scope:

This Standard establishes abbreviations for words and word combinations for use on drawings and in engineering and scientific writing. The purpose is not to promote the use of abbreviations but to establish standard abbreviations to be used when abbreviations are necessary. This Standard also includes commonly used SI units. (See the Bibliography for a list of related standards.)

Functional designations, graphic symbols, letter combinations, data elements, mathematical symbols, quantity symbols, and reference designations, because they are not considered abbreviations, are with few exceptions excluded from this Standard. Also excluded are abbreviations for such categories as organizations, agencies, and computer languages. Symbols for chemical elements appear in Clause 10.