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Is there a guideline on whether it's acceptable to abbreviate decades, and if so, how? I'm thinking of a context in which saying "the 1970s and 1980s" appears slightly stilted, and "the 1970s and '80s" would be more natural; however, I don't see any recognition that it's ever OK to say " '80s", or whether there's a preference about the use of the apostrophe. (" '80s" is abbreviated from "1980s" and so is usually written with the apostrophe, but I think some style guides prefer to avoid the apostrophe altogether. Note that this is different from the incorrect usage "1980's", which is correct only if you're saying "belonging to 1980" or "1980 is".)
Has this been discussed before? (I didn't really want to search through 57 archives.) — Josiah Rowe ( talk • contribs) 04:09, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
In keeping with Ref. [6: ISO 31-0], this Guide takes the position that it is acceptable to use the internationally recognized symbol % (percent) for the number 0.01 with the SI and thus to express the values of quantities of dimension one (see Sec. 7.14) with its aid. When it is used, a space is left between the symbol % and the number by which it is multiplied [6: ISO 31-0]. Further, in keeping with Sec. 7.6, the symbol % should be used, not the name "percent." Example: xB = 0.0025 = 0.25 % but not: xB = 0.0025 = .25% or xB = 0.25 percent —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.155.158.96 ( talk • contribs) 14:35, 8 October 2006 UTC
Let's just relax and use some common sense. Expressions like ten percent and 10% are traditional in English prose and typography, so it is appropriate to use either. SI style like 10 % is used in many scientific publications, so it may be appropriate in such articles (but include a non-breaking space, or these expressions may line-wrap in an ugly, amateurish way). Pretty much the same goes for ten degrees Celsius, 10° C, 10 °C. Remember that it's a style guide, not scripture. — Michael Z. 2006-10-19 17:31 Z
We've been having a discussion over at Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history regarding the naming conventions for firearm calibres. The general consensus is that the current standard is wrong and needs to be changed to reflect common usage and convention. For example, the article entitled " 7.62 x 54 mm R" is at odds with how the calibre is usually written- convention is "7.62x54R", without the spaces or the "mm". The discussion can be found here. We'd appreciate your input. -- Commander Zulu 04:51, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
Given the lack of objection, I'm going to add something on the article page here shortly to reflect the standard for firearm calibres, unless someone has any major problems. -- Commander Zulu 10:07, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
In the article, we have
Why is it we do not follow the international standard with the spaces? It is universally understood and completely unambiguous. In <math>, thin space is represented as /,. In plain text, I don't know how to represent it - perhaps that answers my question: We don't follow the standard because we can't?-- Niels Ø 13:24, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
What are my options if I want to make a date as few characters as possible. I guess I would like it to look like 5/13/2002 or if it has to be a dash 5-13- 2002. The manual of style has [[1958-02-17]]: 1958-02-17 but this is what I get for 09-30-2004. Thanks - Peregrinefisher 01:20, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
Should they be spelled out? i.e. second instead of 2nd? -- plange 22:43, 28 October 2006 (UTC)
Some editors are claiming that dates should not be wikified for airline schedule information in airport articles (see, for example, here). Before I pursue this further, I would like to see some other opinions. -- Donald Albury 12:17, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
I strongly disagree with "almost always". I'm so pissed off with the linking thing that I'm now not linking dates, even at the expense of foregoing the auto-formatting.
The problem should be shifted to the techs and above who've made auto-formatting and linking the same process. Bad idea.
I suggest that you soften the "almost always". I'll just refuse to comply if it stays. Tony 13:40, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
These seem to be good points, and auto-conversions of weights, measures and currencies as an optional preference may be worth looking into. But first, let's lobby to overcome this regrettable technical connection of linking and the auto-formatting for dates. I've looked at the MediaZilla link provided above, and wonder why nothing came of that push earlier this year. Tony 10:08, 2 November 2006 (UTC)
I see three aspects to the question of how to write dates at Wikipedia: personal/national custom, logical writing style (specifically, punctuation), and cross-referencing.
