98-503: The CBH Group (commonly known as CBH , an acronym for Co-operative Bulk Handling ) is a grain growers' cooperative that handles, markets and processes grain from the wheatbelt of Western Australia . CBH was formed on 5 April 1933, at a time when a royal commission on bulk handling of grain was in progress, and after over 20 years of failed proposals for bulk handling of grain in Western Australia. The trustees of
196-428: A numeronym . For example, "i18n" abbreviates " internationalization ", a computer-science term for adapting software for worldwide use; the "18" represents the 18 letters that come between the first and the last in "internationalization". Similarly, "localization" can be abbreviated "l10n"; " multilingualization " "m17n"; and " accessibility " "a11y". In addition to the use of a specific number replacing that many letters,
294-645: A single word ("television" or "transvestite", for instance), and is in general spelled without punctuation (except in the plural). Although "PS" stands for the single English word " postscript " or the Latin postscriptum , it is often spelled with periods ("P.S.") as if parsed as Latin post scriptum instead. The slash ('/', or solidus ) is sometimes used to separate the letters in an acronym, as in "N/A" ("not applicable, not available") and "c/o" ("care of"). Inconveniently long words used frequently in related contexts can be represented according to their letter count as
392-507: A 1940 translation of a novel by the German writer Lion Feuchtwanger . It is an unsettled question in English lexicography and style guides whether it is legitimate to use the word acronym to describe forms that use initials but are not pronounced as a word. While there is plenty of evidence that acronym is used widely in this way, some sources do not acknowledge this usage, reserving
490-464: A delay in the delivery of the rolling stock, QR National continued to operate some 3 ft 6 in ( 1,067 mm ) gauge services until October 2012, while to operate standard gauge services, locomotives were hired from Chicago Freight Car Leasing Australia and SCT Logistics . A further three locomotives were delivered in 2015 as compensation for late delivery of the original order. In October 2013, CBH referred an ongoing dispute with
588-625: A different meaning. Medical literature has been struggling to control the proliferation of acronyms, including efforts by the American Academy of Dermatology. Acronyms are often taught as mnemonic devices: for example the colors of the rainbow are ROY G. BIV (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet). They are also used as mental checklists: in aviation GUMPS stands for gas-undercarriage-mixture-propeller-seat belts. Other mnemonic acronyms include CAN SLIM in finance, PAVPANIC in English grammar, and PEMDAS in mathematics. It
686-781: A medial decimal point . Particularly in British and Commonwealth English , all such punctuation marking acronyms and other capitalized abbreviations is now uncommon and considered either unnecessary or incorrect. The presence of all-capital letters is now thought sufficient to indicate the nature of the UK , the EU , and the UN . Forms such as the U.S.A. for "the United States of America " are now considered to indicate American or North American English . Even within those dialects, such punctuation
784-595: A merger of Westrail with Australian National was being investigated. Nothing ever came of it. On 17 December 2000, the WAGR's freight division along with the Westrail name and logo were sold to Australia Western Railroad , a subsidiary of the Australian Railroad Group (ARG). The deal also saw the WAGR's freight lines leased to ARG for 99 years. The WAGR's remaining functions, including owning
882-407: A period when the letters are pronounced individually, as in " K.G.B. ", but not when pronounced as a word, as in " NATO ". The logic of this style is that the pronunciation is reflected graphically by the punctuation scheme. When a multiple-letter abbreviation is formed from a single word, periods are in general not used, although they may be common in informal usage. "TV", for example, may stand for
980-494: A red stripe later added. In the late 1960s, a grey and light blue livery was introduced. The latter was resurrected by South Spur Rail Services in the early 2000s. Carriages were painted Indian red, before a larch green and cream livery was introduced in October 1951. When launched in 1964, The Midlander stock was painted in a maroon and ivory livery. When the Westrail brand was introduced in 1975, an orange and blue livery
1078-583: A seasonal basis. In the late 1960s, the Eastern and Eastern Goldfields lines between Perth and Kalgoorlie was gauge converted to allow through operation of trains from the eastern states along with the Esperance & Menzies lines , with sections through the Avon River and east of Southern Cross built on new alignments. A concerted program of dieselisation saw diesel locomotives replace
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#17327835813831176-442: A service from Perth to Kojonup via Boddington . By 1949, there were 28 buses. and by 1959, more than fifty. Dual-purpose buses that also carried freight were introduced in 1949. Buses operated included Fodens , articulated trailer buses , AECs , Leyland Lions , Hino RC320Ps and Mercedes-Benz O303s . In the late 1960s, long-distance coaches operated from Perth to Meekatharra , Esperance , Geraldton and Albany . In
1274-436: A service was officially named. Further trains were named in the 1960s in an effort to increase the prestige of rail travel. The WAGR operated services from Perth to many destinations throughout the state. In 1935, it operated 63 sleeper services a week. It also operated local passenger, many operating as mixed trains . The last of these ceased in 1973. While the current Perth urban passenger network operated by Transperth
