Hi Rob, Rob Pierce writes: > Good evening, > > Is there a written/unwritten rule for using quotation marks? Do man pages and > web pages follow the same rules? > > When would I use 'this', "this", `this', ``this'', “this“, etc.?
Generally: In manuals, use .Dq and .Sq for double and single quotes. In www, use " and '. There are some other macros in mdoc(7) that generate quote marks (.Qq and friends), when you specifically need straight quotes (e.g., code listings) and can't just type " directly (e.g., on a macro line). For personal webpages I use UTF-8 quotes (U+2019/A, U+201C/D) directly. But for pages with many authors, like www.openbsd.org, it's best to go with what's simple and works: " and '. Keep the burden on authors light. The text is what's important. `` '' is an artifact. The only place they look balanced is on the console and in troff's PDF output. Everywhere else (such as the xterm and firefox defaults) has displayed this unbalanced for years. " looks better and is easier to type. -- Anthony J. Bentley
