Hash marks revisited

[DAVID IBBETSON <ibbetson -at- IDIRECT -dot- COM>]

Mike Sechelski writes:
>  I wouldn't call it "octothorp"; no one would know what you were
>     talking about.

>     A hash mark?...naaaw.

>     I'm afraid I'd resort to pound sign, although I don't really like
>     it either.

Where's your audience? In countries that use the pound as a unit of money
the phrase "pound sign" means the fancy capital L that is used in the same
way as (USians use the dollar sign). In former times a script lower case l
after the amount was used as an alternative to the fancy L before the amount.

Octothorpe is used by the telephone industry. I have seen various
explanations for its name. (Literally "eight villages").

In the UK the hash mark is NOT used to indicate a pound weight. the
abbreviation lb is used. It is placed after the amount. Both the script L
and lb are abbreviations of the Latin word Libra.

David (the idiot who hoped, vainly, that he wouldn't have to discuss
octothorpe again) Ibbetson

David Ibbetson                                   ibbetson -at- idirect -dot- com
133 Wilton St, #506, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5A 4A4
Phone (416) 363-6692    Fax (416) 363-4987

Fiat justitia et pereat mundus (Let justice be done, though the world
perish) -- Motto of Ferdinand I (1503-64), Holy Roman Emperor from 1558
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