Interpreting notes symbols vary from person to person, and there is no single standard answer. They are not merely copied from others. Today, I will share some important considerations for interpreting notes for your reference. Everyone is welcome to learn and create their own symbolic system based on this.
Important Considerations for Interpreting Notes1. Interpreting notes should capture key points, avoiding the need to remember everything. Interpreting notes serve as an extension or supplement to memory, and they do not need to replace it. The main content of interpreting notes includes concepts, propositions, names, numbers, organizations, and logical relationships (such as size, sequence, pros and cons, up and down, cause and effect, etc.). The units of notes should primarily consist of words and symbols that express meaningful groups.2. Interpreting notes should be fast and precise, but not sloppy.3. Interpreting notes can use the source language, the target language, or a combination of both. As long as it aids in the accuracy and fluency of interpretation, there is no need to adhere strictly to a particular language or symbol. For example, “United Nations General Assembly” can be recorded as “UN” or “联大”.4. Interpreting notes should use a lot of common abbreviations, for example: cf (confer/compare), Co (company), e.g. (for example), max (maximum), min (minimum), ref (reference), std (standard), usu (usually), etc.Symbols for Interpreting Notes
1. Abbreviations for Place Names
| Original Word | Symbol | Original Word | Symbol |
| Korea | K | Sweden | SD |
| Switzerland | SW | Cardinal Directions | “|－” |
| the Republic of Korea (South Korea) | ROK “K” | the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) | DPRK “_K” |
| Eastern Germany | “G|” | Western Europe | “|EU” |
2. Abbreviations for Currencies
| Original Word | Symbol | Original Word | Symbol |
| Sterling/pound | £ | US dollar | $ |
| Renminbi/RMB | ¥ | Australian dollars | $A |
| Austrian schillings | Sch | Canadian dollars | Can$ |
| Eurodollar | € | New Zealand dollars | NZ$ |
| Japanese yen | 円 |
3. Abbreviations for Time
| Original Word | Symbol | Original Word | Symbol |
| hour | hr | minute | ’ |
| second | ’’ | morning | m |
| afternoon | a | evening/night/tonight | n |
| today | d | yesterday | .d |
| the day before yesterday | ”d | tomorrow | d’ |
| the day after tomorrow | d’ ’ | day by day/everyday | dd |
| last night | ’n | next morning | m’ |
| this week | w | the week before last | ”w |
| Monday | 1w | Tuesday | 2w |
| Wednesday | 3w | Thursday | 4w |
| Friday | 5w | Saturday | 6w |
| Sunday | 7w | this month | m |
| January | 1m | February | 2m |
| March | 3m | April | 4m |
| May | 5m | June | 6m |
| July | 7m | August | 8m |
| September | 9m | October | 10m |
| November | 11m | December | 12dm |
| two months ago | .2m | this year | y |
| two years later | y2. | before 1949 | /49 |
| after 1949 | 49/ | end of 1949 | 49 |
| 20 years later | 20y| | century | C |
| since/ever since | ┠ | up to now/until | ┫ |
4. Measurements
| Original Word | Symbol | Original Word | Symbol |
| meter | m | inch | in. |
| centimeter | cm | foot | ft |
| millimeter | mm | knot | kt |
| mile | mi | acre | A |
| nautical mile | nm |
5. Abbreviations
| Original Word | Symbol | Original Word | Symbol |
| Apartment | APT | Accountant | ACC |
| According | ACDG | Accept | ACPT |
| Advertisement | AD | Address | ADS |
| aircraft | AC | at least | AL |
| Advice | ADV | Approve | APV |
| as soon as possible | ASAP | As much/many as possible | AMAP |
| are | R | Amount | AMT |
| Building | BLDG | Balance | BAL |
| Cancel | CNCL | Conference | CNF |
| carbon copy | cc | care of | c/o |
| Conform | CFM | Commission | CMI |
| Complete | CMP | Concern/concerning/concerned | CONC |
| Condition | COND | Communication | CMU |
| Compete/competitive | CMPE | Certificate | CERT |
| Company | CO. | Departure | DPT |
| Discount | DISC | Department | DEPT |
| Extent | EXT | Exchange | EXCH |
| Explain | EXPLN | Extra large | XL |
| Final | FNT | Flight | FLT |
| For your reference | FYR | Freight | FRT |
| Guarantee | GUAR | Good | GD |
| Home office | H.O. | Interested | INTST |
| Information | INFO | important | IMP |
| I owe you | IOU | In stead of | I/O |
| In view of | IVO | Include | IINCD |
| insurance | INS | Impossible | IMPS |
| Individual | INDIV | Minimum | MIN |
| Market | MKT | Manufacture | MANUF |
| Message | MSG | manager | MGR |
| Model | MDL | Memorandum | MEMO |
| No later than | NLT | Necessary | NCRY |
| Ordinary | ORD | Observe | OBS |
| Obtain | OBT | Product | PROD |
| Patent | PAT | Packing | PKG |
| Please | PLS | People | PL |
