When writing around an acronym is it proper to treat the acronym as if it was fully expanded or just spelled out? For example "RNG" is an acronym for "random number generator." Thus does one say "a RNG" (for "a random number generator") or "an RNG" (for "an R-N-G") Thanks!
It should be "an RNG", but only if it's clear to the reader what "RNG" stands for. If it isn't, or it only features in the plot for a few sentences, don't use an acronym at all.
Well, there's a group of gun control nuts in my area called the Department Of Urban Constitutional Hangun Elimination, and my friends and I just refer to them without the dashes.
Thanks. I don't have a large enough post count to be considered an authority, so I wasn't going to comment, but that was pure b..s.. Sorry, I know it just continues an off topic thread, but you're right.
Peter C, to address your question, I've written many technical papers and the proper format for using acronyms is that with the first use of the proper term you capitalize the first letter of your term and follow it with the acronym in parenthesis, i.e.:We used a Random Number Generator (RNG) for our data. The use of the RNG gave us the ability to come up with any outcome we desired.
It depends on how a speaker would typically say it, and it's not always clear cut. For example, the computer acronym SQL is either pronounced "ess-queue-ell" or "SEE=kwul" (like sequel), depending on the speaker's preference or the conventions of where it is discussed. So in the former case, you might refer to "an SQL query", and in the latter, "a SQL query." In the case of RNG, it is nearly always spoken as the three letters, not "rung" or "ring", so you would use the indefinite article "an".
That makes sense. I suppose that's why it seemed ambiguous to me since different people have different ways of speaking these things sometimes. Thanks!