1372-436: A single word, such as NATO (as distinct from B-B-C )" but adds later "In everyday use, acronym is often applied to abbreviations that are technically initialisms, since they are pronounced as separate letters." The Chicago Manual of Style acknowledges the complexity ("Furthermore, an acronym and initialism are occasionally combined (JPEG), and the line between initialism and acronym is not always clear") but still defines
1470-457: A ten-year contract to operate services in the south of Western Australia. To operate the services, CBH purchased 22 CBH class locomotives from MotivePower , Boise and 574 grain wagons from Bradken , Xuzhou . Under the agreement, Watco was responsible for providing a comprehensive rail logistics planning service, including train planning and scheduling, tracking, maintenance, inventory control, and crew management. Watco operated and maintained
1568-537: A total of 61 styles. The lack of uniformity caused difficulties in operation and maintenance, and made necessary a large and widely varying stock of spare parts of limited interchangeability. In the early 1950s, the WAGR implemented a replacement program of goods wagons built instead to rigidly standard designs, on only three types of underframes, 5.5, 11.0 and 12.8 metres (18, 36 and 42 ft) in length, respectively. The new standard designs provided for increased axle loads and higher tare -load ratios, and
1666-515: A twentieth-century phenomenon. Linguist David Wilton in Word Myths: Debunking Linguistic Urban Legends claims that "forming words from acronyms is a distinctly twentieth- (and now twenty-first-) century phenomenon. There is only one known pre-twentieth-century [English] word with an acronymic origin and it was in vogue for only a short time in 1886. The word is colinderies or colinda , an acronym for
1764-399: A wide variety of services throughout its history, including the more standard country and suburban passenger and freight workings as well as a limited electrified service, early country railcar services, road bus services and overnight sleeper services to distant destinations. Although some passenger trains were bestowed nicknames, it was not until The Westland was launched in 1938, that
1862-471: A word, an abbreviation is not an acronym." In contrast, some style guides do support it, whether explicitly or implicitly. The 1994 edition of Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage defends the usage on the basis of a claim that dictionaries do not make a distinction. The BuzzFeed style guide describes CBS and PBS as "acronyms ending in S". Acronymy, like retronymy , is a linguistic process that has existed throughout history but for which there
1960-677: A word. American English dictionaries such as Merriam-Webster , Dictionary.com's Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary and the American Heritage Dictionary as well as the British Oxford English Dictionary and the Australian Macquarie Dictionary all include a sense in their entries for acronym equating it with initialism , although The American Heritage Dictionary criticizes it with
2058-572: Is a subset with a narrower definition: an initialism pronounced as a word rather than as a sequence of letters. In this sense, NASA / ˈ n æ s ə / is an acronym but USA / j uː ɛ s ˈ eɪ / is not. The broader sense of acronym , ignoring pronunciation, is its original meaning and in common use. Dictionary and style-guide editors dispute whether the term acronym can be legitimately applied to abbreviations which are not pronounced as words, and they do not agree on acronym spacing , casing , and punctuation . The phrase that
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#17327835813832156-488: Is a question about how to pluralize acronyms. Often a writer will add an 's' following an apostrophe, as in "PC's". However, Kate L. Turabian 's A Manual for Writers of Research Papers, Theses, and Dissertations , writing about style in academic writings, allows for an apostrophe to form plural acronyms "only when an abbreviation contains internal periods or both capital and lowercase letters". Turabian would therefore prefer "DVDs" and "URLs" but "Ph.D.'s". The style guides of
2254-721: Is becoming increasingly uncommon. Some style guides , such as that of the BBC , no longer require punctuation to show ellipsis ; some even proscribe it. Larry Trask , American author of The Penguin Guide to Punctuation , states categorically that, in British English , "this tiresome and unnecessary practice is now obsolete." Nevertheless, some influential style guides , many of them American , still require periods in certain instances. For example, The New York Times Manual of Style and Usage recommends following each segment with
2352-411: Is common for grammatical contractions (e.g. don't , y'all , and ain't ) and for contractions marking unusual pronunciations (e.g. a'ight , cap'n , and fo'c'sle for "all right", "captain", and "forecastle"). By the early twentieth century, it was standard to use a full stop/period/point , especially in the cases of initialisms and acronyms. Previously, especially for Latin abbreviations , this
2450-527: Is currently not on display. In December 1937, the Governor class diesel railcars were introduced on daylight regional services from Perth. The longer distance services remained locomotive hauled. Where lines were closed in the 1940s and 1950s, or passenger services discontinued, road bus services were introduced. Most of the services and the same routes continue to the present. The rail-road services commenced on 24 November 1941 with one vehicle operating