Encoding a date so that it is a link results in three things:
1. The date appears in different ways to different readers; which form of the date appears is the result of user preference (or default).
2. The date is punctuated logically or illogically (and thus, according to my prescriptivism, properly or improperly); this depends on the combination of the original writing and the displayed writing.
3. The date appears in a different color, with underlining, and acts as a cross-reference to another article.
My personal opinion about Point 1 is that user date preferences should be removed from Wikipedia's programming, and that the Manual of Style should require exactly one style for dates that aren't part of direct, verbatim quotations. My personal preference is that that style be "Monday 6 November 2006" (with perfectly acceptable shorter forms being, as the context warrants, "Monday", "Monday 6", "Monday 6 November", "6 November 2006", "6 November", and "November 2006"). I have little sympathy for the reader or editor who likes to pretend that "6 November" is clear while "November 6" is incomprehensible gibberish (or vice versa) or likes to get angry about which form is in front of him. (My reason for advocating the date–month–year sequence is that it shrinks the matter of commas.) Wikipedia has other style standards that contradict one personal/national custom or another: an example is which punctuation to place inside and outside quotation marks—and Wikipedia has a single policy (not a double one for, say, Britons and Americans), and a single way of displaying the punctuation (no stuff about encoding the punctuation as a link so that it appears differently for different readers). I also think that, when a date is encoded, it should have to be written in the same way as a non-encoded date (except, of course, the insertion of the double square brackets), and it should have to be displayed in exactly the same way as a non-encoded date (except, of course, the color and underlining).
If Wikipedia were to become as I recommend in my discussion of Point 1, then Points 2 and 3 would be simplified drastically.
Point 2 would become a matter of simply an improperly written date, which could be corrected easily. There would be no matter of a properly written date having its displayed punctuation imperfected by an inadequately written program that changes the date's display form. The present program illogicalizes the punctuation for a good many dates at Wikipedia:
If there were only one way of writing a proper date link, and only one way of displaying a date link, this problem would be gone.
Point 3 would become only a matter of relevant cross-referencing, instead of also a matter of (im)proper punctuation and personal/national custom, if my suggestion were implemented.
My personal preference about when a date should act as a cross-reference (which I see as the worthy point of encoding a date as a link (I think this matter of personal/national custom is unworthy)) is that, if a date appears on the screen, I be able to click on that date to see what else happened on that date in history. The flow of my reading is not significantly distracted by the different appearance (color, underlining) that cross-references have. If the same date appears five times in a window without any scrolling, not all five occurrences should be cross-references. Also, any cross-reference that seems to lead to an article about a year or date in general (rather than, say, an article about pop music in that year) better lead to what it seems to lead to.
I understand that people will still argue about how relevant a cross-reference is in a certain spot. But the argument about links should be only about cross-referencing—not about this waste of time, effort, emotion, and computer resources, not to mention this imperfector of punctuation, that is the present way of encoding and displaying dates for personal/national preference. My main concern is the combination of (1) not having an imperfect date-rendering program botch the punctuation, (2) not having people fight over personal/national style when all we have to do is say "There is only one preferred style (in terms of punctuation and ordering) of writing dates at Wikipedia (except in verbatim quotes from other sources), and all editors have the right to make dates conform to that style, and no editor should cause a date to stop conforming to that style", and (3) having the link-encoding argument be reduced to the sole question of cross-referencing.
In no other aspect of Wikipedia (at least to my knowledge) do we use linking for anything other than making a cross-reference—something that allows the reader to jump easily to another article to read more about that topic. The distinction between "November 6" and "6 November" isn't so important that it deserves a special bit of programming (and one that works imperfectly at that) and editors wasting their time on which form is appropriate for one article or another.
