Never understood how anyone can say going XXX-YYY direct (via BBB), surely as soon as you land somewhere before your destination you're no longer going "direct"?
Going back, one boarding card and travelling aboard the same aircraft - even with en-route stops, say Olympic Airways LHR-ORY-FCO-ATH -
would have been considered a ''direct flight'' from London to Athens. Back then there were various such multi-stop flights within Europe. That would often cause passengers to enquire about flight routings, and they'd be pleased when told their
''direct'' flight was
also non-stop! Frequent flyers always understood the difference if their flight was ''direct'', rather than non-stop.
Now, with so many more worldwide point-to-point services, at any airport you'd be hard pushed to find passengers wandering about, holding transit cards before re-boarding their "direct" flight. Accordingly, perhaps there's less demand for such specific terms.