2548-740: Is entirely electrified, between May 1924 and March 1969 the State Electricity Commission operated the only electrified line in Western Australia as part of the WAGR network. The line was 800 metres (2,600 ft) in length and operated within the confines of the East Perth Power Station . The electric locomotive used on the railway is preserved at the Western Australian Rail Transport Museum in Bassendean , though
2646-631: Is especially important for paper media, where no search utility is available to find the first use.) It also gives students a convenient review list to memorize the important acronyms introduced in a textbook chapter. Expansion at first use and abbreviation keys originated in the print era, but they are equally useful for electronic text . While acronyms provide convenience and succinctness for specialists, they often degenerate into confusing jargon . This may be intentional, to exclude readers without domain-specific knowledge. New acronyms may also confuse when they coincide with an already existing acronym having
2744-464: Is generally said as two letters, but IPsec for Internet Protocol Security is usually pronounced as / ˌ aɪ ˈ p iː s ɛ k / or / ˈ ɪ p s ɛ k / , along with variant capitalization like "IPSEC" and "Ipsec". Pronunciation may even vary within a single speaker's vocabulary, depending on narrow contexts. As an example, the database programming language SQL is usually said as three letters, but in reference to Microsoft's implementation
2842-459: Is not uncommon for acronyms to be cited in a kind of false etymology , called a folk etymology , for a word. Such etymologies persist in popular culture but have no factual basis in historical linguistics , and are examples of language-related urban legends . For example, " cop " is commonly cited as being derived, it is presumed, from "constable on patrol", and " posh " from " port outward, starboard home ". With some of these specious expansions,
2940-415: Is traditionally pronounced like the word sequel . In writing for a broad audience, the words of an acronym are typically written out in full at its first occurrence within a given text. Expansion At First Use (EAFU) benefits readers unfamiliar with the acronym. Another text aid is an abbreviation key which lists and expands all acronyms used, a reference for readers who skipped past the first use. (This
3038-597: The Australian Taxation Office revealed that despite generating more than $ 3.4 billion in revenue in 2013/14, the company paid no tax. This made it Australia's biggest revenue earner not to pay tax in the period under review. During the early years most grain movement was by rail over the Western Australian Government Railways network, with sidings and branch lines specifically serving wheat growing areas. Many of
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3136-516: The Colonial and Indian Exposition held in London in that year." However, although acronymic words seem not to have been employed in general vocabulary before the twentieth century (as Wilton points out), the concept of their formation is treated as effortlessly understood (and evidently not novel) in an Edgar Allan Poe story of the 1830s, " How to Write a Blackwood Article ", which includes
3234-623: The Modern Language Association and American Psychological Association prohibit apostrophes from being used to pluralize acronyms regardless of periods (so "compact discs" would be "CDs" or "C.D.s"), whereas The New York Times Manual of Style and Usage requires an apostrophe when pluralizing all abbreviations regardless of periods (preferring "PC's, TV's and VCR's"). Possessive plurals that also include apostrophes for mere pluralization and periods appear especially complex: for example, "the C.D.'s' labels" (the labels of
3332-660: The Pichi Richi Railway . With the deregulation of the Australian rail market in the 1990s, former WAGR rolling stock has operated in other states, with L class locomotives having operated in the eastern states for ATN Access , Aurizon and Pacific National . In September 1970, WAGR News Letter was launched as a staff newsletter . The last edition was published in December 1973, with Movement superseding it. From 1975 until 1981, Westrail News Letter
3430-579: The Public Works Department ). The WAGR network was joined to that of the rest of mainland Australia, albeit to 4 ft 8 + 1 ⁄ 2 in ( 1,435 mm ) standard gauge , a different gauge, in October 1917 with the opening of the Commonwealth Railways ' Trans-Australian Railway to Kalgoorlie . Legislative restrictions were implemented to limit competition from road transport, most notably from
3528-539: The Restoration witticism arranging the names of some members of Charles II 's Committee for Foreign Affairs to produce the "CABAL" ministry . OK , a term of disputed origin, dates back at least to the early nineteenth century and is now used around the world. Acronyms are used most often to abbreviate names of organizations and long or frequently referenced terms. The armed forces and government agencies frequently employ acronyms; some well-known examples from
3626-764: The Swan View Tunnel . A few isolated lines were operated, such as the Marble Bar line in the Pilbara and the Hopetoun to Ravensthorpe railway line on the South Coast. With many lines in need of heavy maintenance, rolling stock in need of replacement and heavy losses being incurred, during the 1950s many branches closed with 1,320 kilometres (820 mi) of the network so treated in 1956–57, although 275 kilometres (171 mi) were subsequently reopened on
3724-480: The "belief" that the etymology is acronymic has clearly been tongue-in-cheek among many citers, as with "gentlemen only, ladies forbidden" for " golf ", although many other (more credulous ) people have uncritically taken it for fact. Taboo words in particular commonly have such false etymologies: " shit " from "ship/store high in transit" or "special high-intensity training" and " fuck " from "for unlawful carnal knowledge", or "fornication under consent/command of