| Piece | PC | Position | POSN |
| Possible | POSS(BL) | Quantity | QUTY |
| Quality | QLTY | room | RM |
| Regular | REGL | Representative | REP |
| Reservation | RESN | Repeat | RPT |
| Responsible | RESPON | receive | RCV |
| Reference | REF | Situation | SITN |
| Standard | STD | Section | SEC |
| Though | THO | TGM | Telegraph |
| Thanks | TKS | Telephone | TEL |
| Trade | TRD | through | THRU |
| Temporary | TEMP | Traffic | TRF |
| Total | TTL | You | U |
| Your | UR | Will | WL |
| Week | WK | Weight | WT |
6. Handling Longer Words
| Word Ending | Abbreviation | Original Word | Symbol |
| -ism | m | socialism | Sm |
| -tion | n | standardization | stdn |
| -cian | o | technician | techo |
| -ing | g | marketing | MKTg |
| -ed | d | accepted | acptd |
| -able/ible/ble | bl | available | avbl |
| -ment | mt | amendment | amdmt |
| -ize | z | recognize | regz |
| -ful | fl | meaningful | mnfl |
7. Letters, Images, Symbols
| Original Word | Symbol | Original Word | Symbol |
| people/person | ｏ | Japanese | JPｏ |
| Government/govern | C | Governmental official | CZ |
| Politics/political | P | politician | PZ |
| Efficient/effective | G | inflation | Q |
| victory/win/success | V | Leader/head | T |
| agriculture/agriculture | A | business | B |
| conflict/confrontation | C× | work/employ | W |
| industry/industrial | i | treaty/agreement | U |
| bilateral | U内填入2 | trilateral | U内填入3 |
| Unilateralism | U内填入1 | Multiple | U内填入m |
| Negotiation breakdown | U上加一个“/” | country/state/nation | □ |
| Import | gO | Export | Og |
| chair/host/preside over | Z | Chairman/host | Z° |
| contact, exchanges: | ∞ | fishery | ∞ |
| head of government/company | CT | international/worldwide | ○ |
| global/universal | |||
| as we all know | EO | meeting/conference/negotiation/seminar/discussion/symposium | ⊙ |
| pleasant/joyful/happy/excited | J | unsatisfied/discomfort | L |
| angry/sad | |||
| indifferent/apathetic/unconcerned | O | total/totally/entire | ∑ |
| go into/arrive at/give to/send to/present to | g→ | lead to/result in/in the direction of | → |
| come/go back to/originate | ← | be/come from/return/receive from | f← |
| launch/open/start | ↗ | develop/strengthen/promote/boost/improve/enhance | ↑ |
| up/upward/rise/increase | h↑ | ups and downs/twists and turns/roller coaster | << |
| arise/ascend | |||
| submit to | ↓ | exchange/mutual | n |
| a match/rival/competitor/counterpart/against | VS | many/lots of/a great deal of/a good many of/plus | + |
| more | ++ | most | +3 |
| little/few/lack/in short of/be in shortage of/minus | － | about/around/or so/approximately | ≈ |
| bigger/larger/greater/more than/better than | > | less/smaller | < |
| superior to/surpass | ∧ | inferior to | ∨ |
| among/within | ( ) | but yet however | ∧ |
| cross out/eliminate | / | question/issue | ? |
| wonder/miracle/pay attention to | ！ | matchless/peerless | 无敌 |
| say/speak/talk/marks/announce/declare | : | end/stop/halt/bring sth to a standstill/stop | ∥ |
| right/good/famous/well-known | √ | wrong/incorrect/something bad/notorious/negative | × |
| stand up for/support/agree with sb/certain/affirmative | Y | not agree/disagree | N |
| thought | * | important/best/outstanding/brilliant | ☆ |
| very/extremely | __ | under the circumstance | ￣ |
| means/that is to say/in other words/the same as/be equal to | #NAME? | be different from | ≠ |
| and/together with/along with/accompany/along with/further more | & | belong to | ∈ |
| basis of/perpendicular/is perpendicular to | ⊥ | therefore/so/as a result/consequently | ∴ |
| because/because of/due to | ∵ | hear/listen | ○3 |
| about | ＠ | parallel | // |
| water | H2O | for | 4 |
| to | 2 | without | w/o |
| with | w/ | plus or minus | ± |
| times | x | so on, etc, and so forth | ··· |
| divided by | ÷ | circle,circumference | ○ |
| degree | ℃ | ellipse | 0 |
| percent | % | diameter | θ |
| per thousand | ‰ | triangle, delta | △ |
| between | |.| | inside/within/include/among | ( ) |
| maintaining peace and stability: | ◎ | Empty | O |
| as always/hold on/persist/insist on | ≡ | pressure/influence | ⊥ |
| On the other hand/or | / | right angle | ∟ |
| Representative/delegation | △ | ocean/sea/river/lake/brook/stream | ∽ |
| hills/mountain | ω | climb the mountain | ω上加一点· |
| between mountains and rivers | ω∕∽ | before/beyond/in front of | ·| |
| above/on/over | ～上加一点· | below/beneath/under | ～下加一点· |
| table/desk/house/building/bed | ︹ | on the chair | ︹上加一短横 |
| under the table | ︹下加一短横 | look/look after/look into/investigate/witness | ⊙ |
| capitalism | 资’ | Four Modernizations | 4m |
| peace-keeping | 维p | Third World | 3w |
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