Difference between lon and lng

Question

When browsing the web and documentation I see the abbreviation lon and lng used for the longitude part of geometry.

I was wondering if there is any difference between lng and lon.

Answer 1

I think lng abbreviation is not wrong, it is a personal choice but it may cause a mixup in the words in the GIS World because The Longitude is settled in our language abbreviation of "Long" or "Lon".

You can see in wikipedia its defined as follows:

The Longitude (abbreviation: Long., λ, or lambda) of a point on the Earth's surface is the angle east or west from a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses (often improperly called great circles), which converge at the north and south poles.

from Acronyms and Abbreviations :

lon - longitude

Abbreviation:   lon
Definition:     longitude - also long , L , long. and LL
Definition Rank:    
Categories:     Technology
Military
Science
Topics by tags: army and military
Unconfirmed Type:   Syllabic Abbreviation

I hope it helps you...

Answer 2

I'm pretty sure there is no difference, it's just that there are inconsistencies in the way that Longitude is abbreviated. I'm not aware if there are any resources available that are trying to set a standard for abbreviations.

Answer 3

Which abbreviation to use is mainly a matter of preference. Personally, I use "lat" and "lon". Here's why:

Both are 3 letters, which provides a nice symmetry. Both are phonic abbreviations that correspond to what people call them when speaking. "long" is a reserved word in most programming languages and it is harder to textually search. "lng" looks garbled.