Say what… aka the acronym dilemma

I still remember it like yesterday, my partner in crime was talking to a whole bunch of suits – “While we tried to eliminate most of the TLA’s, three letter acronym’s, there are still a few we can’t get around, so if you have a question about one, please feel free to stop us & ask.” Immediately, a hand shot up – “I’m sorry but what is a TLA?” I cannot believe she actually kept a straight face when she repeated – “Three Letter Acronym” & the look of dawning that spread across his face.

While many simply say that each industry develops its own acronyms & language to simply spot the outsiders, the truth is it is easier to use them than trying to spell everything out.

The other issue is even if one did spell it all the way out, most people still would not understand what it meant. Seriously, does it help to know that the Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) server was improperly configured and gave you a bogus Domain Name System (DNS) address? Nope – how about we had a small configuration issue, and as soon as you reboot you should be able to access the internet?

With that said, sometimes it can be helpful to know what someone is talking about so you don’t get snowed. In that vein, I have included 35 of the top acronyms used in the Energy Auditing field & tried to include a simple description for each so you.

UPDATE: We have know gotten our glossary started so we have combined the two & hope you like. With that the 35 most popular acronyms.