
Number sign is the Unicode preferred name for the glyph or symbol #. The name was chosen from several used in the United States and Canada. This sign's Unicode value is 0023 in hexadecimal and its ASCII value is 23 in hexadecimal. In the United Kingdom the name is used for the sign ''No.'', which is the Unicode sign 2116 in hexadecimal (№); it does not appear in ASCII. Many Canadians follow their example. That is the sign also traditionally used in European countries, even Russia, which does not use the Latin alphabet. But Unicode calls this sign the Numero sign for disambiguation. The symbol is traditionally called the pound sign in the US. It derives from a series of abbreviations for pound avoirdupois, a unit of weight. At first "lb." was used; later, printers got a special font made up of an "lb" with a line thorough the ascenders so that the "l" would not be mistaken for a "1". Unicode sign 2114 in hexadecimal (℔) is called the "LB Bar Symbol," and it is a cursive development of this symbol. Finally came the reduction to two horizontal and two vertical strokes. Its traditional commercial use was such that when it followed a number, it was to be read as 'pounds': 5# of sugar. And when it preceded a number, it was to be read as 'number': #2 pencil, which still appears on US pencils. Thus the same character in a printer's type case had two uses. It has many other names (and uses) in English language. (Those in bold are listed as alternative names in the Unicode documentation.) *comment sign **from its use in some programming languages, e.g. Perl, to introduce comment text *crosshatch **resemblance *crunch **? *fence, gate, grid, gridlet **resemblance *hash / hash mark / hash sign **the most common name outside the US, including in the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand. **Used in the UK and Australia on touch-tone telephones – "Please press the hash key" **In the UK the symbol is often used as medical shorthand for 'fracture' [http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/18.14.html] *hex **from its use to denote hexadecimal values in some markup and programming languages *octothorn ** William Sherk in ''500 Years of New Words'' (1983), p. 272, has the following entry: "Octothorn, The number sign (#); so called because there are eight points, or thorns, sticking out of it ..." *octalthorpe / octothorp / octothorpe **See wiktionary:Octothorpe for etymology. *pig pen **resemblance *pound / pound sign **Used as the symbol for the pound avoirdupois in the U.S. (where ''lb.'' would be used in the UK and Canada; note that lb. or lbs. is common in the U.S. as well and is used by the general public more often than #). Never called "pound" in the UK, where the term denotes the Pound Sterling and its symbol (£). ***Keith Gordon Irwin in, ''The Romance of Writing'', p. 125 says: "The Italian libbra (from the old Latin word libra, 'balance') represented a weight almost exactly equal to the avoirdupois pound of England. The Italian abbreviation of lb with a line drawn across the letters was used for both weights. The business clerk's hurried way of writing the abbreviation appears to have been responsible for the # sign used for pound." **Used in the U.S. and Canada on touch-tone telephones – "Please press the pound key" *rap **when used to refer to Microsoft's programming language, C Sharp programming language. *sharp **resemblance to the glyph used in music notation; so called in the name of Microsoft's new programming language, C Sharp programming language. However Microsoft says at [http://msdn.microsoft.com/vcsharp/productinfo/faq/default.aspx Frequently Asked Questions About C#]:
''It's not the "hash" (or pound) symbol as most people believe. It's actually supposed to be the musical sharp symbol. However, because the sharp symbol is not present on the standard keyboard, it's easier to type the hash ("#") symbol. The name of the language is, of course, pronounced "see sharp".''
