Abbreviations 😱

[Mario]

Tired of abbreviations that I can’t figure out what they stand for , that and the person doing the posting doesn’t show the zone he’s in or the state , at that point noting makes sense so I move on to the next post. I would suggest that the person entering the post would spell out the name of the fig at least one time at beginning of post and let us know your general location and zone. Showing off your first fig August 15th would have different meaning if your in California or Alaska

THANK YOU

[Newbie2figs]

You have a great point 😀

Mario Tx

[bullet08]

i like DDDM. if you ever played AD&D, you might know it. no, it's not fig. oh, on the other forum i'm on, capitalization is also requirement along with correct grammar. so, spelling out a fig name is a good idea. and zone and location in signature would help.

[Mario]

we have a lot new readers that in no way could possibly know those abbreviations and old timers like me that may not remember
I feel more people would read the posts if they new what they were reading about

[jrdewhirst]

I'm very sympathetic but I also know I'm guilty as hell. Earlier today I wrote RdB thinking, "I don't really have to write out Ronde de Bordeaux, do I?" And BM kk -- "Everybody knows Black Madeira, right?" And then I wrote LdA and then HdA, and I thought "Well, maybe that's a bridge too far."

So I'm gonna toss out an idea -- Can the moderators manage the creation of a list of approved abbreviations of variety names and then post it in the frequently referenced topics? Maybe we can then all follow the rule that approved abbreviations are OK, non-approved not. And any confused forum member, including newbies, can just reference the list.

OTOH and FWIW, I'm not suggesting anything about any other abbreviations -- LOL!

[claret]

At first glance this looks like a time-saving and error-proofing measure. But not even figvarieties.com has all the combinations. And in some cases one abbreviation stands for more than one fig. CdD Gegantina? or is it Gris? -- just one example. Nope, the responsibility is squarely on the writer's shoulders, Joe.

[jrdewhirst]

claret -- I just think the implication is a refinement of my first attempt.

I notice that you didn't write out CdD. Shirking your responsibility!

[bullet08]

maybe the forum can be configured to pop up fig name when abbreviation is used, like username when you type with @.

[Evdurtschi]

Good point, Mario. I believe I have been guilty of this myself and I certainly remember what it was like when I first started. I was so confused and thought everyone was old and constipated with all the talk about different BM’s!!! 😝 For example, I remember reading the following and wondering what this poor guy ate!!! “Oh my gosh!! I just had the best BM ever!!” 😂 And I remember thinking, “yeah, figs can do that to you”

[GuyA]

😀🤣BM!😵🚽🧻good laugh.

[jrdewhirst]

I don't want this great point to die on the vine. . . . I understand that many forum members won't know what RLBV means, but I also know that I'm not going to write out Red Lebanese Bekka Valley (or Jason's Unknown Black Ischia, or even Green Michurinska) even once in each new post.

So what would it take to create a glossary of abbreviations?

Note that it's not merely a matter of stringing together first letters (e.g., JUBI). If we tried that approach, we'd confuse Marseilles Black and Malta Black, Black Greek and Bourjasotte Grise, White Madeira and White Marseilles.

[Mario]

You’re right this shouldn’t die on the vine,
I find myself skipping the entire post if I don’t know what I’m reading about

[Sod]

Guilty as well.

[acerpictum]

However, in order to write more clearly than now (and quickly), you need to use non-initials - codes from letters, such as CDDB, with a loss of meaning. Abbreviations can be more convenient and understandable, for example - MarB, MalB, MadW, MarW. Or similar.

[arachyd]

When I come across an abbreviation I don't recognize I do a search and if it isn't on here it will be on the internet. I saw a few times where a person simply asked what an abbreviation stood for and was answered. Easy enough to do. Personally, I'm not going to type out all the names every time but if someone asks for clarification I'll type it out for them.

[Californiacuban]

While I agree with the premise, arachyd has the key for sure. I've seen many abbreviations I don't know and if you simply google "RBLV" WITH "fig" (or search in:figbid or search inurfigs ) you usually guaranteed to get an answer.

Now the other day I did see a new one and I could not find it. I think RdB and VdB are fairly safe to use...but the newer ones, we can write those out.

I do agree even more on location. That makes a huge difference, and I cannot google that!!

[Mario]

Spelling it out once on a post isn’t to much to ask and it’s easier than probably 20 or more people looking it up on line.
for me it’s easier to skip the blog altogether

[Wisner]

I agree, way too many abbreviations for me to learn. I will usually just skip the thread with abbreviations I don't recognize.

