Comments on: The Greatest Sin Against Mankind

By: CERDIP

CERDIP — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

Bravo! I wrote an 800-page book last year for Premier Press (find it here, or look it up on Amazon - ISBN# 159200136X) ad was pleasantly surprised to see that their style guide (and style templates) DO NOT use the double space after a full stop.

Most other publishers are the same now, I’m told, and have been in quite a while.

I hate that, yet the rule is so pounded into my head that I still do it absent mindedly from time to time.

By: CERDIP

CERDIP — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

and* was

Preview is my friend!

(Where’s my copy editor!?!?!)

By: Patterico

Patterico — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

Interesting. I always put two spaces at the end of a sentence. It’s a habit. But I notice that many word processing programs (including, I think, whatever powers Movable Type) tend to omit the second space, which doesn’t bother me much.

Regardless, I am enjoying the increasing Anger. I hope it continues to build over the coming week.

By: Ken Hirsch

Ken Hirsch — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

Movable type displays that way because HTML considers any run of spaces, carriage returns and newlines equivalent to a single space, except in between

and

and a few other exceptions. You would have to put in non-breaking spaces if you wanted more than one space.

By: meep

meep — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

Ah, I did not know that the double space was particular to monospace typewriters. I learned to type on a typewriter, and I’m sorry to say that my spacing habit is ingrained in my touchtyping habits. Now that I know that the reason for that extra space has nothing to do with proportional type, I will endeavor to cut it out.

As Ken notes, HTML removes the extra spaces, so I don’t look such an ass online, but I turned off the alert in Word for two spaces, and I’ll put it back on.

Hmmm, another mystery solved.

By: The Angry Clam

The Angry Clam — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

Changing the world, one person at a time.

Welcome back to the civilized world, meep.

By: ChrisD

ChrisD — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

A-friggin-men, Clam!

There’s an excellent little book, “The Mac is Not a Typewriter.” Despite the title, it’s not really Mac-specific (it probably was when it was written, but PCs have come a long way.) It covers additional things like ’straight’ vs. curly quotes, etc.

My current peeve: people who use an apostrophe-s for plurals. Grrrrr.

By: Hugo

Hugo — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

Gratias deo ago, the Clam is home.

By: Claire

Claire — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

Like meep, I learned to touch-type on a typewriter - a manual upright. Fastest typists got to use one of 4 IBM Selectrics for the next week. So I do the two spaces at the end of a sentence. Straight wrists (it HURT not to do it on a manual), sit up straight, feet on the floor. I still type like this. Sister Jude would be spinning in her grave if I didn’t.

That said, I’m glad most word processing programs automatically adjust. I either can’t or won’t change my ingrained habits, but if it is so annoying to so many people, let the autocorrect remain.

Now MY pet peeve: people who don’t use the correct synonym. Such as: affect-effect, to-two-to, there-their-they’re, its-it’s, whose-who’s, meat-meet-mete, either/or-neither/nor. And in blogdom, baited-bated. *makes me think of fish breath* I think I’ll start a running list, maybe post it somewhere (assuming someone hasn’t done it already).

After all, one good peeve deserves another, wouldn’t you agree?

By: The Angry Clam

The Angry Clam — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

Yeah, except the word you’re looking for is homonym.

Homonym = words that sound identical but are spelled differently, and have different meanings.

Synonym = words with identical meanings.