Since most fonts don't contain the sharp sign most websites will doubtless continue to use the fallback hash mark. The "music sharp sign" which should be used if available is U+266F (♯). *splat **colloquial term referring to vague resemblance of # to a squashed spider **sometimes used for the asterisk (*), for the same reason **sometimes used for the cloverleaf-like Command key on Apple_computer keyboards *square **often misattributed as the UK name for ''#'', in reference to touch-tone telephones. From the earliest days of ''#'' appearing on telephones, it has been called "hash". **the International Telecommunications Union specification ITU-T E.161 3.2.2 states: "The # is to be known as a 'square' or the most commonly used equivalent term in other languages." *tic-tac-toe (US) / noughts-and-crosses (UK) **resemblance to game board *widget mark In Internet chatting, this symbol is used to mark the end of an internet chat session, a convention used to say that the chatter is going to type no more. In a URL the sign is used between the URL of a webpage and a "name" or "id" which defines a position in that webpage, by means of the attribute in a HTML element. A reference from the page itself can start with the number sign, and dispense with the URL of the page. The pronunciation of # as "pound" is common in the US which can cause confusion. The British Commonwealth has its own, rather more apposite, use of "pound sign". On British keyboards the UK Pound Sterling symbol often replaces #, with # being elsewhere on the keyboard. The US usage derives from an old-fashioned commercial practice of using a # suffix to tag pound weights on bills of lading. The character is usually called "hash" outside the US. ==In other languages== * Bulgarian language: ''диез'', pronounced ''dies'' * Chinese language: "井號" (''jǐng hào''; literally: ''"well" sign'') as it resembles the hanzi for water well (井; ''jǐng'') * Danish language: ''firkant'' (''square''), the official name used by telcos for touch-tone key, or havelåge (''garden gate'' from the gate in a picket fence) * Dutch language: ''hekje'' (''picket fence'') * Estonian language: ''trellid'' (''grate'') * Finnish language: ''ruutu'' (''square'') or ''risuaita'' (''brushwood fence'') * French language: ''dièse'' (''sharp sign'') * German language: ''Raute'' or Rautenzeichen (''Rhombus'', the official name used by telcos for the touch-tone key), ''Lattenzaun'' (''picket fence''), ''Doppelkreuz'' (''double cross'') * Greek language: ''δίεση'' (''diesis'') * Hebrew language: ''sulamit'' (from ''sulam'' == "ladder" + ''-it'', feminine ending) * Italian language: ''cancelletto'' (''small gate'') * Japanese language: "番号記号" (''bangōkigō'', "number sign"); "井桁" (''igeta'', literally the rim of a well, which is traditionally this shape) or "シャープ" (''sharp'' in katakana) * Norwegian language: ''firkant'' (''square'') * Portuguese language: ''cardinal'', used in mathematics notation to represent the cardinality of a set * Romanian language: ''diez'' ("sharp sign") * Russian language: ''решётка'' (''reshëtka''), pronounced ''ree-SHOT-ka'' (''grid'') * Spanish language: ''almohadilla'' ("little pillow") * Swedish language: ''fyrkant'' (''square'') or ''brädgård'' (''timberyard'') * Turkish language: ''Sayı işareti'' ==See also== * Numero sign ==References (as numbered above)== #Weird Words #*Entry for this symbol: http://www.quinion.com/words/weirdwords/ww-oct1.htm – valid as of May 22, 2003 #World Heritage Dictionary #*Entry for this symbol: http://www.bartleby.com/61/88/O0028850.html – valid as of May 22, 2003 Punctuation Typography
For addressing when a target mail receiver box is intended, is a space used between "#" and the box ordinal number? 555 Wilshire Blvd., #43 or 555 Wilshire Blvd., # 43 Thank you. :In standard American usage, at least, spaces never occur between the number sign and the number itself. ...to bring this on topic, it might be prudent to include examples of usage in the article. --User:Aponar Kestrel 20:29, 2004 Jul 25 (UTC) ---- Quote: pound / pound sign Used as the symbol for the pound avoirdupois in the U.S. (where lb. would be used in the UK and Canada). Never called 'pound' in the UK. and The business clerk's hurried way of writing the abbreviation appears to have been responsible for the # sign used for pound. Doesn't this pound/number sign confusion come from the fact that ISO 646 had the pound sign where ASCII