3822-454: The 10 owned by CBH. Although scheduled to transition in May 2022, all parties agreed to bring the handover date forward to September 2021. In 1999/2000 season CBH received a record amount of grain, 12.2 million tonnes in all, made up of 11 different grain types. CBH received a new record harvest of 14.7 million tonnes from grain growers in Western Australia during the 2003/2004 season. This record
3920-463: The 160-character SMS limit, and to save time, acronyms such as "GF" ("girlfriend"), "LOL" ("laughing out loud"), and "DL" ("download" or "down low") have become popular. Some prescriptivists disdain texting acronyms and abbreviations as decreasing clarity, or as failure to use "pure" or "proper" English. Others point out that languages have always continually changed , and argue that acronyms should be embraced as inevitable, or as innovation that adapts
4018-461: The 18 letters between the initial "i" and the final "n"). Authors of expository writing will sometimes capitalize or otherwise distinctively format the initials of the expansion for pedagogical emphasis (for example, writing: "the onset of Congestive Heart Failure (CHF)" or "the onset of c ongestive h eart f ailure (CHF)"). Capitalization like this, however, conflicts with the convention of English orthography, which generally reserves capitals in
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4116-576: The 1930s until the 1950s, when the Transport Co-ordination Board kept strict control over commercial road traffic through powers vested by the State Transport Co-ordination Act 1933 . As road transportation expanded and losses escalated, many lines closed from 1949. The network peaked in 1937 at 6,600 kilometres (4,100 mi). Unusually for such a large network, only one tunnel was required,
4214-466: The British press may render it "Nato"), but uses lower case in " Unicef " (from "United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund") because it is more than four letters, and to style it in caps might look ungainly (flirting with the appearance of "shouting capitals"). While abbreviations typically exclude the initials of short function words (such as "and", "or", "of", or "to"), this is not always
4312-524: The Department of Works & Railways was established. The first government railway line in Western Australia opened on 26 July 1879, between Geraldton and Northampton . It was followed by the Eastern Railway from Fremantle to Guildford via Perth on 1 March 1881. The WAGR adopted the narrow gauge of 3 ft 6 in ( 1,067 mm ) to reduce construction costs. Over
4410-724: The Midland Railway Workshops. From the late 1930s, the WAGR operated diesel railcars such as the Governor and Wildflower classes. In 1936, the WAGR owned 420 locomotives, 4 railcars, 461 carriages, 24 brake vans and 11,052 goods wagons. A survey of goods wagons carried out in 1949 disclosed that the WAGR had 54 classes of 4-wheeled vehicles and 13 different types of bogie wagons. The 4-wheeled vehicles had been built on 12 different types of underframes in no fewer than 71 variations, ranging in length from 3.4 to 6.4 metres (11 to 21 ft). The bogie wagons were mounted on six different types of bogie trucks and represented
4508-564: The U.S. Navy, is "COMCRUDESPAC", which stands for "commander, cruisers destroyers Pacific"; it is also seen as "ComCruDesPac". Inventors are encouraged to anticipate the formation of acronyms by making new terms "YABA-compatible" ("yet another bloody acronym"), meaning the term's acronym can be pronounced and is not an offensive word: "When choosing a new name, be sure it is 'YABA-compatible'." Acronym use has been further popularized by text messaging on mobile phones with short message service (SMS), and instant messenger (IM). To fit messages into
4606-560: The United States are among the " alphabet agencies " (jokingly referred to as " alphabet soup ") created under the New Deal by Franklin D. Roosevelt (himself known as "FDR"). Business and industry also coin acronyms prolifically. The rapid advance of science and technology also drives the usage, as new inventions and concepts with multiword names create a demand for shorter, more pronounceable names. One representative example, from
4704-659: The Wheat Board of Western Australia and Wesfarmers registered the company together with capital of £100,000 divided evenly into 100,000 shares. The cooperative was formed under the principle of one person, one vote, regardless of the amount of grain supplied. CBH merged with the Grain Pool of WA in November 2002, after the Parliament of Western Australia passed legislation allowing the merger to go ahead. In 2016,
4802-411: The acronym may use normal case rules, e.g. it would appear generally in lower case, but with an initial capital when starting a sentence or when in a title. Once knowledge of the words underlying such an acronym has faded from common recall, the acronym may be termed an anacronym . Examples of anacronyms are the words " scuba ", " radar ", and " laser ". The word "an acro nym" should not be confused with
4900-545: The acronym stands for is called its expansion . The meaning of an acronym includes both its expansion and the meaning of its expansion. The word acronym is formed from the Greek roots akro- , meaning 'height, summit, or tip', and -nym , 'name'. This neoclassical compound appears to have originated in German , with attestations for the German form Akronym appearing as early as 1921. Citations in English date to
4998-590: The adoption of acronyms was modern warfare, with its many highly technical terms. While there is no recorded use of military acronyms dating from the American Civil War (acronyms such as "ANV" for " Army of Northern Virginia " post-date the war itself), they became somewhat common in World War I , and by World War II they were widespread even in the slang of soldiers, who referred to themselves as G.I.s . The widespread, frequent use of acronyms across
