Table Of ContentELECTROTECHNICAL COMMISSION
Multilingual Dictionary of
Electricity, Electronics and
Telecommunications
with terms in nine languages and definitions in English
Ф Distributed by
The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc.
in cooperation with the International Electrotechnical Commission
IEEE SH 15156
Multilingual Dictionary of
Electricity, Electronics and
Telecommunications
with terms in nine languages and definitions in English
INTERNATIONAL ELECTROTECHNICAL COMMISSION
3. RUE DE VAREMBÉ GENEVA SWITZERLAND
Multilingual Dictionary of
Electricity, Electronics and
Telecommunications
with terms in nine languages and definitions in English
Distributed by
The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc.
in cooperation with the International Electrotechnical Commission
IEEE
The International Electrotechnical Commission has published the full
Multilingual Dictionary of Electricity, Electronics and Telecommunica
tions in five volumes :
Volume 1 : Terms and definitions in English and French with equivalent
terms in Russian, German, Spanish, Italian, Dutch, Polish
and Swedish.
Volume 2 : Terms and definitions in English with equivalent terms in
French and the seven other languages.
Volume 3 : German, Dutch and Swedish indexes.
Volume 4 : Spanish and Italian indexes.
Volume 5 : Russian and Polish indexes.
This volume is a North American version of Volume 2 which is
distributed in the United States and Canada by the IEEE.
Copies of the other volumes may be obtained from :
American National Standards Institute, Inc.
11 West 42nd Street, 13th Floor
NEW YORK, NY 10036
Standards Council of Canada
International Standardization Division
45, O’Connor Street, Suite 1200
OTTAWA, Ont. KIP 6N7
or
ELSEVIER SCIENCE PUBLISHERS
PO Box 1991
1000 BZ AMSTERDAM THE NETHERLANDS
COPYRIGHT - ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
No part of this publication may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic
or mechanical, including photocopying and microfilm, without the prior written permission of the
publisher.
© 1992 IEC Central Office,
3, rue de Varembé, 1211 Geneva 20 Switzerland
ISBN 1-55937-185-4
SH 15156
CONTENTS
Foreword .................. VII
Using the dictionary ................................. IX
English dictionary .............................................................................. 1
Figures ................................................................................................. i
Yellow pages : List of fields covered ........................................... XI
The IEC, the International Electrotechnical Commission, is the
authority for world standards in electrical and electronics engineering.
The IEC is composed of National Committees in more than 40 countries
formed to represent in international discussions all their national electri
cal and electronics interests, including manufacturers, users, trade as
sociations, the engineering profession and government. IEC standards,
developed by over 200 Technical Committees and Sub-Committees
whose programmes collectively span electrotechnology, are used as the
basis of national rules and standards in over 100 countries, and for the
purposes of international trade.
FOREWORD
Since the first years of its existence, questions of international
nomenclature, which facilitate exchanges of both goods and ideas, have
engaged the attention of the International Electrotechnical Commission
(IEC). An alphabetical list of electrotechnical terms, together with their
definitions, proposed by the IEC’s first Technical Committee : “ Nomen
clature ” (TC 1) was approved at the Berlin meeting in 1913. The sec
retariat duties of this Technical Committee since it was set up in 1910 have
been carried out by the French Electrotechnical Committee.
From the early twenties onwards, the Commission prepared the first
edition of its International Electrotechnical Vocabulary (IEV) which was
published in 1938. That edition contained some 2 000 terms accompanied
by the definitions of the concepts represented.
In 1983, the IEC Multilingual Dictionary of Electricity was pub
lished. It was based on 40 chapters of the IEV, defined more than
7 500 terms in French and English, and gave the equivalent terms in seven
other languages : Russian (the third official language of the IEC), as well
as German, Spanish, Italian, Dutch, Polish and Swedish.
Terms relating to telecommunications were excluded.
The title of the present second edition : IEC Multilingual Dictionary
of Electricity, Electronics and Telecommunications, reflects both the
ever-increasing role of electronics in the activities of the Commission and
the inclusion of terms relating to telecommunications.
IEV chapters of the 700 series have been prepared by joint groups of
experts from the Technical Committees of the International Telecommu
nication Union (ITU), the International Consultative Radiocommunica
tion Committee (CCIR), the International Consultative Telegraph and
Telephone Committee (CCITT), and the IEC. The CCIR - CĆITT -IEC
Joint Co-ordinating Group for vocabulary (JCG) co-ordinates these
activities.
This second edition is based on nearly 70 IEV chapters and con
tains 18 000 terms and synonyms.
For the list of fields covered, please refer to the yellow pages.
In addition to providing a unique multilingual reference work, this
dictionary is intended to facilitate understanding between electrical
engineers of all countries and assist in eliminating a certain laxity in
technical language, the source of numerous misunderstandings, costly in
both time and money.
USING THE DICTIONARY
A brief description of some of the principles applied in the prepara
tion of this volume may be of help to the reader.
The basic entry consists of a term and its definition with the equi
valent term in French.
— The term, representing a precise concept in a specific context, i.e.
chapter and section, often takes the form of an expression of varying
complexity. When there are several expressions, the first is chosen as
the main one, while the others are given as synonyms.
— The definition is sometimes accompanied by a commentary in the
form of notes and examples.
— The terms given in English and French are translated into seven other
languages of the IEV, namely : Russian (the third official language of
the IEC), as well as German, Spanish, Italian, Dutch, Polish and
Swedish.
— The absence of a term in one of the languages signifies that it was not
available or did not exist at the time of publication of this edition.
Terms often consist of several words of which not all have the same
significance. In an expression the main significant word retained is called
the key word; it is used to facilitate terminological research.
Notes
1) If the same key word appears in different grammatical forms, only the
simplest form is used in the list (singular, masculine nominative,
infinitive) depending upon the particular language.
2) Very often the character of the key word has been assigned to groups
of words, either because these groups are highly representative (occur
ring frequently in different expressions) or because they designate
concepts quite different from those designated by the individual words
of which they are formed.
The key words, listed in alphabetical order, form the framework of
the Dictionary. Under each of them are listed all the expressions in which
they appear, these in turn being listed in their natural alphabetical order
and numbered in this order. This number — the numerical index — is
used for all internal references in the Dictionary.
If an expression contains several key words, one of them is chosen
as the “main key word”, the others being designated “secondary key
words”. An expression is only accompanied by all its attributes (syn
onyms, definition, translation, etc.) under the main key word. A second
ary key word is merely followed by a reference to the main key word.