[Mario]

Don’t blame you, I’ll bit more people than we think are doing same ,why read about something you don’t know what it is

[jrdewhirst]

Here's how I might abbreviate the varieties I own. Consider these just a proposal for now. If you are interested, suggest additions or alternatives. I realize that as varieties are added, conflicts will arise. We can deal with them in turn.

If we make enough progress, we can ask the moderators to move it to the frequently referenced section.

Mario -- I realize that this initiative will increase abbreviations not eliminate them. But maybe it'll make them more standardized and comprehensible. If you want me to start a separate thread rather than hijack yours, let me know.

Black Bethlehem		BB
Black Greek		BG
Black Madeira kk		BMkk
Black Zadar		BZ
Campaniere		Camp
Dalmatie		D or Dal
Danny's Delight		DD
De Tres Esplets		DTE
Florea		F or Flo
Green Michurinska		GM
Grise Olivette		GrO
Hative d'Argenteuil		HdA
Improved Celeste		IC or ICON
Improved Celeste (Early)		ICE
JH Adriatic		AJH
JUBI / Negretta		JUBI
Kesariani		K
Lattarula		Latt
LSU Gold		LSUG
LSU Purple		LSUP
Malta Black		MlB
Marseilles Black vs		MrBvs
Moscatel Preto		MP
Natalina		Nat
Negra D'Agde		NdA
Nero 600M		N600M
Nordland		Nord
Norella		Nor
O'Rourke		O’R
Paradiso Gene		PG
Pastilierre		Past
Planera		Planera
Raasti North Persian		ICandy
Red Lebanese Bekaa Valley		RLBV
Ronde de Bordeaux		RdB
Salem Dark		SD
Sao Miguel Roxo		SMR
Smith		S or Smith
St Martin		StM
St Rita		StR
Takoma Violet		TV
Teramo		Teramo
Valle Negra		VN
Violet Sepor		VS
White Madeira #1		WM#1
San Pedro:
Filacciano Bianco		FB
Zumwalt		Z
Lampeira Preta		LP
Grantham’s Royal		GR

[Nora]

Nice start. Keeping with a simplicity theme, I would suggest:

1. Minimum of 2 letters. Minimum of 3 would be clearer
(except for those 2 letter standards such as BM, grandfather them in?).

2. All uppercase.

3. Don’t shorten anything 5 letters or less (e.g. Smith)

[eboone]

MlB could be confused with Madeira Island Black, I would expect.

[AndreaVanIsle]

Thanks Joe! I made a screenshot(s) and added to my fig photo album.
I’m new to commenting so don’t know the format..

Andrea, Z8/9 Vancouver Island

[Sparky]

Here's another vote for people putting their location and growing zone in their signature. Most of what people say or ask on this forum has very little meaning without the context of their location. There are people with hundreds of posts who still have not done it. C'mon, people! Put your location and zone in your signature!

[Sulev]

leon_edmond User Settings -> Account -> Edit Post Signature (under Visible Post Elements at Conversation Detail Options section)

[Sparky]

Sulev Thanks, I had trouble finding it myself

[ginamcd]

Agree location (at least the state) and zone are vital. If it's not in the signature line, sometimes you can find it in the person's profile by clicking on their screen name.

[Clarktj2]

Can someone say how to edit your signature. Thanks

[claret]

Clarktj2 I see that you've made 132 posts so far, so you've been here a while. But to make things easy on myself, I'm cutting and pasting what I normally post on a newbie's "Introducing myself" thread. There may be something else here that interests you also (Note: the URL in step one is a live link, so just click on it).

1. Go to https://www.ourfigs.com/forum/figs-h...erenced-topics and click on the link in section 2. c. Personalizing Member Info: , Signature Line …
2. You’ll notice that most of us put at least 3 things in our signatures
• Our first name,
• The general area where we live (a nearby major city is good enough), and
• The “hardiness zone” for where our plants grow. You can find yours by looking here: https://www.plantmaps.com/
Once we have that information, we can help you more.