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#17327835813835096-506: The apostrophe should be reserved for the possessive ("the TV's antenna"). In some languages, the convention of doubling the letters in the acronym is used to indicate plural words: for example, the Spanish EE.UU. , for Estados Unidos ('United States'). This old convention is still sometimes followed for a limited number of English abbreviations, such as SS. for Saints , pp. for
5194-509: The associated industries. These tours went as far north as Geraldton and east to Kalgoorlie , but most commonly south to the forest areas around Pemberton and that town's timber mills. Tours also covered apple festivals in Bridgetown and Manjimup . The first tour was organised for industry and business leaders from Victoria , but by 1933 they were open to the public and sufficiently popular to have waiting lists. A defining aspect of
5292-471: The branch lines and rail facilities have not been updated or maintained, with road transport increasing in many areas. In 2009, CBH decided to put its rail grain haulage services out to tender for the first time. It aimed that the amount of grain transported by rail rise from 50% to 70%. CBH settled on a business model that saw it invest in new locomotives and grain wagons, with day-to-day operations contracted out. In December 2010, CBH awarded Watco Australia
5390-1163: The case. Sometimes function words are included to make a pronounceable acronym, such as CORE ( Congress of Racial Equality ). Sometimes the letters representing these words are written in lower case, such as in the cases of "TfL" (" Transport for London ") and LotR ( The Lord of the Rings ); this usually occurs when the acronym represents a multi-word proper noun. Numbers (both cardinal and ordinal ) in names are often represented by digits rather than initial letters, as in "4GL" (" fourth generation language ") or "G77" (" Group of 77 "). Large numbers may use metric prefixes , as with " Y2K " for "Year 2000". Exceptions using initials for numbers include " TLA " ("three-letter acronym/abbreviation") and "GoF" (" Gang of Four "). Abbreviations using numbers for other purposes include repetitions, such as " A2DP " ("Advanced Audio Distribution Profile"), " W3C " ("World Wide Web Consortium"), and T3 ( Trends, Tips & Tools for Everyday Living ); pronunciation, such as " B2B " ("business to business"); and numeronyms , such as "i18n" ("internationalization"; "18" represents
5488-406: The changes. In September 1975, the WAGR adopted the trading name Westrail and an associated logo. However, the official name of the WAGR was not changed. The new name was the main element of a complete program to improve the WAGR's public image. Every visible feature of the organisation was to be associated with the new Westrail identity. The transition from WAGR to Westrail quickly began, with
5586-413: The compact discs). In some instances, however, an apostrophe may increase clarity: for example, if the final letter of an abbreviation is "S", as in "SOS's" (although abbreviations ending with S can also take "-es", e.g. "SOSes"), or when pluralizing an abbreviation that has periods. A particularly rich source of options arises when the plural of an acronym would normally be indicated in a word other than
5684-564: The contrived acronym "P.R.E.T.T.Y.B.L.U.E.B.A.T.C.H." The use of Latin and Neo-Latin terms in vernaculars has been pan-European and pre-dates modern English. Some examples of acronyms in this class are: The earliest example of a word derived from an acronym listed by the OED is "abjud" (now " abjad "), formed from the original first four letters of the Arabic alphabet in the late eighteenth century. Some acrostics pre-date this, however, such as
5782-438: The dictionary entries and style guide recommendations regarding the term acronym through the twentieth century did not explicitly acknowledge or support the expansive sense. The Merriam–Webster's Dictionary of English Usage from 1994 is one of the earliest publications to advocate for the expansive sense, and all the major dictionary editions that include a sense of acronym equating it with initialism were first published in
5880-601: The early 1970s the WAGR Bus service included seasonal six-day Wildflower Study Tours from Perth and along roads to and from Geraldton through the northern wheatbelt. These had first been operated in 1948 by the Midland Railway of Western Australia . Also in the early 1970s, the King Karri Scenicruiser buses ran from Bunbury through Manjimup , Pemberton , Northcliffe and Walpole to Albany at
5978-664: The exclusive sense for acronym and its earliest citation was from 1943. In early December 2010, Duke University researcher Stephen Goranson published a citation for acronym to the American Dialect Society e-mail discussion list which refers to PGN being pronounced "pee-gee-enn", antedating English language usage of the word to 1940. Linguist Ben Zimmer then mentioned this citation in his December 16, 2010 " On Language " column about acronyms in The New York Times Magazine . By 2011,
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#17327835813836076-763: The final word if spelled out in full. A classic example is "Member of Parliament", which in plural is "Members of Parliament". It is possible then to abbreviate this as "M's P", which was fairly common in mid-twentieth-century Australian news writing (or similar ), and used by former Australian Prime Minister Ben Chifley . This usage is less common than forms with "s" at the end, such as "MPs", and may appear dated or pedantic. In common usage, therefore, "weapons of mass destruction" becomes "WMDs", "prisoners of war" becomes "POWs", and "runs batted in" becomes "RBIs". Abbreviations that come from single, rather than multiple, words – such as "TV" ("television") – are usually pluralized without apostrophes ("two TVs"); most writers feel that
