Geek Speak

[gameshowcongress]

I have been curious about this for awhile, and since Ken has previously been in the general information technology world, perhaps he or others who follow this message board can comment.

There is the international radio alphabet, often used of late by people trying to give you information of an alphanumeric string over the telephone, such as your airline reservation record locator:

A lpha
B ravo
C harlie
D elta
E co
F oxtrot
G olf
H otel
I ndia
J uliet
K ilo
L ima
M ike
N ovember
O scar
P apa
Q uebec
R omeo
S ierra
T ango
U niform
V ictor
W hisky
X ray
Y ankee
Z ulu

And as I have not had it committed to memory, I am always just using a name and then indicating a source, such as "S as in Sam (I am)" which is a lot slower.

Now, there should be some source out there for references of simple terms to communicate puctuation - but the only ones you hear usualy are "star" for * for the asterisk key on the telephone (also called "splat" in programmer-ese"), and "pound" for # (also called hash). the key to these words in my opinion is to have a one or at most two syllable distinct name such as

- dash (or dah for the amateur radio folks)
. dot (or dit - ditto)
@ "at" (not each anymore)
? hook (in programmer speak)
! bang (prog speak)
$ buck (prog speak)
| pipe (prog speak)
/ slash (web speak)
\ backslash (don't get into the orenthal james jokes here....) - this could then just be called "back" or maybe something else.

Does anyone have good descriptive or unique names for colon : semi colon ; or other things used in text ideograms of faces that I cant recall the term for at the moment....

or a good short name for &, <, >, or other commonly used punctuation?

Paul Bailey

[rmfromfla]

Colon: spastic! (as in the Larry Spencer schtick from "The Gong Show")

[Ken Jennings Jr.]

The international radio alphabet may come back into vogue. A lot of the voice activiated nav systems in new cars (e.g. the Honda Pilot) allow you to spell words while entering destinations etc. for navigation purposes. You can use either of the two standard alphabets. Which reveals in advance the answer to this little what-do-these-things-have-in-common puzzle.

CHARLIE
OSCAR
VICTOR
XRAY

Answer: The are shared by both the standard English language radio alphabets. The less common one starts with APPLE, BOY, CHARLIE, DOG, EDWARD, FRANK . . . . Google for the rest.

Cheers!

[metsfan001]

Who can forget the classic Weezer song "#|"?

[Herbal-T]

I usually just refer to that area as my a**, which would make semi-colon "half-a**".

[eleanor_rigby]

Well, as : and ; are commonly used in internet smileys, colons can become "eyes" and semicolons could be "winks."

And then & (ampersand) could be "amp" and then you have your less- and greater-than signs.

[Sean]

The international radio alphabet may come back into vogue. A lot of the voice activiated nav systems in new cars (e.g. the Honda Pilot) allow you to spell words while entering destinations etc. for navigation purposes. You can use either of the two standard alphabets. Which reveals in advance the answer to this little what-do-these-things-have-in-common puzzle.

CHARLIE
OSCAR
VICTOR
XRAY

Answer: The are shared by both the standard English language radio alphabets. The less common one starts with APPLE, BOY, CHARLIE, DOG, EDWARD, FRANK . . . . Google for the rest.

Cheers!

Interesting. I'm a police dispatcher, and we apparently use yet another phonetic alphabet:

ADAM
BOY
CHARLES
DAVID
EDWARD
FRANK
GEORGE
HENRY
IDA
JOHN
KING
LINCOLN
MARY
NANCY
OCEAN
PAUL
QUEEN
ROBERT
SAM
TOM
UNION
VICTOR
WILLIAM
XRAY
YOUNG (though most of us use YANKEE)
ZEBRA

Where did the APPLE on you mention originate?

--Sean

[WendellWit]

Why does this discussion make me think of Victor Borge's Phonetic Punctuation? (25-second Google Video clip... wish it were longer)

[gameshowcongress]

Why does this discussion make me think of Victor Borge's Phonetic Punctuation? (25-second Google Video clip... wish it were longer)

Just saw that - it would have been interesting to see Mr. Borge in the Johnny Gilbert role - "This.. is.. Jeopardy -swish phut!)

or would that be JeopardyBANG?! Perhaps better yet, JeopardyINTERROBANG (see en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interrobang)

[WendellWit]

I ♥ the interrobang.

If there's room in the extended character set for ☺☻♀♂♣♥♦♪ and ♫, then where is the interrobang!?

(If it really is there somewhere, I'd appreciate somebody showing me - right now the Windows Character Map is NO help)