had number sign? --User:romanm 00:00, 7 Nov 2003 (UTC) :No, the article has the right of it. Look on the bottom of a Wendy's bag sometime, or possibly that of another fast-food chain, though I can't verify. You may see something like 3#, presumably meaning that the bag is rated to hold three pounds of food (or whatever). --User:Aponar Kestrel 20:29, 2004 Jul 25 (UTC) ---- BT definitely do call # "square". Only this morning (19 December 2003), I was instructed to press "square" in order to gain entry to a teleconference. Lord knows why they do it. Even my mum knows that # is called "hash"! User:Pmcray ---- "(However, in French the # key on a telephone is called le carré.)" Really ? Actually, I have never heard this sign being called a "carré" (square in english). Everyone I know calls it a "dièse". User:SeeSchloss 18:25, 30 Mar 2004 (UTC) ---- "''hex: from its use to denote hexadecimal values in some markup and programming languages; e.g. for web colors in HTML''" I don't know if there's a programming language that uses the sign in the way described, but I ''do'' know that the meaning of this sign in HTML is just the ordinary number sign; it has nothing to do with hexadecimal. (The # in a color attribute indicates the color being given as a number rather than as a color name. The # in character references indicates usage of a numeric char reference instead of a so-called character entity reference (essentially a symbolic name). Only the additional letter ''x'' denotes the number as being hexadecimal in the latter case.) I remove the reference to HTML for now. Somebody else should see if there's really an instance where # means hexadecimal — I doubt it. -- User:141.30.230.88 07:19, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC) ---- At least in my part of UK, the # is medical shorthand for 'fracture' (as in 'this gentleman's # union is progressing nicely'). It's quite hard to look this kind of stuff up, and I don't know if it's official or international, but it's worth noting here in the talk page for future reference.-User:Ashley Pomeroy 12:55, 27 May 2005 (UTC) == Redirect? == Shouldn't a search for "#" be redirected to this article? --User:Micahbrwn 03:14, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
See other meanings of words starting from letter:
Words begining with Number_sign:
Number_sign
Number_sign
Number sign
Number sign is the Unicode preferred name for the glyph or symbol #. The name was chosen from several used in the United States and Canada. This sign's Unicode value is 0023 in hexadecimal and its ASCII value is 23 in hexadecimal. In the United Kingdom the name is used for the sign ''No.'', which is the Unicode sign 2116 in hexadecimal (№); it does not appear in ASCII. Many Canadians follow their example. That is the sign also traditionally used in European countries, even Russia, which does not use the Latin alphabet. But Unicode calls this sign the Numero sign for disambiguation. The symbol is traditionally called the pound sign in the US. It derives from a series of abbreviations for pound avoirdupois, a unit of weight. At first "lb." was used; later, printers got a special font made up of an "lb" with a line thorough the ascenders so that the "l" would not be mistaken for a "1". Unicode sign 2114 in hexadecimal (℔) is called the "LB Bar Symbol," and it is a cursive development of this symbol. Finally came the reduction to two horizontal and two vertical strokes. Its traditional commercial use was such that when it followed a number, it was to be read as 'pounds': 5# of sugar. And when it preceded a number, it was to be read as 'number': #2 pencil, which still appears on US pencils. Thus the same character in a printer's type case had two uses. It has many other names (and uses) in English language. (Those in bold are listed as alternative names in the Unicode documentation.) *comment sign **from its use in some programming languages, e.g. Perl, to introduce comment text *crosshatch **resemblance *crunch **? *fence, gate, grid, gridlet **resemblance *hash / hash mark / hash sign **the most common name outside the US, including in the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand. **Used in the UK and Australia on touch-tone telephones – "Please press the hash key" **In the UK the symbol is often used as medical shorthand for 'fracture' [http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/18.14.html] *hex **from its use