6174-464: The first letter of acronyms, reserving all-caps styling for initialisms, writing the pronounced acronyms "Nato" and "Aids" in mixed case, but the initialisms "USA" and "FBI" in all caps. For example, this is the style used in The Guardian , and BBC News typically edits to this style (though its official style guide, dating from 2003, still recommends all-caps ). The logic of this style is that
6272-435: The king". In English, abbreviations have previously been marked by a wide variety of punctuation . Obsolete forms include using an overbar or colon to show the ellipsis of letters following the initial part. The forward slash is still common in many dialects for some fixed expressions—such as in w/ for "with" or A/C for " air conditioning "—while only infrequently being used to abbreviate new terms. The apostrophe
6370-500: The label "usage problem". However, many English language dictionaries, such as the Collins COBUILD Advanced Dictionary , Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary , Macmillan Dictionary , Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English , New Oxford American Dictionary , Webster's New World Dictionary , and Lexico from Oxford University Press do not acknowledge such a sense. Most of
6468-836: The language to changing circumstances. In this view, the modern practice is just the "proper" English of the current generation of speakers, much like the earlier abbreviation of corporation names on ticker tape or newspapers. Exact pronunciation of "word acronyms" (those pronounced as words rather than sounded out as individual letters) often vary by speaker population. These may be regional, occupational, or generational differences, or simply personal preference. For instance, there have been decades of online debate about how to pronounce GIF ( / ɡ ɪ f / or / dʒ ɪ f / ) and BIOS ( / ˈ b aɪ oʊ s / , / ˈ b aɪ oʊ z / , or / ˈ b aɪ ɒ s / ). Similarly, some letter-by-letter initialisms may become word acronyms over time, especially in combining forms: IP for Internet Protocol
6566-455: The last steam locomotives in March 1972. In the late 20th century, the end of restrictions on competing road transport resulted in the WAGR and its successors moving from being a small customer-oriented system to a predominantly main line bulk carrier operation. This resulted in many smaller communities losing their facilities. However, in the wheatbelt, bulk handling of grain continued despite
6664-517: The locations of the receival points became part of a system of management zones: Each zone is further broken down into areas. Acronym An acronym is a type of abbreviation consisting of a phrase whose only pronounced elements are the initial letters or initial sounds of words inside that phrase. Acronyms are often spelled with the initial letter of each word in all caps with no punctuation . For some, an initialism or alphabetism , connotes this general meaning, and an acronym
6762-470: The middle of sentences for proper nouns; when following the AMA Manual of Style , this would instead be rendered as "the onset of congestive heart failure (CHF)". Western Australian Government Railways Western Australian Government Railways (WAGR) was the state owned operator of railways in the state of Western Australia between October 1890 and June 2003. Owned by the state government , it
6860-466: The more general "x" can be used to replace an unspecified number of letters. Examples include "Crxn" for "crystallization" and the series familiar to physicians for history , diagnosis , and treatment ("hx", "dx", "tx"). Terms relating to a command structure may also sometimes use this formatting, for example gold, silver, and bronze levels of command in UK policing being referred to as Gx, Sx, and Bx. There
6958-484: The network owner Brookfield Rail over track access prices and the state of the network to the Economic Regulation Authority. In December 2017 CBH Group expanded its locomotive fleet purchasing 10 DB class locomotives from Aurizon. When next tendered, the contract was awarded to Aurizon for six years with an option to extend to 10 years. Aurizon introduced a further three sets of wagons to
7056-589: The new name rapidly and almost universally replacing the old one in the vocabulary of staff and the public. Strong impetus to acceptance of the new corporate identity was given by the completion of a new Westrail office headquarters and passenger facility at East Perth Terminal (then known as Perth Terminal). The new building, named the Westrail Centre, was opened by the Premier of Western Australia , Sir Charles Court , on 12 November 1976. Westrail
7154-604: The new wagons were also fitted with NCDA-type central drawbars and doubly articulating couplers. In connection with the gauge conversion of the Eastern and Eastern Goldfields Railways in the late 1960s, the WAGR constructed a stock of standard gauge goods vehicles, including a class of wheat hopper wagons that, with a maximum payload of almost 77 tonnes (170,000 lb), were the largest freight vehicles operated by any Government railway in Australia. Chief Mechanical Engineer
7252-424: The next few decades, an extensive network of railway lines throughout Western Australia was built, primarily to service the wheatbelt . Prior to the expanded use of road transport, the network was of vital importance in the state, particularly for the moving of agricultural, forestry and mining products. In 1890, the Department was abolished and replaced by the WAGR and the Department of Works and Buildings (later
