A Glossary would help.

General Topics
1

Hi, all.

While searching around this board, I was reminded of how impenetrable these environments can be at times, when I stumbled upon a thread that was replete with instances of the acronym, ‘OTL’; needless to say, I could find no reference in the thread to what ‘OTL’ might mean or indicate.

(Perhaps I have been somewhat spoiled through my experience of scientific and technical papers wherein an acronyim might be introduced in the form, “…the Outer Layer Throttle (OTL) is significant in that…”, allowing valid use of, and the subsequent reference to, ‘OTL’.)

While I have learned to recognise the more common abbreviations in use around the internet, and to generally ignore them for what they are - at best, puerile trivia, and, at worst, downright untruth, and an element of these post-literate times - here was one in a context that suggested a real and significant meaning.

In true response to the Google effect (another post-literate manifestation, this time of what was once the “Dictionary Effect”) my quest was now for the meaning of ‘OTL’, and was, sadly, in vain; by the time I had to abandon the search, I had found nothing beyond a hint that it had some relation to MBAM.

Which brings me back to my point: a glossary of terms and acronyms that are generally in use in the arena of anti-malware, might well be a useful addition to this board.

I suggest that it be rigorously policed/moderated, to maintain a relevant content, and to exclude the ubiquitous rash of social(?) interchange devices.

Can I request, also, that the first entry be “OTL”?

Festive greetings to you all,
kb-r

2

MBAM = MalwareBytes AntiMalware www.malwarebytes.org

OTL = OTL by OldTimer – A Modern Replacement for HijackThis
http://www.geekstogo.com/2010/05/27/otl-by-oldtimer-a-modern-replacement-for-hijackthis/

3

Another reason why abbreviation sometimes lead to confusion and should always be referenced somewhere
in the post with the actual meaning of that abbreviation.

4

Maybe people could start using the built in function of the forum to display acronyms:

[nobbc]acronym[/nobbc]

so it becomes: MBAM
The explaination appears on mouseover.

Although it is a little long, this could simply be added to canned text that people have and would save some people not knowing what it is.

5

OTL is an analysis and removal tool - full name Old Timers Listit, there are various other flavours of this:

Old Timers Scanit (OTS a more in depth version)
Old Timers Helpit (OTH used to stop all running processes)
Temporary File Cleaner (TFC clears all temp files)
Old Timers Listit Pre-install Environment (OTLPE a live windows CD operating environment)
TDL rootkit cleaner (TDSKiller from Kaspesky - kills the TDL4 MBR rootkit)
AVZ a standalone antivirus and analysis tool by Kaspersky

6

There is a glossary here. Although it is a little old, mostly still relevant.

7

A Google of OTL returns the correct answer at result #8. Interpreting the results, of course, implies a little technical awareness beforehand.

It is probable that had the entire thread with the reference to OTL been read from the beginning, the poster that supplied the link to same tool would have explained its use at the time, or linked to a thread that did.

There are all sorts of abbreviations for the various tech tools - many of which come and go as they are superseded - hence a glossary soon goes out of date. (Example: HjT = HijackThis. The number one analysis tool in its day. Still in use, but outdated.)

I empathize somewhat with the situation, but frankly, it is the nature of the forum that help often gets fairly technical. If you are the one soliciting help in a thread, and TLA’s that you don’t understand and need to know are included, the question should be posted within the thread. Bit of a PITA, I know, but often the tools that are suggested to be run cannot be reasonably all explained on the go. It would take too long to post all the help instrucations.

8

Good morning.

Thank you all for the replies. It looks like a useful collection of tools.
With the nature of ‘OTL’ identified, it almost explains itself in the context of the thread that I mentioned.

It’s difficult not to just liberally use acronyms, and perhaps we’ll never break the habit - interestingly, I see that in my first post I happily (and thoughtlessly) used the abbreviation, ‘MBAM’, with no expansion; just as interesting, no-one seems to have noticed.

Regards,
kb-r

9

That almost made me roffle, if I was prone to that sort of thing. ;D