Originally Posted by
Jonathan
The 4-letter code clearly creates confusions for new people who have an MBTI background, but once one understands the differences, it's not bad. I think people are less likely to make typos when they use it, whereas the three letter code only works when you memorize it, since it's less inherently logical (as it uses "I" to mean both introtim and intuitive and uses "E" to mean both extratim and ethical).
People always say ignore MBTT, but you really can't because the issue always needs to be explained to new people coming from MBTI. The theoretical distinction is simple: Socionics seeks to define characteristics of Xi vs. Xe and views the most outwardly visible function as the base function, whereas MBTI views the most outwardly visible function as Xe.
As to notations, I like the idea of using "TiNe" "SeFi" etc.
Of course now that there's so much interest in +/-, you can now use a 1-element code:
+Ni instead of ILI
-Ne instead of IEE
etc.