7350-729: The plural of 'pages', or mss. for manuscripts . The most common capitalization scheme seen with acronyms is all-uppercase ( all caps ). Small caps are sometimes used to make the run of capital letters seem less jarring to the reader. For example, the style of some American publications, including the Atlantic Monthly and USA Today , is to use small caps for acronyms longer than three letters; thus "U.S." and " FDR " in normal caps, but " nato " in small caps. The acronyms " AD " and " BC " are often smallcapped as well, as in: "From 4004 bc to ad 525 ". Where an acronym has linguistically taken on an identity as regular word,
7448-483: The pronunciation is reflected graphically by the capitalization scheme. However, it conflicts with conventional English usage of first-letter upper-casing as a marker of proper names in many cases; e.g. AIDS stands for acquired immuno-deficiency syndrome which is not a proper name, while Aids is in the style of one. Some style manuals also base the letters' case on their number. The New York Times , for example, keeps "NATO" in all capitals (while several guides in
7546-685: The publication of the 3rd edition of the Oxford English Dictionary added the expansive sense to its entry for acronym and included the 1940 citation. As the Oxford English Dictionary structures the senses in order of chronological development, it now gives the "initialism" sense first. English language usage and style guides which have entries for acronym generally criticize the usage that refers to forms that are not pronounceable words. Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage says that acronym "denotes abbreviations formed from initial letters of other words and pronounced as
7644-966: The rail network and operating regional passenger services, were transferred to the Western Australian Government Railways Commission. On 1 January 2003, the WAGR Commission's functions were absorbed by the Public Transport Authority . The former Westrail Centre is now known as the Public Transport Centre . The WAGR was renamed a number of times to reflect extra responsibility for tram and ferry operations that it assumed and later relinquished. Initially, Westrail applied an orange with blue stripe livery to its locomotives and passenger vehicles. Freight rolling stock and road trucks were painted yellow, and blue
7742-535: The railways between 1893 and 1959, however to appreciate the number of commissions that had relevance to railway operations, the coal and wheat industries were linked with the railway operations as well. The following are a selected group of commissions: The WAGR purchased the Great Southern Railway in December 1896 and the Midland Railway of Western Australia in August 1964. The WAGR operated
7840-513: The restrictions on non-government trucking were still in force, with suburban truck services from Perth to Midland , Fremantle , Kewdale and Gosnells . The country services were extensive having Perth and country rail stations as terminal locations. From 1928 until the 1970s (excluding a hiatus from 1929 to c. 1933 , due to the Great Depression ), WAGR ran "reso tours" as a way of publicising WA's natural resources , and
7938-532: The rolling stock, with ownership remaining with CBH. The services link various CBH grain collection points in the wheatbelt with CBH terminal and port facilities in Albany , Geraldton , Esperance and Kwinana . CBH operate on the Arc Infrastructure managed open access network. Although the contract officially commenced on 1 May 2012, Watco operated its first service on 30 March 2012. Because of
8036-489: The same time the Albany Progress overnight train was still operating, making it possible to do a round trip by rail from Perth to Albany and bus from Albany to Perth via Bunbury. In the mid-1970s some services reflected where rail services had either closed or had ceased providing facilities for passengers, the following selection is not the total service at the time. There were also road-freight services, while
8134-470: The sides of railroad cars (e.g., "Richmond, Fredericksburg and Potomac Railroad" → "RF&P"); on the sides of barrels and crates; and on ticker tape and newspaper stock listings (e.g. American Telephone and Telegraph Company → AT&T). Some well-known commercial examples dating from the 1890s through 1920s include " Nabisco " ("National Biscuit Company"), " Esso " (from "S.O.", from " Standard Oil "), and " Sunoco " ("Sun Oil Company"). Another field for
8232-476: The term acronym only for forms pronounced as a word, and using initialism or abbreviation for those that are not. Some sources acknowledge the usage, but vary in whether they criticize or forbid it, allow it without comment, or explicitly advocate it. Some mainstream English dictionaries from across the English-speaking world affirm a sense of acronym which does not require being pronounced as
8330-502: The terms as mutually exclusive. Other guides outright deny any legitimacy to the usage: Bryson's Dictionary of Troublesome Words says "Abbreviations that are not pronounced as words (IBM, ABC, NFL) are not acronyms; they are just abbreviations." Garner's Modern American Usage says "An acronym is made from the first letters or parts of a compound term. It's read or spoken as a single word, not letter by letter." The New York Times Manual of Style and Usage says "Unless pronounced as
8428-578: The tours was that they included all food and accommodation; passengers slept on the train rather than in a separate hotel, and the trains were referred to as "hotels on wheels". Tours typically ran over a weekend, leaving on Friday evening and returning on Monday morning. There were longer tours; in 1961 an 18-day tour included Geraldton, Kalgoorlie, Bunbury , Katanning and Pemberton. Until 1951, most steam locomotives were painted black. From that date, locomotives used on passenger services were painted green. The early diesel locomotives were painted green, with