to denote hexadecimal values in some markup and programming languages *octothorn ** William Sherk in ''500 Years of New Words'' (1983), p. 272, has the following entry: "Octothorn, The number sign (#); so called because there are eight points, or thorns, sticking out of it ..." *octalthorpe / octothorp / octothorpe **See wiktionary:Octothorpe for etymology. *pig pen **resemblance *pound / pound sign **Used as the symbol for the pound avoirdupois in the U.S. (where ''lb.'' would be used in the UK and Canada; note that lb. or lbs. is common in the U.S. as well and is used by the general public more often than #). Never called "pound" in the UK, where the term denotes the Pound Sterling and its symbol (£). ***Keith Gordon Irwin in, ''The Romance of Writing'', p. 125 says: "The Italian libbra (from the old Latin word libra, 'balance') represented a weight almost exactly equal to the avoirdupois pound of England. The Italian abbreviation of lb with a line drawn across the letters was used for both weights. The business clerk's hurried way of writing the abbreviation appears to have been responsible for the # sign used for pound." **Used in the U.S. and Canada on touch-tone telephones – "Please press the pound key" *rap **when used to refer to Microsoft's programming language, C Sharp programming language. *sharp **resemblance to the glyph used in music notation; so called in the name of Microsoft's new programming language, C Sharp programming language. However Microsoft says at [http://msdn.microsoft.com/vcsharp/productinfo/faq/default.aspx Frequently Asked Questions About C#]:
''It's not the "hash" (or pound) symbol as most people believe. It's actually supposed to be the musical sharp symbol. However, because the sharp symbol is not present on the standard keyboard, it's easier to type the hash ("#") symbol. The name of the language is, of course, pronounced "see sharp".''
Since most fonts don't contain the sharp sign most websites will doubtless continue to use the fallback hash mark. The "music sharp sign" which should be used if available is U+266F (♯). *splat **colloquial term referring to vague resemblance of # to a squashed spider **sometimes used for the asterisk (*), for the same reason **sometimes used for the cloverleaf-like Command key on Apple_computer keyboards *square **often misattributed as the UK name for ''#'', in reference to touch-tone telephones. From the earliest days of ''#'' appearing on telephones, it has been called "hash". **the International Telecommunications Union specification ITU-T E.161 3.2.2 states: "The # is to be known as a 'square' or the most commonly used equivalent term in other languages." *tic-tac-toe (US) / noughts-and-crosses (UK) **resemblance to game board *widget mark In Internet chatting, this symbol is used to mark the end of an internet chat session, a convention used to say that the chatter is going to type no more. In a URL the sign is used between the URL of a webpage and a "name" or "id" which defines a position in that webpage, by means of the attribute in a HTML element. A reference from the page itself can start with the number sign, and dispense with the URL of the page. The pronunciation of # as "pound" is common in the US which can cause confusion. The British Commonwealth has its own, rather more apposite, use of "pound sign". On British keyboards the UK Pound Sterling symbol often replaces #, with # being elsewhere on the keyboard. The US usage derives from an old-fashioned commercial practice of using a # suffix to tag pound weights on bills of lading. The character is usually called "hash" outside the US. ==In other languages== * Bulgarian language: ''диез'', pronounced ''dies'' * Chinese language: "井號" (''jǐng hào''; literally: ''"well" sign'') as it resembles the hanzi for water well (井; ''jǐng'') * Danish language: ''firkant'' (''square''), the official name used by telcos for touch-tone key, or havelåge (''garden gate'' from the gate in a picket fence) * Dutch language: ''hekje'' (''picket fence'') * Estonian language: ''trellid'' (''grate'') * Finnish language: ''ruutu'' (''square'') or ''risuaita'' (''brushwood fence'') * French language: ''dièse'' (''sharp sign'') * German language: ''Raute'' or Rautenzeichen (''Rhombus'', the official name used by telcos for the touch-tone key), ''Lattenzaun'' (''picket fence''), ''Doppelkreuz'' (''double cross'') * Greek language: ''δίεση'' (''diesis'') * Hebrew