RE: [TCP] Article: Houston, We Have a Shuttle Typo

["Combs, Richard" <richard -dot- combs -at- Polycom -dot- com>]

Chris Vickery wrote:
 
> I agree wholeheartedly. I went back and forth about this with 
> a coworker. The American English rule of putting all 
> punctuation inside the quotation marks, even for lists of 
> terms seems nutty to me.

But that's not the American rule! The American rule is to put commas and
periods inside quotation marks and semicolons outside. Question marks
and exclamation points go inside only if they're part of the quotation,
and outside if they're not. 

Thus, regarding the quoted message from Bill Swallow:

> I use UK punctuation, particularly with quotes. Makes more 
> sense to me. I dunno, somehow this:
> 
> Can you believe he said "I think you're an idiot"?
> 
> makes more sense than:
> 
> Can you believe he said "I think you're an idiot?"

The first version is _correct_ American English. The second is not. 

Richard 


------
Richard G. Combs
Senior Technical Writer
Polycom, Inc.
richardDOTcombs AT polycomDOTcom
303-223-5111
------
rgcombs AT gmailDOTcom
303-777-0436
------




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