8526-570: The twenty-first century. The trend among dictionary editors appears to be towards including a sense defining acronym as initialism : the Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary added such a sense in its 11th edition in 2003, and both the Oxford English Dictionary and The American Heritage Dictionary added such senses in their 2011 editions. The 1989 edition of the Oxford English Dictionary only included
8624-536: The whole range of linguistic registers is relatively new in most languages, becoming increasingly evident since the mid-twentieth century. As literacy spread and technology produced a constant stream of new and complex terms, abbreviations became increasingly convenient. The Oxford English Dictionary ( OED ) records the first printed use of the word initialism as occurring in 1899, but it did not come into general use until 1965, well after acronym had become common. In English, acronyms pronounced as words may be
8722-425: The word " an achro nym ", which is a type of misnomer. Words derived from an acronym by affixing are typically expressed in mixed case, so the root acronym is clear. For example, "pre-WWII politics", "post-NATO world", " DNase ". In some cases a derived acronym may also be expressed in mixed case. For example, " messenger RNA " and " transfer RNA " become "mRNA" and "tRNA". Some publications choose to capitalize only
8820-609: Was also broken in January with 1.88 million tonnes shipped out. The previous monthly shipping record of 1.66 million tonnes had been set in February 2014. Historically the CBH system had up to 300 receival points – in most cases tied into the Western Australian Government Railways railway network, as the railway lines were the prime grain transport method. By the 2000s, the number of receival points had been reduced to less than 200 and
8918-515: Was broken in 2013/14, with 15.8 million tonnes of grain handled by January 2014. New records were set in the 2016/17 season when the company received 16.6 million tonnes of grain. The company expected over $ 5 billion to have been pumped into the Western Australian economy as a result of the record harvest. A new record for the month of December was set with 831,000 tonnes of grain moved to port via rail. The highest monthly shipping record
9016-511: Was done with a full space between every full word (e.g. A. D. , i. e. , and e. g. for " Anno Domini ", " id est ", and " exempli gratia "). This even included punctuation after both Roman and Arabic numerals to indicate their use in place of the full names of each number (e.g. LII. or 52. in place of "fifty-two" and "1/4." or "1./4." to indicate "one-fourth"). Both conventions have fallen out of common use in all dialects of English, except in places where an Arabic decimal includes
9114-849: Was introduced for locomotives. In the late 1990s, this was superseded by a yellow and blue livery. The WAGR operated a large number of unique steam, diesel and electric locomotive classes. Most of the steam locomotives were built in the United Kingdom, with the WAGR's Midland Railway Workshops building some from 1915. The early diesels were mainly built by Beyer, Peacock and Company in England, Clyde Engineering in Sydney , and English Electric in Brisbane . Later diesels were assembled in Perth. The WAGR built much of its carriage and wagon stock at
9212-449: Was little to no naming , conscious attention, or systematic analysis until relatively recent times. Like retronymy, it became much more common in the twentieth century than it had formerly been. Ancient examples of acronymy (before the term "acronym" was invented) include the following: During the mid- to late nineteenth century, acronyms became a trend among American and European businessmen: abbreviating corporation names, such as on
9310-485: Was renamed a number of times to reflect extra responsibility for tram and ferry operations that it assumed and later relinquished. Westrail was the trading name of the WAGR from September 1975 until December 2000, when the WAGR's freight division and the Westrail brand were privatised. Its remaining passenger operations were transferred to the Public Transport Authority in July 2003. The WAGR had its origins in 1879, when
9408-569: Was responsible for managing the state's rail infrastructure. It operated urban and regional passenger and freight services throughout Western Australia. In Perth, Westrail provided the metropolitan area rail service, under contract to another arm of the State government. Its country passenger services involved the operation of both trains and road coaches. In October 1987, it was announced by Premier Brian Burke and Federal Minister for Land Transport & Infrastructure Support , Peter Duncan , that
9506-674: Was the highest posting at the Midland Railway Workshops , which in turn managed (through construction, repair and design) all aspects of railway maintenance and equipment. The post was established in 1900 and abandoned in 1989. A number of former WAGR locomotives and rolling stock types, as well as many examples of WAGR architecture and railway infrastructure have been preserved, with the Hotham Valley Railway and Rail Heritage WA holding extensive collections. Some items are preserved interstate, notably by
9604-474: Was used on all signs, buildings and printed material. The Westrail logo incorporated a stylised ⟨W⟩ surmounted by a solid bar representing a railway track. Between the bar and the ⟨W⟩ was the word ⟨Westrail⟩ . In July 1997, a yellow with blue livery was unveiled when the first Q class diesel-electric locomotive was delivered. A range of committees of inquiry as well as Royal Commissions were conducted on aspects of
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