The Full Form TWAIN is Technology Without An Interesting Name.

This led people to believe it was an acronym, and then to a contest to come up with an expansion. None was selected, but the entry Technology Without an Interesting Name continues to haunt the standard.”. For example, the Encyclopedia of Information Technology lists “Technology Without an Interesting Name” as the official meaning of TWAIN.

The word TWAIN is from Kipling’s “The Ballad of East and West” – “…and never the twain shall meet…”, reflecting the difficulty, at the time, of connecting scanners and personal computers. The description “Technology Without An Interesting Name” originated from early working group activity, though they do not accept it as an acronym.[1]

Kevin Bier, chairman-emeritus of the TWAIN Working Group and the original author/editor of TWAIN 1.0 (with the aid of several others from seven companies), confirms authoritatively that TWAIN, while not officially an acronym, was conceived as referring to a “toolkit without an important name.”

This non-acronym was inspired by Bier’s contemporaneous reading of a collection of letters by Mark Twain. Bier reports that he finished reading one such letter at nearly midnight one evening, then checked voicemail one last time only to receive notice of yet another set of potential names for the as-yet-nameless technology. In aggravation, he made up the name on the spot and left it as a heated suggestion in a voicemail reply. The name search succeeded and, following consultation with the Mark Twain (S. L. Clemens) estate to assure the legality of the use, the name was officially launched on February 29, 1992 (which Bier saw as “a fitting date for release of our endeavor”).