Boxing the compass is the action of naming all thirty-two principal points of the compass in clockwise orer. Such names, formed by the initials of the cardinal directions and their intermediate ordinal directions, are accepted internationally, even though they have their origin in the English language, and are very handy to refer to a heading (or a course) in a general or colloquial fashion, without having to resort to computing or recalling angle numbers. Despite the name of the 1959 Alfred Hitchcock movie, North by Northwest, there is no such direction. However, old timers allow three letter directions to have a 'by' inserted beween the first and second letter. Hence, NNW becomes North by Northwest, per Hitchcock's title.