Talk:Power symbol

Pawan — Preceding unsigned comment added by 110.44.115.157 (talk) 17:25, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

Unicode
From some Googling, it appears this common symbol is not in Unicode, nor is it in the LaTeX symbol packages. Is this correct? —BenFrantzDale 22:49, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
 * It seems so, and what a shame. 193.11.215.37 (talk) 00:10, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

Visual
It would probably be better to have a non ASCII visual representation of this symbol, ie. a vector-outline or monochrome image. 67.161.201.16
 * I agree completely. —Ben FrantzDale 04:46, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Added a very simple image of the power symbol. Reverie 15:50, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

stylised 1 and 0?
Is it a stylised 1 and 0 or is it supposed to represent the breaking of a cycle? The latter seems more likely to me, and the former seems simply absurd.


 * I always assumed it was a stylised 0/1 because earlier electronics used 0/1 to indicate a power switch. I'm thinking particularly the switches found on computer power supplies circa Intel 386 computers. I'd love to see a reference giving a less-speculative history, though. —Ben FrantzDale 15:22, 28 May 2006 (UTC)


 * I think it's a reference to binary code where 0 is off and 1 is on. If you look at a power strip you'll notice the circle (0) is off and the line (1) is on.  I don't believe that the circle and the line were integrated into one symbol until later (when that was I have no idea).  Stylized 1 and 0 seems to make the most sense to me.  But this is speculative, sorry.--James.sachs 00:25, 30 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I was thinking about the same thing today, but I would think that power switches with 1 and 0 (line and circle) on it would have predated computers (probably not binary 1 and 0 though). I guess if someone can find an old piece of electronics with an on off switch and these symbols, it would help.  Something from the 1930s or earlier. For all we know, maybe binary came from power switches? -- Suso (talk) 18:22, 27 October 2008 (UTC)


 * And this whole time I thought it was a stylized picture of a power switch! -- David McCabe (talk) 00:17, 14 April 2009 (UTC)


 * The symbols would work better and be less confusing if they weren't "stylized". They don't look like a 1 and a 0.  They look like a l and an O.  Captain Quirk (talk) 07:43, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I actually think we should either place a citation needed for that part or remove them until there is an actual source that states such a thing. Until such a source exists, what they represent is just speculation. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.23.246.56 (talk) 03:24, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

I always that it was a stylised I and O an abbreviation for "In service" and "Out of service". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 116.199.214.34 (talk) 01:17, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

I think the symbol stands for the Hindu gods Shiva and Shakti. In India there are many roadside temples to these gods in the form of a fountain, representing a yoni, or vagina, with a lingum (phallic symbol) in the middle. Seen from an angle the fountain looks like a circle broken by a rod. The name Shakti means power in Sanskrit and she's the goddess of energy. The standards were created in the early 70s in the US, just at the time when lots of Americans were learning about Hindi gods and goddesses. This also jibes with the New York decision to put the ShivaShakti fertility symbol on the condoms. Bananaquiet (talk) 05:47, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

I think it must be explained in the original standard document that define it. Someone have access to it?--PhoneixS (talk) 15:14, 10 October 2012 (UTC)

I have contacted with IEC secretary and he confirm that come from logic 1 and 0. Here is his response:
 * Dear Mr Alfonso,
 * Thank you very much for your mail of 13th Oct.
 * They are believed to standardized from logic 1 and 0.
 * Best regards,
 * Yoshikazu Seki,
 * Secretary of IEC/TC 3/SC 3C — Preceding unsigned comment added by PhoneixS (talk • contribs) 10:49, 14 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Technically, he just confirmed that he isn't sure where they come from; a previous IP editor made a (rather badly-written) edit claiming that it has nothing to do with 1 and 0, and that the IEC maintains as such. I don't believe it's true, but I cleaned up the edits (leaving in the added content) to wait for a citation; if you could find a citable version of this, that would be nice. Hppavilion1 (talk) 16:21, 9 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Yoshikazu Seki,
 * Secretary of IEC/TC 3/SC 3C — Preceding unsigned comment added by PhoneixS (talk • contribs) 10:49, 14 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Technically, he just confirmed that he isn't sure where they come from; a previous IP editor made a (rather badly-written) edit claiming that it has nothing to do with 1 and 0, and that the IEC maintains as such. I don't believe it's true, but I cleaned up the edits (leaving in the added content) to wait for a citation; if you could find a citable version of this, that would be nice. Hppavilion1 (talk) 16:21, 9 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Technically, he just confirmed that he isn't sure where they come from; a previous IP editor made a (rather badly-written) edit claiming that it has nothing to do with 1 and 0, and that the IEC maintains as such. I don't believe it's true, but I cleaned up the edits (leaving in the added content) to wait for a citation; if you could find a citable version of this, that would be nice. Hppavilion1 (talk) 16:21, 9 May 2017 (UTC)

Accidental misuse
Added a section that mentions a fairly common mistake on a wide array of products. Also added an example picture because the description itself is not entirely clear. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Zagaberoo (talk • contribs) 05:30, 7 December 2006 (UTC).

