Main Page

NENA Knowledge Base

NENAkb

A NENA Development Group Resource

For more information about NENA (National Emergency Number Association), please see NENA's home page: https://nena.org

No Knowledge Base account is necessary to use this site! If you are a NENA member or a member of the NENA Development Group (NDG) and want to offer suggestions, comments, or corrections, you can use the Discussion pages. To do that, you should create an account on NENA Knowledge Base.

You must be a NENA Knowledge Base Editor, and member of the Development Group Administrative Committee References Working Group to edit the content of NENA Knowledge Base pages. To join the NENA References Working Group, click here.

What's in here?

NENA Knowledge Base is a resource for readers of NENA publications and for the members of the NENA Development Group committees that prepare them. It includes:

• The NENA Knowledge Base Glossary An on-line continuation of the previously published NENA Master Glossary.

• NENA Development Group Articles Reference material prepared by the NENA committees that are responsible for the preparation of NENA standards and other documents.
• NENA Development Group Guide A collection of articles that describe how the NENA Development Group develops and approves documents and supporting material for the 9-1-1 community. It includes information and resources to assist NDG leaders to manage their groups according to NENA's policies.
  

NENA Knowledge Base Glossary

How do terms, abbreviations, and acronyms get in here?

There are two primary methods that Glossary terms can be added, changed, or deleted:

1. In approved NENA publications.
Most NENA documents include a glossary of terms used in the document. Some of the terms are identified as having a definition that the authoring Working Group believes should be adopted with the same definition throughout all other NENA publications. When those documents are approved for publication, those terms and their definitions are added to the NENA Knowledge Base Glossary if they did not previously exist, or the definitions for existing terms in the Glossary are modified. The details of this method are described in the A substantive Change to any Glossary or Article Page in an approved NENA publication section on the NENA Knowledge Base Management Policies page.

2. With an ISF (Issue Submission Form)
Another way for anyone to request a new Glossary page (or change or deletion) is to submit an ISF (Issue Submission Form). The details are described in the A substantive Change to any Glossary or Article submitted by anyone in an approved ISF section on the NENA Knowledge Base Management Policies page and the Who can submit requests to add, change, or delete Pages, including Glossary terms, in the NENA Knowledge Base? question on the NENA Knowledge Base Frequently Asked Questions page.

What kinds of terms, abbreviations, and acronyms are included in the NENA Knowledge Base glossary?

The NENA Knowledge Base glossary is not intended to provide definitions for common terms, acronyms, or abbreviations. Generally, common terms that are more extensively defined or described in other references (like Wikipedia) should not be included in the glossary unless they include hyperlinks to NENA documents where the terms are used or discussed in a 9-1-1 context not likely to be mentioned in other public references. The glossary is primarily intended to provide definitions for terms that are uniquely used in the 9-1-1 community, especially those used in published NENA documents.

The terms, acronyms, or abbreviations included in the Glossary should have at least one of these characteristics:

• They have a definition or usage unique to the 9-1-1 community.
• They have several possible meanings but are expected to be used in a consistent way in NENA publications.
• They may have a single, common, popular definition, but are used consistently with a unique or specific meaning in NENA publications.
• They have an essential use in a published NENA document, and the Glossary term page can provide links that can help the reader find where the material is covered.
• They are used in the definitions for other NENA Glossary terms.

Terms, acronyms, and abbreviations that would normally not be included as separate entries in the Glossary include those with these characteristics:

• The definition is only expected to be used in the context of one NENA document. For those cases, the term could be listed in the document's glossary, but not in the NENA Knowledge Base glossary.
• The definition is used in multiple NENA documents but has a different meaning in each document. For those cases, the term could be listed in each document's glossary, but not in the NENA Knowledge Base glossary.
• They do not have a definition or usage unique to the 9-1-1 community and are not an important reference in a NENA document.
• Other public references provide good definitions.
• They are names of fields, variables, parameters, tokens, or other elements. Those terms may be included in a NENA Knowledge Base article or in the definition of another term, usually in a table with other related terms. See CLDXF-US and TTY Protocol for examples.

Acknowledgments

NENA Knowledge Base has been developed and maintained by the National Emergency Number Association (NENA) Development Steering Council (DSC). The glossary terms and definitions and articles are provided by the members of the working groups that prepare NENA's published material. If you are interested in working on the NENA Knowledge Base, please join the Development Group Administrative Committee's References Working Group.