I’m sure this has been asked before, but it’s hard to do a search for @.
It still meant “at” but it was usually used for financial transactions: like 5000 shares of Microsoft @ $10 a share = $50000.
Pricing and inventory:
3 widgets @ $2.00 each.
3 widgets at $2.00 each.
It was used frequently enough to actually be a key on ancient typewriters (at a time when typewriters “conserved” keys by using lower-case L in place of the number 1 and a single quote (’) followed by backspacing to place a period below it in order to emulate an exclamation point).
When the first (American) computers carried the original keyboards forward, the @ was borrowed by some programming operating systems for special purposes, meaning it was still around when the e-mail found a use for it.
Earlier discussions of the symbol (most of which are more concerned with its name than its use) can be found in Name That Symbol and in
What is the @ symbol called? among other threads.
Also, in case you ever wondered, Ray Tomlinson is the person who thought of using the @ symbol.
“At” is only 2 letters long! why use a special @ character just to save one letter?
Precisely because it is a special character that does not normally appear in names, but is on the standard keyboard.
In order to route the email to the recipient, you need to be able to tell what part of the address is the domain name. A special character in the name serves as a separator between the individual’s email name (e.g. RJKUgly) and the domain name (e.g. aol.com) and makes it easy to tell where one stops and the other starts.
Very simplified description follows.
Once you have the domain name, the mail can be routed to that domain by using the DNS (domain name server) system. Once at the domain, MX records can further route the mail to particular host machines. Once at the host the mail server program checks the name part of the address and sends the mail to the specific user on that system.
Because financial transactions are often highly appreviated and extraneous letters could confuse the issue. A financial order might read:
+5000MCS@10.00
+2800GEE@8.80
-1600XER@14.10
-400ABC@11.72
Start using “at” in the order, and you might end up buying controlling interest in American Telegraph & Telephone by mistake.
The @ also implied “each.”
For example:
10 apples at 10¢
Does that mean you get ten apples for ten cents?
To clarify, you can write either:
10 apples at 10¢ each
or
10 apples @ 10¢
The @ sign made it shorter.
It is called an “ampesand!”
Now you can do a search for it yourself.
Correction it is an AMPERSAND.
An ampersand is this: &
The word ampersand is a condensed form of “and per se and,” that is, and in and of itself.
@ is not an ampersand.
& is an ampersand.
I just noticed that the ampersand in the Trebuchet font doesn’t really look like a normal ampersand; it looks more like “8 t” smushed together, Or like a backwards B.
It’s actually the first word of “et cetera.” The reason it looks different in different typefaces is a matter of style and convention.
Construction plans:
#4 @ 16" - Meaning: place #4 sized reinforcing bars at 16" spacings.
I suppose the closest synonym in this case is “each.”
My apologies for jumping to an unwarranted conclusion. I knew better. :smack: :rolleyes:
Is there a special name for the @ symbol or is it just “The @ sign/symbol?”
“at symbol”
Well we Dutch call @ ‘apestaartje’…i.e. little monkeytail.
Why? I have no clue…
Rememerb also the @ symbol came into use in US / British commerce long before even typewriters were invented. It was simply a shorthand glyph that proved popular enough (read as useful enough) to make its way into the early typewriters. Recall that prior to typewriters, there was effectively no upper limit to the nuber of different glyphs that could be commonly used for various special industry-specific meanings.
It’s eventual co-optation for use in email addresses relies on the fact that the glyph is pornounced in American English as “at”, and by coincidence, the word “at” has two meanings: an assertion of location (“I am AT home”), or a per each item price (“3 apples AT 50 cents (implictly) each”).
It is also used to express interest rates:
$120,000 @ 8%.