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>From my perspective, if the phrases are sentences, use a period or
don't, but be consistent.
So, if you use periods, then you are painting yourself into a corner
where all phrases must use periods and therefore must be sentences.
Whereas, like an unordered list, if your convention is to present the
phrase without ending punctuation, it makes it easier for you to
accommodate other messages.
Thoughts?
-----Original Message-----
From: techwr-l-bounces+sean -dot- brierley=ipc -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
[mailto:techwr-l-bounces+sean -dot- brierley=ipc -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com] On
Behalf Of technical writing plus
Sent: Tuesday, April 17, 2007 3:40 PM
To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Subject: RE: Your thoughts on punctuation?
Methinks that for a US audience, no periods is best and is expected. For
an international audience, or for a non-US audience, perhaps periods
would be better.
Typographical wisdom dictates that using ALL CAPS does mislead users on
messages of the same length, especially short ones...There are
exceptions:
the display may be too small or badly designed for CAPS/no caps to make
a difference. You'll have to judge the usability...So...If the machine
is making the user guess as to what happens next, dots can punctuate the
intent. "Calling server..."
For politeness, a period is cool.
"Please wait."
Tell your engineers gently about customer etiquette, manners, protocol,
grammar and syntax. :-) And how rude customers find it when these are
ignored.
-- Reading David Allen's _Getting Things Done_ (2001)--
Andrew Warren wrote
Ladonna Weeks wrote:
> Our product has a keypad used for installation and diagnostics. It can
> display up to four lines of 20 characters each. What is correct
> punctuation for brief, informative statements, such as the following:
>
> (line 1) Calling server
> (line 4) Please wait
>
> Should there be a period after each statement? I'm having trouble
> getting the programmers to add periods and I wonder if the convention
> for such displays is to leave them off. What is your experience?
Ladonna:
I don't use periods for that sort of thing; I punctuate and capitalize
as I would on a sign:
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