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Re: Id vs. ID in SAX

• From: Elliotte Rusty Harold <elharo@m...>
• To: xml-dev@x...
• Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 08:34:56 -0500

At 10:37 AM -0800 3/9/00, jmbolles@T... wrote:
>The difference is Id is an abbreviation, where as URL is an acronym.

I'm not sure I believe that. I suspect in common American usage today 
ID is a separate word that happens to be spelled in all caps. 
Certainly it derives from an abbreviation for "identification" but I 
think it's taken on a life of its own. Some dictionaries I've 
consulted do list it as a separate word. Others do not list it at 
all. Some even manage to list "ID card" but not "ID". My old edition 
of the OED does not list ID as a separate word. It apparently came 
into common use in the last few decades. Does anyone have a copy of 
the latest edition handy? Or a subscription to the online version?

I also don't think that names of methods like getHttpUtils() 
perfectly match this case. The abbreviation for the hypertext 
transfer protocol is routinely spelled as both http and HTTP in the 
literature. The former spelling can be used to justify the 
getHttpUtils() style intercapped method name. On the other hand, if 
you wrote the word "id" without caps most people would think you were 
talking about Freudian psych-babble and not an identification.


+-----------------------+------------------------+-------------------+
| Elliotte Rusty Harold | elharo@m... | Writer/Programmer |
+-----------------------+------------------------+-------------------+
|                  The XML Bible (IDG Books, 1999)                   |
|              http://metalab.unc.edu/xml/books/bible/               |
|   http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=0764532367/cafeaulaitA/   |
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  • Re: Id vs. ID in SAX
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