language: ''sulamit'' (from ''sulam'' == "ladder" + ''-it'', feminine ending) * Italian language: ''cancelletto'' (''small gate'') * Japanese language: "番号記号" (''bangōkigō'', "number sign"); "井桁" (''igeta'', literally the rim of a well, which is traditionally this shape) or "シャープ" (''sharp'' in katakana) * Norwegian language: ''firkant'' (''square'') * Portuguese language: ''cardinal'', used in mathematics notation to represent the cardinality of a set * Romanian language: ''diez'' ("sharp sign") * Russian language: ''решётка'' (''reshëtka''), pronounced ''ree-SHOT-ka'' (''grid'') * Spanish language: ''almohadilla'' ("little pillow") * Swedish language: ''fyrkant'' (''square'') or ''brädgård'' (''timberyard'') * Turkish language: ''Sayı işareti'' ==See also== * Numero sign ==References (as numbered above)== #Weird Words #*Entry for this symbol: http://www.quinion.com/words/weirdwords/ww-oct1.htm – valid as of May 22, 2003 #World Heritage Dictionary #*Entry for this symbol: http://www.bartleby.com/61/88/O0028850.html – valid as of May 22, 2003 Punctuation Typography
Number sign
For addressing when a target mail receiver box is intended, is a space used between "#" and the box ordinal number? 555 Wilshire Blvd., #43 or 555 Wilshire Blvd., # 43 Thank you. :In standard American usage, at least, spaces never occur between the number sign and the number itself. ...to bring this on topic, it might be prudent to include examples of usage in the article. --User:Aponar Kestrel 20:29, 2004 Jul 25 (UTC) ---- Quote: pound / pound sign Used as the symbol for the pound avoirdupois in the U.S. (where lb. would be used in the UK and Canada). Never called 'pound' in the UK. and The business clerk's hurried way of writing the abbreviation appears to have been responsible for the # sign used for pound. Doesn't this pound/number sign confusion come from the fact that ISO 646 had the pound sign where ASCII had number sign? --User:romanm 00:00, 7 Nov 2003 (UTC) :No, the article has the right of it. Look on the bottom of a Wendy's bag sometime, or possibly that of another fast-food chain, though I can't verify. You may see something like 3#, presumably meaning that the bag is rated to hold three pounds of food (or whatever). --User:Aponar Kestrel 20:29, 2004 Jul 25 (UTC) ---- BT definitely do call # "square". Only this morning (19 December 2003), I was instructed to press "square" in order to gain entry to a teleconference. Lord knows why they do it. Even my mum knows that # is called "hash"! User:Pmcray ---- "(However, in French the # key on a telephone is called le carré.)" Really ? Actually, I have never heard this sign being called a "carré" (square in english). Everyone I know calls it a "dièse". User:SeeSchloss 18:25, 30 Mar 2004 (UTC) ---- "''hex: from its use to denote hexadecimal values in some markup and programming languages; e.g. for web colors in HTML''" I don't know if there's a programming language that uses the sign in the way described, but I ''do'' know that the meaning of this sign in HTML is just the ordinary number sign; it has nothing to do with hexadecimal. (The # in a color attribute indicates the color being given as a number rather than as a color name. The # in character references indicates usage of a numeric char reference instead of a so-called character entity reference (essentially a symbolic name). Only the additional letter ''x'' denotes the number as being hexadecimal in the latter case.) I remove the reference to HTML for now. Somebody else should see if there's really an instance where # means hexadecimal — I doubt it. -- User:141.30.230.88 07:19, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC) ---- At least in my part of UK, the # is medical shorthand for 'fracture' (as in 'this gentleman's # union is progressing nicely'). It's quite hard to look this kind of stuff up, and I don't know if it's official or international, but it's worth noting here in the talk page for future reference.-User:Ashley Pomeroy 12:55, 27 May 2005 (UTC) == Redirect? == Shouldn't a search for "#" be redirected to this article? --User:Micahbrwn 03:14, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
See other meanings of words starting from letter:
N
NA | NB | NC | ND | NE | NF | NG | NH | NI | NJ | NK | NL | NM | NO | NP | NR | NS | NT | NU | NW | NX | NY | NZ |Words begining with Number_sign:
Number_sign
Number_sign
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