.
COMPENDEX Computerised Engineering Index.
CORDIS Community Research and Development - Online database (Host:ECHO).
CS Chemical Society (UK).
DAI Dissertation Abstracts International.
diss. Dissertation (Lat. dissertare) - a thesis or treatise prepared as a condition for the award of a degree or diploma.
DOS Disk Operating System - a machine language program developed by Microsoft Corp. for personal computers (IBM PCs and compatibles).
EARN European Academic and Research Network . A European equivalent to BITNET. Uses BITNET-type protocols.
EC European Community.
ed. Edition - all the copies of a work published in one typographical format, printed from the same type or plates, and issued at the same time or at intervals.
EI Engineering Index.
EPA Environmental Protection Agency.
EPO European Patent Office.
ESA European Space Agency.
et. al. Abbreviation for et alia (Lat. ‘and other people’).
FAQ Frequently Asked Question.
FIZ Fachinformationszentrum (Karlsruhe, Germany).
fol. folio Relates to the format of a book (larger than 35cm ).
FTP File Transfer Protocol - the normal method of transferring computer files across the computer networks.
ib., ibid. ibidem (Lat.‘same place.’) From the same work (book or journal article).
ICE Institute of Civil Engineers.
IEE Institution of Electrical Engineers (UK).
IEEE Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (USA) formed in 1963 by the merger of the IRE (Institute of Radio Engineers) and the AIEE (American Institute of Electrical Engineers).
ill. Illustration.
INPADOC International Patent Documentation Centre (Vienna).
in situ In position, in place. (Lat.)
INSPEC Bibliographic database covering physics, electrical and electronic engineering, and computer and control. Produced by the IEE.
IOP Institute of Physics (Bristol, UK).
ISBN International Standard Book Number. A number which is given every book or edition of a book before publication to identify the publisher, the title, the edition and volume number. The ISBN consists of ten digits (Arabic 0 to 9 and x).
ISDN Integrated Systems Digital Network - a single communication service for all forms of signal traffic and on a single public digital network with standardised interfaces that will support speech, low-speed and high-speed data and video traffic.
ISSN International Standard Serial Number. An internationally accepted code for the identification of serial publications. The ISSN consists of seven Arabic digits with an eighth which serves to verify the number in computer processing.
TIC International Translations Centre (Delft, the Netherlands).
JANET Joint Academic Network (UK).
JICST Japan Information Center for Science and Technology.
l., ll. Line, lines (Lat. linea).
l.c., loc. cit. In the appointed location (Lat. loco citato).
LC Library of Congress (Washington, DC). Sometimes used for the Library of Congress classification system.
LCSH Library of Congress Subject Headings.
litt. Literature list.
ms. Manuscript - a document of any kind that is written by hand, and which, in that form, has not been reproduced in multiple copies.
no. = number Issue of a periodical publication such as a journal.
N.S. New Series.
NTIS National Technical Information Service (Springfield, Virginia, USA).
OPAC Online Public Access Catalogue - the computerised library catalogue.
op. cit. Meaning ‘in the work quoted’ (Lat. opere citaro).
orig. Original - in an authors own words or other original medium.
OSI Open Systems Interconnection- an international set of communication standards.
p., pp. Page, pages (Lat. pagina).
pr. Printed.
pseud. Pseudonym.
publ. Published, publisher.
rev. (1) Revised, as in "completely revised edition."
rev. (2) Review.
SCI Science Citation Index.
SDI Selective Dissemination of Information.
SGML Standard Generalized Mark-up Language. A method of embedding instructions into a document in a standard way that can be interpreted by type-setting software to define the typography and layout.
SIGLE System for Information on Grey Literature in Europe.
SMTP Simple Mail Transfer Protocol - the Internet standard protocol for transferring e-mail messages.
STM Scientific, Technical and Medical (e.g information system).
SUNET The Swedish University data communication NETwork for the academic community.
suppl. Supplement - additional matter continuing, or adding new matter to that already published.
TCP/IP Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol - common designation for the Internet suite of protocols.
TEX A mark-up language, compiler and software, developed by the American Mathematical Society (AMS) for mathematical papers. Has the ability to cope with all mathematical symbols.
TIB Technische Informationsbibliothek (Hannover, Germany).
UDC Universal Decimal Classification - a general scheme of classification covering the whole field of knowledge. UDC is often used in libraries with technological literature.
UNIX An operating system available for a wide range of computers. (Ultrix and Solaris are among its descendents).
vol. Volume.
VT100 A standard terminal type, supported by many computer systems, and emulated by many terminals or personal computers which are not themselves VT100 terminals.
WAIS Wide Area Information Server - a powerful client-server distributed system for searching in databases or fulltext across the Internet. Based on Z39.50 protocols.
WORM Write Once/Read Many - an optical disk that allows one "written" entry which can be read many times.
WWW World Wide Web - a hypertext-based system or for finding and accessing Internet resources. W3 Used widely in certain areas of physics.
X.25 The CCITT standard interface protocol for packet switching networks. X.25 defines the message structure required by data terminal equipment. Used in many public and academic networks in Europe.
X.400 A CCITT standard for electronic message handling.
X.500 The CCITT standard for directory services provided in conjunction with other services on data networks.
yr. Year.
trans. Translated, translator, translation.
Z39.50 A US national standard for information retrieval service definition and protocol specifications for library applications. It can be used between dissimilar computers. The corresponding OSI standard is known as SR (Search and Retrieve).
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