But even better! Before you ask questions and wait for people to answer, there’s an abundance of great information you can find on your own, without waiting. I highly recommend these four resources on the web. I use them often myself:
1. The Index of Frequently Referenced Topics here on the forum. Keep this link handy, because you'll find a treasure trove of information there. That way you won't need to wait for others to answer your questions. You'll be way ahead of the game! It's at https://www.ourfigs.com/forum/figs-h...erenced-topics
2. figdatabase.com -- one of 2 sites where you might find useful information on various fig varieties. Incomplete, but still helpful.
3. figvarieties.com -- the other (also incomplete but sometimes very helpful) site for information on fig varieties.
4. A little tip I was given that has come in very handy: The search engine here on Ourfigs.com isn't near as powerful as google.com. But there's a way to use google to search the Ourfigs web site on any topic you want. Here's an example: On Google.com, if you do a search for

site:http://www.ourfigs.com "Dark Portuguese"
That search will return all the forum's posts on the Dark Portuguese fig variety. It's a very useful tool!

Alan

[jrdewhirst]

Good stuff claret!

[claret]

Thanks jrdewhirst. Clarktj2 -- Travis, I see your first signature line revision now. Great! ... except not everyone knows what "cddb" means (the problem that this thread is all about). Come on, man -- get with the program! Help the newbies! It's only a few more key strokes out of the thousands you'll make in a day.

[jrdewhirst]

Nora wrote:

<< Keeping with a simplicity theme, I would suggest:

1. Minimum of 2 letters. Minimum of 3 would be clearer
(except for those 2 letter standards such as BM, grandfather them in?).

2. All uppercase.

3. Don’t shorten anything 5 letters or less (e.g. Smith) >>


These are good suggestions. I'm gonna try this:

1. Minimum of 2 letters, except in a few cases where a single letter is grandfathered (e.g., A jh).

2. All uppercase for initial letters. But lower case for (a) subsequent letters in the same word (e.g. Smith, BBeth), and (b) abbreviations of prepositions (e.g., RdB, VdB, CdD), and (c) names of sources (e.g., BM kk, MarsB vs).

3. Don't shorten anything 6 letters or less, at least the 1st time. After one full or abbreviated mention, even a single letter will do (Smith then merely S, Teramo then T).

4. Standardized abbreviations for colors. For example, black would be B (English), Noir (French), Neg (Spanish, Italian), Pr (Portuguese), Mav (Greek). Just suggestions. I'll flesh out this idea later.

5. Standardized abbreviations for place names. These will generally require more than one letter. For example, Mars (Marseilles), Isc (Ischia), Az (Azores).

6. Maybe most important, grandfathering of many widely accepted abbreviations that don't follow these rules exactly (e.g., RdB, VdB, CdD, EBT).

[RedRockFig]

After my Army days I came home with a head full of groups of alphabet letters that meant something. Now I am learning a whole new set of letter groups for figs I grow. I think just keeping it for the most common varieties and just keeping it simple is the key

[Terra]

When I first came to the forum every other post it seemed had fig name abbreviations that left me ???
Honestly it began to become tiresome and time consuming to stop everytime and try to find out what the fig name abbreviation was.
I learned what some abbreviations mean now but in some cases I just skip the post in frustration.
I really don't see what the big deal is typing a full proper name, it would take literally a few seconds more of your time.
I think putting the zone you live in a great idea as well, I always check that out in the signatures.

[Netstars]

My approach is simple. If I am responding to a post about Boysenberry Blush, my response might include BB. This should be rather simple to understand.
If I randomly say BB in a post that either has nothing to do with Boysenberry Blush, that is confusing.
I do it out of convenience and try not to confuse folks.
I might start a thought with the full name and abbreviate later in the same communication.

[claret]

Red Lebanese (Bekaa Valley)
Marseilles Black Vasile Surugiu
Col de Dame Gegantina
Colonel Littman’s Black Cross

[jrdewhirst]

I'd say RLBV, MarsB vs, CdDG, CLBC.

I get that these can be inscrutable to the newbie, but the glossary would take care of that so long as we have no repeats (e.g., Malta Black and Marseilles Black can't both be MB).

[Figwasp]

jrdewhirst I've only ever seen it as MBVS.

[jrdewhirst]

Figwasp -- I've seen Marseilles Black as MBvs or MBVS or just MB (because we don't always credit the person who introduced the variety. How often do we see "Florea vs"?). I think someone might write Malta Black as MB. And there must be other varieties with the same initials. So there's room for cionfusion.

But all that is beside the point. I'm just saying that we can create an agreed abbreviation. I don't really care what it is. MBvs would be most consistent with past practice; MarsB vs (or similar) would minimize confusion with other names.

