What's the name of names like i18n, log4j, c14n ?

Question

Hi,

I know that i18n -> i nternationalizatio n (18 letters), log4j -> log for java (4 -> four -> for), c14n -> c anonicalizatio n (14 letters), and so on.

What are the names of these natural langages techniques ? It's sort of rebus, puzzle, jokes ? Is there some doc on that ?

Thanks.

Answer 1

i18n, c14n, and L10n are all just ways of abbreviating fairly long words that often get mentioned (and thus typed!) a lot. the 18/14/10 stand for the number of characters omitted from the word:

• internationalization = i + 18 more characters + n

et cetera.

The others, like "log4j" are more just using common abbreviation techniques in computer text/slogans, like using "2" instead of "to" or "4" instead of "for".

Because the abbreviations are mostly just things that became accepted over time, there's not necessarily an authoritative source for them, but you'll often find them mentioned on things like Wikipedia pages on certain topics.

Answer 2

Hi,

I think you might be looking for the term numeronym. The wikipedia page gives a list of (more or less) common numeronyms. Hope that helps.