The Mavens of Techno-Speak
Kirt's Cogitations™ #143

RF Cafe University "Factoids," "Kirt's Cogitations," and "Tech Topics Smorgasbord" are all manifestations of my ranting on various subjects relevant (usually) to the overall RF Cafe theme. All may be accessed on these pages:

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The Mavens of Techno-Speak

The mavens of techno-speak have given us yet another noun-turned-verb to add to our lexicon. "Texting" is the newly popular word describing the act of composing and sending an SMS (Short Messaging Service) note. SMS, an immensely popular feature of 2.5G and 3G wireless, transported more than 1 billion messages in August 2001 alone. How does one conjugate the verb "to text": has texted, is texting, will text? That works for a regular verb, but what if it is declared irregular with a past tense like: text-taxed or text-toxt or text-text (ala see-saw and tell-told and let-let)? How about these active verb tenses involving "to text": I texted, I am texting, I was texting, I have texed, I will be texting, I will text, I will have texted. And, the passive tenses: The message is texted, The message was texted, The message is being texted,... Well, you get the picture.

RF Cafe began life in 1996 as "RF Tools" in an AOL screen name web space totaling 2 MB. Its primary purpose was to provide me with ready access to commonly needed formulas and reference material while performing my work as an RF system and circuit design engineer. The World Wide Web (Internet) was largely an unknown entity at the time and bandwidth was a scarce commodity. Dial-up modems blazed along at 14.4 kbps while tying up your telephone line, and a lady's voice announced "You've Got Mail" when a new message arrived...