[jrdewhirst]

OK, this is how I propose to abbreviate my own varieties. I'm trying to follow the rules in Post #17 above; if I made any mistakes, please let me know.

I've proposed some abbreviations for place names, embedded. For example, Mars for Marseilles. By default, A is Argenteuil or Adge, depending on context; and B is Bordeaux. I is Ischia. M is Madeira. Z is Zadar.

I'm also trying to implement some standard abbreviations for colors, also given below.

It's a work in progress . . . .

Varieties:

Black Bethlehem	BBeth
Black Greek	BGrk
Black Madeira kk	BM kk
Black Zadar	BZ
Campaniere	Camp
Dalmatie	Dal
Danny's Delight	DD
De Tres Esplets	DTE
Florea vs	Florea
Green Michurinska	GMich
Grise Olivette	GrO
Hative d'Argenteuil	HdA
Improved Celeste	IC or ICON
Improved Celeste (Early)	ICE
JH Adriatic	Adr jh
JUBI / Negretta	JUBI
Kesariani	Kes
Lattarula	Latt
LSU Gold	LSU-G
LSU Purple	LSU-P
Malta Black	MaltaB
Marseilles Black vs	MarsB vs
Moscatel Preto	MscPr
Natalina	Nat
Negra D'Agde	NdA
Nero 600M	Ne600M
Nordland	Nord
Norella	Nor
O'Rourke	O’R
Paradiso Gene	Par g
Pastilierre	Past
Planera	Planera
Raasti North Persian	ICandy
Red Lebanese Bekaa Valley	RLBV
Ronde de Bordeaux	RdB
Salem Dark	SDk
Sao Miguel Roxo	SMR
Smith	Smith
St Martin	StM
St Rita	StR
Takoma Violet	TV
Teramo	Teramo
Valle Negra	VN
Violet Sepor	VS
White Madeira #1	WM#1
San Pedro:
Filacciano Bianco	FBia
Zumwalt	Z
Lampeira Preta	LPr
Grantham’s Royal	GR

Colors:

Black	B
White	W
Green	G
Violet	V
Dark	Dk
Noir	Noir
Blanche	Bl
Verte	Ver
Violette	Vi
Grise	Gr
Negro/a	Neg
Blanco/a	Bla
Verde	Ver
Violetta	Vio
Preto/a	Pr
Bianco/a	Bi

[don_sanders]

Some of those already have commonly used abbreviations like MBVS, AJH, N600M. LPR could be confused with Lampeira Prusch. I like Icandy.

[jrdewhirst]

Don -- On the 1st three, I made small changes merely to comply with my own rules. If the community agrees on the current versions as exceptions to the rules, that'd be fine with me. As for LPr, my intent with the color abbreviations is that Pr always means Preto/a. So Lampeira Prusch would have to be something like LPru.

[acerpictum]

I would venture to suggest some thoughts on this topic. First, only the full spelling should be considered the variety name. Any abbreviation is not a name, but only indicates it. It is important that the abbreviation reads the stem / root, so that the texts are easy to read, without delays in thinking and understanding what kind of variety we are talking about. Second, the base is the name of the place / region, always of 4 letters - with a capital letter, and the epithet - the color of the fruit - is always one or two lowercase letters. And nothing else is needed. For example, bMade.

[Mario]

All this suggestions for abbreviations are wonderful but I’m still a firm believer the easiest way is to write out the full name ONLY ONCE at beginning of post.
I for one will not read any post that needs any effort to figure out what I’m reading about, and the date of figs ripening without the knowledge of the zone is useless.

[Sulev]

At the beginning of the thread or at the beginning of (each) post, there is a huge difference,

[claret]

Simple and to the point. One person types 20 more keystrokes the first time they mention a variety in their post. Then the hundreds or thousands of readers who see it later have only one thing to do: read.

Craven's Craving. Cherry Cordial.

[tinyfish]

For me the beginning of the thread would be enough.

[tinyfish]

Maybe to far down in this thread now but for the Canadian members listing their growing zone can you convert it to the USDA Zone and list it as USDA zone fill in the blank. Most of the members are from the USA.

[claret]

Please refer to post 16.1 above. The 3rd bullet under point #2 contains a link to a site with interactive maps. Keep scrolling down on that site, and you can find USDA zone equivalents for all over the world. Very handy for the sake of standardizing. It would be nice if we had an "international standard" instead, but I don't know of one. If anyone does, please PM me; I'll add it to my signature.