Since engineers are strongly associated with
jargon, we
often present arguments to audiences that don't
understand the definitions of terms we consider
basic.
A nomenclature is a dedicated section in
a written work for defining those terms. My personal
rule of thumb is to create a nomenclature if there
are at least three or four terms the
audience might
not be familiar with.
I have other rules of thumb that go along with this
basic policy:
- If I'm not sure whether the audience knows a term
or not, I include it.
- It doesn't matter to me during development of a
nomenclature whether the audience agrees to my
definition or not. The important thing going into
a presentation is that they know what definitions
I'm working with. I can be corrected later if
I'm wrong; I can modify a definition later if it's
incomplete.
- I have to be careful not to introduce new terms in
the original definition. (This is often the difficult
part for us engineers.) My goal -- admittedly not
always reached -- is to always define technical terms
using words that anyone with a college education might
have learned.
- Likewise, I can't use a term to define itself. The
rhetoricians call that "circular reasoning." On the
other hand, we engineers often define terms this
way without intending to deceive an audience.
- I have to remember that even Greek letters (an
engineer's staple) don't always have the same
definitions across disciplines.
It's pretty easy to create a nomenclature on a Web page,
using HTML:
<dl>
<dt>describing function</dt>
<dd>linear representation of nonlinear
behavior, used in control systems and
valid over a limited input range</dd>
</dl>
The result looks like this:
- describing function
- linear representation of nonlinear
behavior, used in control systems and
valid over a limited input range
It's much simpler than creating a table. You can format such
a list using cascading style sheets
without any changes to the surrounding page.
References
Thomason, L. "Defining
Terms with HTML." netmechanic.com, 03.2002.