On Feb 28, 2020, at 12:21 PM, Bob Bridges <robhbrid...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Guys, on the matter of French spacing (as with the Oxford comma) neither side > can legitimately argue that the debate is over. It's just not true that the > consensus has established "the rule"; you'll find, rather, a significant body > of thought on both sides. I've had to settle back and agree to disagree. > Me, I use French spacing, and I use the Oxford comma only when necessary to > resolve ambiguity. But when I'm editing for professional writers, I express > my opinion and then do it their way; it's their work, after all. > > (I think the reason a lot of style guides don’t espouse French spacing is > that they're designed for large-volume publishers, who have a really solid > motive for not wasting space. That's a legitimate reason for them to drop > the extra space, and you should feel free to do the same in your own writing > if you want your writing to emulate the lead of the NYT and People magazine. > Don't fool yourself into thinking it's the only rule, though.) >
There should be extra visual separation between sentences. The question is, how to obtain that separation? On a typewriter the only way to get it was to type two spaces. For a manuscript going to a printer, you’d have professional typesetters, so it didn’t matter how many you typed because the typesetter would do the right thing. Today for most computer input your text is being formatted by algorithms that often approach the ability of the old-time professionals were, so typing the extra space is superfluous or may even cause the algorithm to put in too much space. There are lots of exceptions, though. I learned the two-space rule when I started typing on my mom’s Selectric back in the 70s, but I’ve gotten out of the habit now that word processors usually reformat my input in any case. -- Pew, Curtis G curtis....@austin.utexas.edu ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