President Lethe 15:58, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
When I first read a help page on wikitext, [[1958-02-17]] was the only format mentioned. Now it says a) several others work and b) that this one is not preferred anymore. So what linked format is preferred? Shinobu 15:11, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Added a clarification to Direct quotations Section. Text as follows:
"If the quote includes an obscure use of units (e.g., five million board feet of lumber) annotate it with a footnote which provides metric units rather than revising the actual quote; see the guidelines of Wikipedia:Footnotes for an explanation of footnote generation using the <references/> tags or other accepted Wikipedia footnote methods."
Think it should be noncontroversial, but if it is too brave, let's discuss. Williamborg ( Bill) 15:39, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Excellent call. Thanks - Williamborg ( Bill) 00:19, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
Is there a recommended style for recurring decimals?
The overline is shown with CSS, which is suboptimal on old browsers, but better for displaying nicely. MathML would be the best solution, but hasnt been implemented yet. — Omegatron 21:42, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
text-decoration
one. Therefore the CSS-Solution might be the best in Practice, but i would like to suggest to use u
instead of span
:
underline
and overline
are mutually exclusive in CSS2). An Alternative is using Fractions, e.g. using
Template:Frac:
I get a leftover comma when my preferences transform the comma'd style to the non comma'd. I'm referring to the following advice:
If a date includes both a month and a day, then the date should almost always be linked to allow
readers’ date preferences to work, displaying the reader’s chosen format. The day and the month should be linked together, and the year should be linked separately if present. For example:
This is all very well, but in practice you often have a necessary comma after the year, which produces things like: The party on 17 February 1958, was memorable. So it appears faultily punctuated.
It doesn't bother me much when I'm reading articles, but it does when I'm editing them. I would use the uncomma'd method myself (because I find it less fussy), but sometimes it's necessary to conform to the style already in the article. Am I doing something wrong, or is this problem unavoidable?
qp10qp 03:35, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 55 | ← | Archive 58 | Archive 59 | Archive 60 | Archive 61 | Archive 62 | → | Archive 65 |
Is there a guideline on whether it's acceptable to abbreviate decades, and if so, how? I'm thinking of a context in which saying "the 1970s and 1980s" appears slightly stilted, and "the 1970s and '80s" would be more natural; however, I don't see any recognition that it's ever OK to say " '80s", or whether there's a preference about the use of the apostrophe. (" '80s" is abbreviated from "1980s" and so is usually written with the apostrophe, but I think some style guides prefer to avoid the apostrophe altogether. Note that this is different from the incorrect usage "1980's", which is correct only if you're saying "belonging to 1980" or "1980 is".)
Has this been discussed before? (I didn't really want to search through 57 archives.) — Josiah Rowe ( talk • contribs) 04:09, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
In keeping with Ref. [6: ISO 31-0], this Guide takes the position that it is acceptable to use the internationally recognized symbol % (percent) for the number 0.01 with the SI and thus to express the values of quantities of dimension one (see Sec. 7.14) with its aid. When it is used, a space is left between the symbol % and the number by which it is multiplied [6: ISO 31-0]. Further, in keeping with Sec. 7.6, the symbol % should be used, not the name "percent." Example: xB = 0.0025 = 0.25 % but not: xB = 0.0025 = .25% or xB = 0.25 percent —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.155.158.96 ( talk • contribs) 14:35, 8 October 2006 UTC
Let's just relax and use some common sense. Expressions like ten percent and 10% are traditional in English prose and typography, so it is appropriate to use either. SI style like 10 % is used in many scientific publications, so it may be appropriate in such articles (but include a non-breaking space, or these expressions may line-wrap in an ugly, amateurish way). Pretty much the same goes for ten degrees Celsius, 10° C, 10 °C. Remember that it's a style guide, not scripture. — Michael Z. 2006-10-19 17:31 Z