The picture itself is actually not entirely clear either, if someone has a better example, please change it. -Zagaberoo

The XBox 360 red ring of death picture? Is that really appropriate for this?

--123.119.101.50 (talk) 13:18, 4 March 2015 (UTC)

Anyone have an idea who invented this symbol?

Fact check needed on Wii/Revolution mention
An earlier revision of this article incorrectly identified the standby symbol as a "power symbol", and the pictured Wii prototype is shown as an example of misuse. Can someone confirm how the switch on that prototype actually worked? If there was a standby mode in addition to power off, the label may not have been a mistake. Thanks! --Klork 12:51, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

''(Moving the uncertain section here for now, because it's really looking more like popular uncertainly over what the symbols mean, more than a mistake on the part of Nintendo. Here it is:) It is, however, occasionally misused to represent "off" on on/off switches, resulting in what appears as an "on/on/off" switch. This mistake was notably made on the Nintendo Wii prototype when it was still known as "Revolution".

IEEE
Why are the IEEE standards listed as "alternatively"... most of the devices that I have seen in my lifetime seem to use the IEEE "power" symbol... was some study done to determine which is more common, or, whether the "Standby" symbol is used more frequently as "power" or "standby"? I am inclined to believe it is used more frequently simply as an on/off, and certainly on computers, holding in the "Standby" button seems to function as a power switch as well... so, what gives? I would also like to point out that doing a google image search for "power symbol" results in an overwhelming number of "standby" symbols. I'm not claiming that this is definitive, just, something to note. JudgeX (talk) 17:21, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Crescent or Waning Moon?
The "Definitions" section describes the moon as "crescent", but the moon is actually "waning", which is also how the "Standby symbol ambiguity" section describes it. MaigoAkisame (talk) 22:34, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Crescent and waning are two unrelated categories of moon phase: "waning" is when the moon is going from Full to New (illumination on the left-hand side in the Northern Hemisphere, right-hand side in Southern), as opposed to "waxing" (when it is going from New Moon to Full Moon- right-hand illumination in North, left-hand in South). "Crescent" is just when the proportion of the moon illuminated is strictly between 0 and 0.5. A moon can be a waning OR waxing crescent, and all phases other than New and Full have two variants- one waning, one waxing.


 * Now, perhaps the article shouldn't specify that it's a waning moon because, y'know, Australia exists and it'd be waxing there. Hppavilion1 (talk) 16:27, 9 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Deleted "waning" from the page, since (unless the IEC specified that it's waning) there's no way to objectively determine which it is- people elsewhere will answer differently. Hppavilion1 (talk) 16:30, 9 May 2017 (UTC)

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Matching Unicode to IEC
Since the IEC 60417 order of these symbols is different from the Unicode order, it can be difficult to compare the lists and find the IEC value for a Unicode value or vice versa. If you don't have the new additions to Unicode in your font, all you see is the Unicode code point value and name, and a square containing four tiny hex digits. I'm using   to add the symbols to the appropriate rows of the table in the Definitions section to make it at least possible. --Thnidu (talk) 04:51, 12 September 2016 (UTC)

Missing a quick answer at the start - I means on, O means off
I came to the article via Google to try to find out which of I or O means on or off. I had to read through a lot of text to eventually about 2/3 down the page, after a lot of reading and re-reading and a lot of careful thinking, find the answer hinted at. The first webpage given in Google is even worse, not answering the simple question but instead going into minute detail about various types of switches https://www.quora.com/Which-is-on-and-which-is-off-in-the-I-O-switches 92.24.182.235 (talk) 12:30, 15 August 2021 (UTC)

Ruqeyya Ruslan
Ruqeyya Ruslan 212.47.136.75 (talk) 18:10, 20 July 2022 (UTC)

Rhichard
Rhichard 201.130.85.231 (talk) 03:33, 14 September 2022 (UTC)

Rika
Rika 115.147.54.23 (talk) 02:36, 10 October 2022 (UTC)