We've been having a discussion over at Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history regarding the naming conventions for firearm calibres. The general consensus is that the current standard is wrong and needs to be changed to reflect common usage and convention. For example, the article entitled " 7.62 x 54 mm R" is at odds with how the calibre is usually written- convention is "7.62x54R", without the spaces or the "mm". The discussion can be found here. We'd appreciate your input. -- Commander Zulu 04:51, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
Given the lack of objection, I'm going to add something on the article page here shortly to reflect the standard for firearm calibres, unless someone has any major problems. -- Commander Zulu 10:07, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
In the article, we have
Why is it we do not follow the international standard with the spaces? It is universally understood and completely unambiguous. In <math>, thin space is represented as /,. In plain text, I don't know how to represent it - perhaps that answers my question: We don't follow the standard because we can't?-- Niels Ø 13:24, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
What are my options if I want to make a date as few characters as possible. I guess I would like it to look like 5/13/2002 or if it has to be a dash 5-13- 2002. The manual of style has [[1958-02-17]]: 1958-02-17 but this is what I get for 09-30-2004. Thanks - Peregrinefisher 01:20, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
Should they be spelled out? i.e. second instead of 2nd? -- plange 22:43, 28 October 2006 (UTC)
Some editors are claiming that dates should not be wikified for airline schedule information in airport articles (see, for example, here). Before I pursue this further, I would like to see some other opinions. -- Donald Albury 12:17, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
I strongly disagree with "almost always". I'm so pissed off with the linking thing that I'm now not linking dates, even at the expense of foregoing the auto-formatting.
The problem should be shifted to the techs and above who've made auto-formatting and linking the same process. Bad idea.
I suggest that you soften the "almost always". I'll just refuse to comply if it stays. Tony 13:40, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
These seem to be good points, and auto-conversions of weights, measures and currencies as an optional preference may be worth looking into. But first, let's lobby to overcome this regrettable technical connection of linking and the auto-formatting for dates. I've looked at the MediaZilla link provided above, and wonder why nothing came of that push earlier this year. Tony 10:08, 2 November 2006 (UTC)
I see three aspects to the question of how to write dates at Wikipedia: personal/national custom, logical writing style (specifically, punctuation), and cross-referencing.
Encoding a date so that it is a link results in three things:
1. The date appears in different ways to different readers; which form of the date appears is the result of user preference (or default).
2. The date is punctuated logically or illogically (and thus, according to my prescriptivism, properly or improperly); this depends on the combination of the original writing and the displayed writing.
3. The date appears in a different color, with underlining, and acts as a cross-reference to another article.
My personal opinion about Point 1 is that user date preferences should be removed from Wikipedia's programming, and that the Manual of Style should require exactly one style for dates that aren't part of direct, verbatim quotations. My personal preference is that that style be "Monday 6 November 2006" (with perfectly acceptable shorter forms being, as the context warrants, "Monday", "Monday 6", "Monday 6 November", "6 November 2006", "6 November", and "November 2006"). I have little sympathy for the reader or editor who likes to pretend that "6 November" is clear while "November 6" is incomprehensible gibberish (or vice versa) or likes to get angry about which form is in front of him. (My reason for advocating the date–month–year sequence is that it shrinks the matter of commas.) Wikipedia has other style standards that contradict one personal/national custom or another: an example is which punctuation to place inside and outside quotation marks—and Wikipedia has a single policy (not a double one for, say, Britons and Americans), and a single way of displaying the punctuation (no stuff about encoding the punctuation as a link so that it appears differently for different readers). I also think that, when a date is encoded, it should have to be written in the same way as a non-encoded date (except, of course, the insertion of the double square brackets), and it should have to be displayed in exactly the same way as a non-encoded date (except, of course, the color and underlining).
If Wikipedia were to become as I recommend in my discussion of Point 1, then Points 2 and 3 would be simplified drastically.
Point 2 would become a matter of simply an improperly written date, which could be corrected easily. There would be no matter of a properly written date having its displayed punctuation imperfected by an inadequately written program that changes the date's display form. The present program illogicalizes the punctuation for a good many dates at Wikipedia:
If there were only one way of writing a proper date link, and only one way of displaying a date link, this problem would be gone.
Point 3 would become only a matter of relevant cross-referencing, instead of also a matter of (im)proper punctuation and personal/national custom, if my suggestion were implemented.
My personal preference about when a date should act as a cross-reference (which I see as the worthy point of encoding a date as a link (I think this matter of personal/national custom is unworthy)) is that, if a date appears on the screen, I be able to click on that date to see what else happened on that date in history. The flow of my reading is not significantly distracted by the different appearance (color, underlining) that cross-references have. If the same date appears five times in a window without any scrolling, not all five occurrences should be cross-references. Also, any cross-reference that seems to lead to an article about a year or date in general (rather than, say, an article about pop music in that year) better lead to what it seems to lead to.
I understand that people will still argue about how relevant a cross-reference is in a certain spot. But the argument about links should be only about cross-referencing—not about this waste of time, effort, emotion, and computer resources, not to mention this imperfector of punctuation, that is the present way of encoding and displaying dates for personal/national preference. My main concern is the combination of (1) not having an imperfect date-rendering program botch the punctuation, (2) not having people fight over personal/national style when all we have to do is say "There is only one preferred style (in terms of punctuation and ordering) of writing dates at Wikipedia (except in verbatim quotes from other sources), and all editors have the right to make dates conform to that style, and no editor should cause a date to stop conforming to that style", and (3) having the link-encoding argument be reduced to the sole question of cross-referencing.
In no other aspect of Wikipedia (at least to my knowledge) do we use linking for anything other than making a cross-reference—something that allows the reader to jump easily to another article to read more about that topic. The distinction between "November 6" and "6 November" isn't so important that it deserves a special bit of programming (and one that works imperfectly at that) and editors wasting their time on which form is appropriate for one article or another.
President Lethe 15:58, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
When I first read a help page on wikitext, [[1958-02-17]] was the only format mentioned. Now it says a) several others work and b) that this one is not preferred anymore. So what linked format is preferred? Shinobu 15:11, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Added a clarification to Direct quotations Section. Text as follows:
"If the quote includes an obscure use of units (e.g., five million board feet of lumber) annotate it with a footnote which provides metric units rather than revising the actual quote; see the guidelines of Wikipedia:Footnotes for an explanation of footnote generation using the <references/> tags or other accepted Wikipedia footnote methods."
Think it should be noncontroversial, but if it is too brave, let's discuss. Williamborg ( Bill) 15:39, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Excellent call. Thanks - Williamborg ( Bill) 00:19, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
Is there a recommended style for recurring decimals?
The overline is shown with CSS, which is suboptimal on old browsers, but better for displaying nicely. MathML would be the best solution, but hasnt been implemented yet. — Omegatron 21:42, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
text-decoration
one. Therefore the CSS-Solution might be the best in Practice, but i would like to suggest to use u
instead of span
:
underline
and overline
are mutually exclusive in CSS2). An Alternative is using Fractions, e.g. using
Template:Frac:
I get a leftover comma when my preferences transform the comma'd style to the non comma'd. I'm referring to the following advice:
If a date includes both a month and a day, then the date should almost always be linked to allow
readers’ date preferences to work, displaying the reader’s chosen format. The day and the month should be linked together, and the year should be linked separately if present. For example:
This is all very well, but in practice you often have a necessary comma after the year, which produces things like: The party on 17 February 1958, was memorable. So it appears faultily punctuated.
It doesn't bother me much when I'm reading articles, but it does when I'm editing them. I would use the uncomma'd method myself (because I find it less fussy), but sometimes it's necessary to conform to the style already in the article. Am I doing something wrong, or is this problem unavoidable?
qp10qp 03:35, 30 November 2006 (UTC)